Riot Summary for June

Wow, I can’t believe the first month has gone by already.  We have made lots of changes and have plenty more to go.

We are still focusing on electricity.   We started out with an average of 21 kwh/day.  At the end of June we are to 14 (47% of average).  Our goal is to reduce to 9 kwh/day by the end of July.   We have turned our refrigerator down to its lowest setting.  We are thinking about trading it for a small chest freezer and cooler.  We don’t keep much in the fridge that must be kept cool.  It is just a convenient place to store things!  We still haven’t turned on the AC.  I must say it hasn’t been as hard as I anticipated.  We do have a plan (see Adventures in Keeping Cool post) and that helps.

Our household gasoline (not CK or MA commutes) is at 9 gallons.  That is 9% of our allotment.

Our propane usage was 0.5 therms (0.5% of our allotment).  I am amazed at how little propane it takes to cook.  We continue to use the wood fired grill for some cooking, although not as much as at first.  The earth oven will be excavated and the foundation started next weekend.  It is a much larger project than I anticipated.

Garbage was 18 pounds for the month (3% of allotment).  It mostly came this last week as I purged a great deal of broken junk from the house.  Our recycling was 19 pounds (just a wee bit over 3%).

I’m still waiting on the water bill.  I know it will be lower, but I’m not sure how much lower.

We spent $105 in the consumer goods category.   (10.5% of our allotment)  We spent most of it on animal fencing.  We’ll  buy more fencing in a few months for the new sheepfold.

KMH

What the World Eats, part 2

I had my daughter do a short study using the information from yesterday’s blog. She was to find out what percentage of income went to buy food. She found the per capita Gross National Products for each nation and used that as her starting point.

Here are the percentages:

1. China 26.18%
2. Mongolia 23.93% (appeared to be local foods)
3. Germany 20.7%
4. Mexico 17.48%
5. Poland 13.21%
6. Japan 12.45%
7. England 9.38%
8. Italy 8.8%
9. Kuwait 6.94%
10. Egypt 6.13% (mostly local foods)
11. USA 6%
12. Ecuador 3.8% (mostly local foods)
13. Bhutan 1.4% (mostly local foods)
14. Chad 0.87% (mostly or all local foods)

Now she is going to track all our food next week, take our own picture and put our percentage on here.

KMH

What the World Eats

Bryan over at My Fair Share has a wonderful link today. It is a photo essay titled What the World Eats.

What the World Eats

KMH

Temptation

Temptation = 86 degrees + 76% humidity + no breeze

It is very warm today and promises to be again tomorrow.  I still haven’t caved in and turned on the AC, but boy was I tempted.   If I can just make it for one more hour . . .

Sweltering,  KMH

A Slight Interruption

MA has been working for almost 2 weeks. It has been an interesting adjustment time. We have noticed many changes. Here are a few:

1. He can do the chickens/turkeys in 20 minutes. It takes HM and I over an hour.
2. He can pound T-poles for hours. HM and I get tired after 2 poles.
3. He can chop wood. HM and I can barely lift the ax.
4. The household volume has lowered while the pitch has risen.
5. I miss the boy who has become a man.
6. I am proud of the man the boy has become.
7. Mothers can get weepy when viewing a first paycheck. And the son thinks it’s ok and even looks a little pleased.
8. Mothers also get weepy when this grown-up child asks to be told what to do for a little while longer (”Not much longer, just a little while.”).

The weepy one,KMH

Tally for Week Three

I am feeling a little discouraged as I sit here and do our calculations. It is so easy to slip back into the Standard American Mentality (SAM). I need to remind myself why we are walking down this narrow path. I need to remember the importance of what we are doing. I need to relax and enjoy the day!

Tally for Weeks 1-3:

• Gasoline: 7 gallons (includes the once a quarter coop pick up)
• Electricity: average 15 (yep, it went up!)
• Heat & Cook: 0.4 therms
• Garbage: Landfill, 2 pounds; Recycling, 5 pounds
• Water: averaged 50 gallons for laundry, kitchen sink averages 40 gallons per day, bathroom sinks average 3 gallons per day, showers still aren’t measured, animals are about 150 gallons a week now. All bathroom sink gray water is being used for flushing, kitchen sink for watering trees and landscaping. Shower warm-up water is being used for cat, dogs, fish, and cleaning.
• Consumer Goods: total $100. (Includes new permanent rabbit warren fencing, fans, and glass lunch containers.)
• Food: all produce is from our garden or the farmers’ market. We bought 1/2 gallon of organic milk, 2 loaves of bread, and had a huge bulk coop order.

We are going to have to go back to monitoring the electric meter each day. Without doing that it is easy to let our usage creep up. It is very discouraging to see our numbers heading back up instead of down.

On the consumer good front, we now have a much bigger rabbit yard/warren. The rabbits will be much happier, and it is much less grass for me to mow. We’ll probably add at least one more rabbit yard, and 1/4 acre more to the goat yard. I’d also like to finish expanding the garden. Adding those will probably put us just over the 10%, but each them is crucial to making our little farm more sustainable. They also mean less area that is grass that needs to be mowed or scythed.

Next up: building the earth oven, continuing to keep the AC off, monitoring the electric usage, and keeping up with garden and animals.

KMH

Basil

Ocimum basilicum (Sweet Basil heirloom variety)

Days to Germination: 5-7

Days to Maturity: 75-85

Sow seeds indoors or directly into the garden in a warm, sunny, well-drained area. Sow only after danger of frost is past. Seeds germinate best in temperatures between 70 and 85 degrees.

The leaves can be picked off as soon as they uncurl or you can cut the whole plant at maturity. Basil needs a longer drying time than most other herbs. Basil needs insects for pollination.

Seed Saving Techique: The flowers racemes mature from the bottom to the top. When the bottom raceme turns brown cut the stem and dry out of sunlight. Each flower contains four seeds. I run each raceme over the wire sieve to separate the seed from the pod and chaff. The seeds are very light so you must be careful when blowing away the excess chaff. Seeds will stay good for 5 years.

Our favorite PESTO recipe:

1 c basil leaves, 1/2 c parsley leaves, 1/2 c parmesan cheese, 1 clove garlic, 1/4 c olive oil. Put all in blender and whirl away until smooth. Enjoy!

We are having pesto for dinner tonight. I cannot wait.

KMH

Local Food Month; Goals

Our goals for the Local Food Month challenge are going to be pretty simple.

We’ll strive to make sure all our produce is locally produced.

All meat and eggs will come from our property. Dairy will be organic (since our goats are not producing right now) and purchases will be limited to milk. I’ll turn the milk into yogurt and cheese here at home.

Grains are harder. I’ll try to only use what I have in stock. That will mean grinding wheat for pancakes, waffles, bread, muffins, and pasta.

HM and I will also give up our treat night. Once a week, while the guys are at TaeKwonDo class, we have a store made meal or treat. We’ll skip that in favor of homemade. However, we will still cling to our chocolate bars! After all, a girl can only give up so much all at once.

KMH

Local Food Month

Crunchy Chicken is at it again. This time the challenge is to eat locally for a month. Details are below. I’ll post our goals in a day or two.

KMH

From http://crunchychicken.blogspot.com/

During the month of July you’re going to increase your consumption of locally and sustainably grown food and decrease your consumption of imported and packaged food. You choose the level of participation you want to do.

Think of this as an a la carte menu - you can pick as many or as few items to focus on.

Eat local:

• produce (fruits and vegetables)
• dairy (milk, yogurt, cheese)
• meats and seafood
• breads and grains

Limit:

• pre-packaged food
• frozen food
• fast food

Make your own:

• cereals
• pastas
• breads
• soymilk
• yogurt

Rioting continues for a second week

We are really getting into the swing of the Riot. The first week the changes were really obvious, but this week we are down to the smaller details. I’m still motivated, still learning so much, and still enjoying the cyber-community we are building.

Tally for weeks 1 and 2:

• Transportation: 4 gallons (not counting CK or MA commute)
• Electricity: average 12 kwh
• Heat and Cooking: .2 gallons of propane
• Garbage: landfill 2 lbs, recycling 3 lbs
• Water: unsure of amount, but it is going down
• Consumer goods: $75
• Food: 50% homegrown or locally grown, 35% bulk, 15% processed

Steps for Week 3:

• Continue plans for Earth Oven
• Refrigerator: clean coils, turn down, research freezers (maybe just keeping a small chest freezer for ice packs and food. Use a 5 day cooler with the ice packs for refrigerator
• Shut down breakers for most outlets.
• We stay at a3 kwh until around 7 pm. Why do we use more at night than during the day. Figure it out.
• We went ahead and put buckets under most sinks for gray water. We’re using that for flushing and watering the gardens. This week, measure water in the buckets for an estimate of sink water usage.

KMH

Lettuce

Lattuca sativa

Heirloom variety: Buttercrunch

Days to Germination: 7-14 (I usually see the first sprouts 2-4 days after planting.)

Planting and Harvesting: Plant early to mid spring and again in late summer. Succession planting insures a continuous supply. MA also built a wooden shade for my lettuces. This part of the bed is 12 inches taller on the south and west sides of the bed. It works very well. But eventually the lettuce will bolt.

Seed Saving Technique: Lettuce will bolt in summer due to long days and heat. The seed is ready to harvest 12-24 days after flowering. I go out each day and shake the flower head into a paper bag to collect the seeds. At the end of the season, I use a sieve to separate the seed from the “feather.” Keep the seeds in a cool dark place for up to 3 years.

We also plant several types of leaf lettuce. The seed collecting is done the same way. I am careful to plant them in opposite corners of the garden and to clearly mark each paper sack.

KMH

Adventures in Keeping Cool

Summer weather has arrived in Southern Indiana. That means heat and humidity. Lots of heat. Lots of humidity.

We have come up with a system to keep the house and its occupants fairly comfortable this year without the AC. Most of these we have tried as stop-gap measures as we fought our desire to turn on the AC. Here is our system done as a list. That way I can come and read it everyday until the urge to turn on the AC fades!

• Open windows at night and use fans to pull in cooler air.
• Shut windows as soon as the sun hits them. Pull curtains closed.
• Make reflectors or shades to go behind curtains.
• Use dishpan (not the one from the kitchen) with cold water to soak feet. (By the way, this really helps. I sometimes stand in the pan while washing dishes, chopping vegetables, or even doing my reading.)
• Turn on a fan if you are in the room. Sit in front of it with a cold wash cloth around your neck.
• Go outside and sit under a shade tree or take a walk in our woods.
• Go outside and sit on the hot deck. Then come in. You’ll remember that the house is much cooler than the deck.
• Remember you are doing a good thing by leaving the AC off.
• Look at last years electric bills for July, August and September!
• When you absolutely cannot take it — read the Little House book where Laura helps Pa make hay. Now stop complaining.

OK. I have a plan. I hope the plan works!

KMH

Low Impact Week in Review

Well, Low Impact Week has come and gone. It was a great thing for our family. We saw that implementing even small steps can have a huge impact. It was also great because it drew our family’s attention to others trying to reduce their impact and led us to participate in the Riot for Austerity (aka — 90% Reduction challenge).

So let’s look at how we did.

1. Electricity: We started at 21 kwh per day and ended with an average of 18. That included 2 butchering days (which came in at 30/day). Our best day was 9 kwh! That was even a 90 degree day! Whoohoo!! This will be our area of focus from June-September.

2. Water: We dropped 700 gallons a week. There is still much room for improvement. This will be our area of focus from September-December.

3. Food Choice: I still say we did great! I found a few things on my grocery list that need to be purged, and we’ll work on alternatives to those from January to March.

4. Garbage and Recycling: We are at about 2% of the American Average. We’ll just keep on doing what we are doing. No changes anticipated, except as we eliminate a few things from our grocery list there should be less recycling.

5. Paper Products: 5 catalogs canceled, 1 newspaper canceled, 4 bills arriving on-line now, opted out of junk mail, and didn’t print a single piece of computer paper, and only re-used envelopes for scratch paper. We’ll continue to work on this throughout the year.

6. Transportation: CK’s commute is still long, but we now have a plan for watching tire inflation, planning errands on his route home, and possibly even shortening some of the commute by parking and bike riding the last few miles. (We’ll see. . .don’t hold your breathe on the last part.) MA used 2 gallons to deliver the chickens he slaughtered for a friend. Household gas use was 1 gallon for the week. And even that gallon was with 3 people in the truck. Yippee! (This obviously will also be worked on throughout the year.

7. Do More: This week prepared us for the year long Riot for Austerity. We feel very encouraged and ready to go.

I can’t wait to see what challenge Crunchy Chicken has in store for us.

KMH

Speaking of Stuff

Stuff:  The Secret Lives of Everyday Things by John C. Ryan and Alan Thein Durning.

Read: June 2007.  Rating 4 stars (Amusing, educational, but not a “Grab it ’cause the house is on fire” kind of book)

This book takes a look at 9 things that are consumed by the Average American.  It follows them through the manufacturing process to your doorstep.  The 9 things are:  coffee, newspaper, t-shirt, shoes, bike/car, computer, hamburger, french fries, and cola.  Along the way, we learn how much of our natural resources we consume without even being aware of it.

Cleaning House

We finally are getting some much needed rain. So HM and I have taken the opportunity to deep clean the house. Now, when I clean the house that means everything moves! I have found so much “stuff” that I don’t need. I wonder why I even bought some of it. I wonder if stuff has a reproductive life. There seems to be more of it. Didn’t I just do this last fall? I know I did. So where did it all come from?

I am a little afraid that I underestimated our consumer goods percentage!

When MA was just a little boy he had a really hard time with asthma. It prompted us to remove carpets and blinds from our house and learn to clean with natural products instead of chemical.

Our favorite recipes follow:

1. Toilet Cleaner: Bowl–Baking Soda and a Toilet Brush. Scrub. Flush. Rest–Dash of vinegar. Wipe with soft cloth.

2. All purpose: Vinegar and warm water. A little baking soda if something is really bad. Occasionally some Dr. Bronner’s is fun.

3. Dishes: Dr. Bronner’s for scrubbing, a little vinegar in the rinse water, and a lot of elbow grease.

4. Wood floors: Mostly just a dust mop. Once a week we use a little Murphy’s Oil Soap mixed into hot water.

5. Laundry: 1 box borax, 1 box washing soda, 1 bar grated homemade soap (or Fels Naptha). I use it dry, mix with a little hot water, then pour into the cold wash water.

That’s it. That’s all we use.

KMH

Chickens

Gallus gallus. The domesticated chicken. Variety: Buff Orpington.

Chickens, ah chickens. I could go on for days about my chickens. They are gentle, quiet (well except for loudmouth, pictured above), and content creatures. They don’t ask for much just protection, a little land, some food, water, bugs and dirt. I have all that in abundance.

We raise our chickens in portable pens. Each pen holds 6-7 hens, their rooster, food and water. Each day the pen gets moved to a fresh spot of grass. This keeps the grass mowed, fertilized, and occasionally dug up.

This year we are building a permanent coop for our girls. I love the portable ones, but HM and I are not strong enough to move them daily. CK and MA are planning several yards connected to the coop so they’ll still have fresh grass. We’ll just have to rotate which door is open.

Our chickens eat a diet mostly composed of table scraps, their own shells (dehydrated and crushed), and layer’s ration. We are slowly eliminating the layer’s ration. I’m trying to find the balance between how many chickens I need for our family with how many chickens we can feed with scraps, grass, and homegrown veggies and grain. 3 per person seems to be about right.

Clearing up common misunderstandings:

1. Hens do not need a rooster to lay eggs, only to lay fertile eggs.
2. Roosters do not just crow at sunrise. They crow anytime they want. And they want to a lot.
3. A hen will naturally begin laying eggs as the day lengthens and quit laying as the day shortens. You can artificially manipulate this by adding light to their house, feeding extra protein, or buying “genetically enhanced” chickens. We don’t do any of those.
4. The same “enhanced” chicken will not incubate her own eggs. The desire and ability has been bred out of them.
5. A salmon will swim upstream, quietly lay a thousand eggs, and die. A chicken will walk around, lay one egg, and squawk all day about it.

Now, I have to go outside and collect today’s eggs.

KMH

Low Impact Week; Update 1

Today is the third day of Low Impact Week. It seems like a good time to report on our progress and failures.

1. Energy: We started at 21 kwh/day. We have lowered that to 13! I am so excited. We have been keeping the hot water heater off except for a few hours a day. We also turned to electric range and oven at the breaker. This seems to have made the biggest difference. The outdoor grill is working very well. We have made all sorts of interesting things on it. The solar dehydrator is almost finished. The earth oven is still in the planning stages. I have been using a propane camp stove for boiling water and cooking pancakes for breakfast.

2. Water: Since my initial shock over how much water we use, we have already cut back 2000 gallons a month. (Nothing like knowing how much you use to force you into saving!) This was mostly from saving water while waiting for it to heat up. We have used that water for pets, cleaning, and some laundry. I have also stopped flushing when the water is clear. I learned the expression “If it’s yellow let it mellow, if it’s brown flush it down.” It goes against everything I grew up knowing, and everything I taught my children, but we’re trying. I wasn’t able to install rain barrels for drinking — wrong kind of roof!

3. Food Choices: We’re doing great! Except for the Newman’s Mint O’s. Boy, I love those. I’m trying to ration those and my chocolate.

4. Garbage and Recycling: Great! No problems expected, no problems reported!

5. Paper Products: I have canceled 3 catalogs, one local newspaper, and 2 bills (well, they are done paperless now. I still have the bill.)

6. Transportation: Well, I knew this one was going to be hard. Good news, we have made no unexpected trips. Bad news, Kelly’s commute won’t be changing.

7. Do more. We decided to use Low Impact Week as launching point for the 90% reduction challenge. It is all about trying, not necessarily succeeding. We’re trying . . .

KMH

Low Impact Week Begins

I cannot believe it is already June 1. I swear someone has been messing with my calendar. I’m not ready.

This morning we took a meter reading, cooked on the camp stove, planned meals around the wood burning grill, and turned off the hot water heater. We’ll turn it on at 6 am and back off by 7:30.

How’s everyone else feeling about turning the page on the calendar?

KMH