The Alternative Lifestyle Site

Transition Project #3: The House (an update)

Summer has been and gone and we are in the last throws of perfect Autumn weather here in North East Victoria, Australia.  Perfect deck and pergola building weather and that’s exactly what we are up to.

Our building program has proceeded steadily over the past 6 months and we are getting very close to our straw bale home extension being completed.  The render work is all finished (thanks Chris from Australian Render Systems in Beechworth), the gorgeous handmade doors and windows are in (thanks Rob and the crew from Designed By Eye in Stanley)  and the double glazing (thanks Hilton from Indigo Glass – another local business) is working perfectly, the lighting and fans have all been installed as have the solar panels and we are now exporting electricity to the grid.

You can get the same system we purchased (if you live in Australia) from Rezeko – ekoenergy solar, check out their website here.  Wall to wall carpeting was laid in the bedrooms last Monday and of course it was just too much to resist and we have been sleeping in our new bedrooms for about ten days now!  Total bliss.

Now I’m making curtains and the perfection of that process is that we were able to source curtain fabric and lining that is actually manufactured within 40km of our home which ties in beautifully with our ethics of using local people and materials if possible.  What a bonus.    Bruck Textiles is the manufacturing facility located in Wangaratta and the fabric is from the Wilson Fabric range and it’s called Karratha (with is named after a town in Western Australia) just in case you were wondering.

More pictures and videos will follow to bring you visually up to date with how things look and what still has to be done.  The feeling of satisfaction is immense and I can feel a celebration on the front deck (14m x 5m) brewing in the background.  Wish you could join us.

Put your name and email address into the box top right to receive updates, special videos and notifications of exciting happenings here at the Alternative Lifestyle Site Blog.  Glad to have you aboard it’s a great journey.

Transition Project #2: The Chook Project (Part 2)

We’ve been very busy lately, what with Summer being in full swing, house building proceeding at a steady pace and lots of lovely rain. The unintended result of all of this is that our little bantam (Henny Penny) decided that early December would be a good time to start collecting eggs and planning for motherhood.

By the time I discovered her little stash of eggs there were 16 of them and she could hardly cover them all with her body!  We removed all the eggs because we didn’t know which ones to keep and she didn’t want to sit on them anymore once we had discovered her little nest.

She was however still very clucky so we decided to make her a safe little nesting place, away from dogs who love eating eggs and away from foxes who love eating chickens.  The answer ended up being a nice little metal garden cart that we modified to keep her all warm and dry and safe from unwanted visitors.

Needless to say, on Christmas Eve the first of three little chicks made it’s entrance into the world and she is now the mum of three little bundles of soft, fluffy, cheeping delight.  We’ve made a little video of the accommodation and the happy little family for your enjoyment.  Hope it makes you smile!

Video: Adventures In Straw – The Roof

Well it took me a while to unravel the software glitches but at last I did it and can post the video of the roof going on our house. Boy was that a momentous day for us and a relief given the weather we were having. Hope you enjoy!

Transition Projects #3: The House (part 4)

When owner building, the time can seem to simultaneously drag and absolutely speed by. By regular building standards we are taking quite a long time to build our home however this is not an off the shelf house, a breeding box as a friend of mine sarcastically puts it, it is custom made by us, for us and for the planet we all inhabit. So that takes care of the time dragging component but what about the time speeding by? Well, we look back at the end of each month and sometimes marvel at what we’ve managed to accomplish, there are some things that just make such a big impact. Despite beavering away each weekend (and during the longer summer evenings) we can sometimes feel as though no progress has been made. Then, as if by magic, one day something big happens and we marvel at the fact that WE are building a house and it’s beginning to actually look like a house!

To put things into context, neither myself nor my loving partner had ever constructed anything of great consequence. I’d managed to pull together a chook house (looked more like a shanty lean too) and we used to joke that Graham couldn’t even put up a shelf (well, only half joke really) and now we stand back with a nice glass of local red wine in our hands and smile with satisfaction and sometimes surprise at what we’ve managed to create so far.

The difference between our building style and speed was brought home to us recently when we had the roof put on. In our state you are not permitted to put your own roof on (don’t get me started on Industry Lobby Groups) so we engaged a local man to do that for us. During that process we also decided to engage some people to put up the framing for the roof as it was quite tricky and we wanted to get the bales covered before the weather got any worse, rain wise that is. What a LEAP! They were so organised, so fast, so confident. At the end of just a few days we had a roof on!

Now it looks like a real house! We’ve got a lot of prep work to do now to get it ready for its first coat of render but we know that it’s all going to make a big job a lot easier if we can get that done before the render team turn up. So it’s all stops out now to pin the straps to the bales to limit movement (and render cracking), filling up all the gaps in the bales with straw and cob, covering the straps with mud before the render goes on (as the nylon strapping doesn’t like lime apparently) and then hitting the walls with the whipper snipper (brush cutter) so tidy up all the loose ends! Noisy job but fun in a weird power tool kinda way

You know you’ve lost your marbles when this kind of thing is the highlight of your month – I’m looking forward to getting my life back.I got so excited about having a roof on that I made a little video, might as well share it with you – however I’m still struggling with the software…. hmmm, time for a mac?!

I’ll let you know when I finally get to post the video – hopefully not too long. Bye for now.

Transition Movement Explained

I just came across this video of Rob Hopkins (via AlterNet and TED) primarily speaking on our Transition to a World Without Oil.  It’s very thought provoking and may help get to grips with some of the big ideas we need to grapple with.

Enjoy

I’ve some personal projects on the go (see posts on this blog) and am getting involved with my local sustainability group. Would love to hear from others what they are up to in this regard.

Transition Projects #3: The House (part 3)

Now, where was I up to with this little project the last time I wrote to you? Ah yes, head down and tail up looking at the bottom of a stump hole. Well you’ll be pleased to hear that things have progressed quite well since then despite a few dramatic events.

The biggest drama was the discovery of not one but TWO old Chinese mine shafts at the bottom of a few of our stump holes! During the gold rush this area was full of hopeful souls from all over the world and the Chinese shafts stand the test of time due to being round, rather than square as the European shafts generally were.

We got the drilling rig in to determin the make up of the hole we had uncovered but they ran out of drill before they reached the bottom of the shaft so the engineers had to come up with a solution before we could proceed. This was duly done and work continued.

We are first time builders and have only the weekends to do our creative construction so progress is fairly slow but there are some days when it seems a milestone has been reached and we get quite excited. Laying those first sheets of flooring was one of those days (well weekends really) and the weather was so hot we just about expired! Having days like this really inspires us to keep on going, despite the heat or the frustration, despite the doubts we might have about our ability to do the task at hand.

Nothing prepared us for the next big event in our lives though and that was the bushfires which ravaged our area last Summer.

Still, once the danger passed and we recovered our spirit, we soldiered on and were elated at the next two big moments in our building adventure. We completed the construction of the internal framed walls and our straw was delivered!

Now it felt very, very real and boy were we excited that day! We arranged for a young man who lives not far from us to help us unload the truck (thanks Kai) and around 560 bales later our carport had become a haystack!

Of course, I began building our first load bearing strawbale wall that very afternoon – I was so attached to it, I felt like it was the most precious thing and had a very emotional afternoon. This had been a dream of mine for around 8 years and to be finally handling the straw that was to become my home just touched my heart in a really big way. I had no idea I would respond that way but I can tell you that the love has remained and we just adore what we are creating here weekend after weekend.

Every now and then, when we have a big task to complete – like constructing and installing a big thing like this recycled timber door frame we call on our friends and neighbours to lend a hand (thanks Charlie, Melissa and Matthew ) This has been a real joy for us and we’ve met some amazing people in our area just because we share something like owner building and strawbale construction as an interest. This was not something we had realised was going to happen and we feel such a bond with those who have helped us create our home. It’s wonderful.

Due to certain local and State regulations there are some things we can’t do ourselves like electrical (thanks Ron), putting up the roof (thanks Shady, Rob and Neil), and stuff we want someone experienced to do like earthmoving (thanks Tim), so we have used local trades people as a matter of principle – this has been an absolute delight and we are now able to make recommendations to others based on our experience. It’s a great feeling to be able to offer a good person to help someone just embarking on a building adventure like we are on.

If you would like to continue reading about our adventures in building, or any of our transition projects just subscribe to our list and you will receive notifications when we add something of interest to the blog. As a bonus, you will also receive the video series on Energy – maybe you will save some money as a result.

Transition Projects #4: Creating a Resilient Orchard

So now I’m working on yet another project to help us Transition from a high energy lifestyle, to a lower energy lifestyle. Transforming our old neglected fruit orchard into a resilient Food Forest.

If you’ve been following this blog for a little while you will have subscribed to the newsletter in order to receive the 20 video “Energy Series” (which are free by the way) that help you take control of your energy bills by giving you excellent hints, tips and advice on what to do to reduce your consumption, save energy and save money. Recently though, we’ve raised the bar a little and began sharing with you our other major projects.

Project 1: The Food Project – beginning with the construction of our shade house. This totally revolutionised our food production last year and this year it has morphed into a berry and herb growing house with our main potato crop and some soft summer salad vegetables planned for a few weeks time. There will be a part two shortly.

Project 2: The Chook Project – these are our wonderful animal companions and they do so much work for us, eating our scraps, weeding our gardens, eatings pests and they give us eggs and fertiliser in return. Not to mention the sheer joy of having them around. There are plans afoot to upgrade their lodgings but it may be a while before that gets done due to the next big project below.

Project 3: The House - this is our long term project to build ourselves a sustainable home. We are literally building it ourselves so it’s slow, but we are using recycled materials, waste material, natural materials, energy efficient design as well as new and old technologies and materials to create a healthy, efficient, welcoming abode.

Project 4: The Food Forest Orchard

Which brings us to the first steps towards creating a resilient orchard which will one day be a Food Forest. Now my definition of a food forest as it stands today is a food garden incorporating fruiting and non-fruiting trees, shrubs, bushes, ground covers and underground edible items. I’m a long, long way from being able to claim any such thing right now but I am making a start.

This picture shows some of our apple trees which are planted alongside the shadehouse. They are not particularly old trees but from my observation they were planted a few years ago and no-one has touched them since.

This small orchard contains apples, cherries, plums, nectarines, peaches and quinces. There are four rows of six trees in each row and many of these trees are old, overgrown, filled with dead wood, crossed branches and lots of pests and diseases.

Despite this horrid state, they continue to produce fruit.

Imagine what they will do when someone starts to appreciate and care for them.

I recently purchased a DVD from the Australian Permaculture Institute, on Food Forests and it was so inspiring but I found myself a little overwhelmed. Most of the projects were of such a large scale I just couldn’t see how I could do such a thing in my garden.

Then I got onto YouTube and typed in Food Forest and came across a couple of video’s by or about Robert Hart from the UK who has developed a forest garden on a scale that is very applicable to my circumstances. YouTube is an absolute gold mine for visual images and information on this subject so go there and get inspired … well it certainly worked for me!

In our garden we have a limited amount of time in which to work to create and maintain things due to most of our time being spent building the house. However, Spring certainly worked it’s magic this year here in Australia with rain turning our parched land into a green oasis in a matter of weeks and creating an irresistible urge to get out there and do some work of a different nature.

I chose just one tree, in this case a fairly mature plum that has been shaped and pruned in the past but is badly in need of some nurturing. I’ll admit right here that I’m new to orchard maintenance and the details of how to properly care for each different tree are not yet part of my knowledge base without resort to books. However, I do know that dead wood has to go – that is where I always begin. Then diseased wood and wood that is crossing other branches or which for some reason are just not where you want them. Pruning is hard work but very rewarding.

Using my spade length as a measure, I dug a circle around the base of the tree, pulled out all the weeds and grass (some went to the chooks and ducks and some to the compost bins) and gave the whole area a nice long drink.

As you can see from the picture, this kind of activity is like a beacon to the chickens who come from wherever they are to “help” – on this occasion, they gobbled up lots of lawn/grass bugs and unfortunately a few worms too but their scratching also dislodged a few of the weeds I had missed so it seems we make a good team.

This activity was followed up with a good few handfuls of blood and bone, dynamic lifter and cow manure (I used all my homemade compost on the vegetable gardens this year) and another good water in.

Finally, we topped the lot with straw as a mulch to keep the moisture in the soil and attract the chickens back to this spot over the next few weeks.

Why do I want the chickens to come and spend time in this spot? They love straw – mine find it impossible to resist – so they come and scratch about and in the process dig up any new weed seedlings which may be popping up and they drop their nutrient rich manure right there where I want it and I don’t have to do a thing!

At the end of the day this is what I had and the tree looked much happier. This is the first tree on the second row in the orchard and I’ve already given all the trees in the first row the same treatment. Hopefully this time next year all the trees in the orchard will be feeling this kind of love!

Our plan is to begin turning this orchard into a food forest and I’ve begun on the trees in the first row already by reading up on companion planting for fruit trees.

This is part of my pest management strategy and so far I’ve planted apple mint, hollyhocks and lemon grass under an apple tree. Chamomile under a nectarine, strawberries, rosemary, garlic, lavender and catnip under the remaining peach and nectarine trees in that row. These are my herb layer and I have to say they look very attractive, the bees love them and they make me smile when I walk through the trees.

There is a lot more work and learning to be done but already the rewards are showing me that it’s most certainly worth it.

Where ever you are, what ever the season you can do something similar in your garden. If it’s cold and dark right now, get out the books and start planning to plant a new fruit tree and it’s companion plants next season, if it’s growing season where you are right now, go outside and see what you can do to add diversity and complimentary plantings to what you already have in your garden or orchard. Watch some video’s, buy a DVD, read a book or two.

Your garden will love you, your food will be healthier and you will glow with pride and health. Go to it.

Transition Projects #3: The House – part 2

We’ve been working weekends for what seems like a lifetime! Still, it’s all for a great cause – our own home.

We have settled very nicely into our little timber home but we just can’t get past the fact that we just don’t fit in here very well. Add that to our burning desire to live in much more sustainable ways and there is just no putting off the inevitable. We just have to stop talking about it and get things moving.

So plans were drawn up with the help of our trusty strawbale building expert, Brian. A couple of telephone calls, a nice lunch together in the beer garden of the Stanley Pub and we had the makings of a great floor plan. In not too much time we had approval to proceed.

I have to admit that at this very moment I almost lost my nerve. What a task but the sheer opportunity just took over and we began by make a great big mess of our lovely piece of land.

The mess this process made really had a big impact on me. I felt aweful for the amount of damage I was responsible for but I knew that in the long run our property will be better, healthier, more diverse and more productive than it was on that day. I took a big breath and wondered at the deep orange red soil slowly appearing where will I will build my home.

At the beginning of this project we had very lofty ideals about being as eco-friendly as we possibly could. One of my first lessons is that this whole process is one of compromises. We’ve had to take some hard decisions and at times we’ve felt that our choices have been less than we would have wished. We added a few layers to our decision making that have made things a little more difficult for us. A couple of those have been:

• use local tradespeople, businesses and resources where possible.
• shop on merit not price.

This is tough when you don’t live in a major city and you are running to a budget. However, in the main we’ve done a great job and we’ve met some amazing people and built what I hope will be long and strong relationships with people. Those things are priceless. The compromises we’ve accepted and feel happy knowing we’ve done the best we can do on the day.

Eventually we were left with this big, flat dusty space in which to create something fabulous. Did I mention the dust?

Of course, I couldn’t resist putting a garden around the edge of all that moved soil – primarily because I love to create things, love to garden and can’t stand dust!

More importantly though, I didn’t want the Autumn rains to start and cause a lot of erosion around the edge. It also gave me an opportunity to put in some simple steps (made from sleepers and star pickets) and give everything a good mulch and a good water. All those lovely trees you see in the background are our Chestnut orchard. Wonderful things because they are so green all through the hot weather and then lose their leaves in the winter letting in all the lovely sunshine.

But that’s another story

We had to hand dig all the holes that were too close to the existing house for the machinery to dig (there were 40 of those) and then we got our trusty digging friend in with his machinery to dig another 110 holes.

We chose to build on stumps to limit the amount of concrete we use as the production of cement creates a huge amount of green house gases and we just don’t want to be responsible for any more of those than is absolutely necessary.

If you look closely at the last picture you can see one of our lovely Collie dogs, a rooster and a hen. Some animals are so curious they just want to be where all the action is.

More soon.

Sustainable Living: What Is Transition?

It’s an interesting word Transition, don’t you think?

I mean to me it’s much softer than the word Change and yet, at it’s deepest level it means much the same thing. I realise it means change but it has so much more potential.

I used to work in a government department that was charged with organisational change – in those days that was shorthand for a lot of people losing their jobs and everyone else being jollied along to pick up the workload. Transition on the other hand means change yes, but it also has the potential to mean “evolution” to something different and that has the potential to mean something better.

Now, my dictionary says that Transition is “the act of changing or passing from one form, state, subject or place to another.”

Now that sounds participatory and creative and interesting to me, whereas change sounds nasty, like a top-down decision that I’m just going to have to live with. Transition sounds like it can be pulled of by anyone, with a little style even and that is what I think the Transition Movement, which is spreading all over the world, is all about.

Now this movement under it’s current guise, started in the UK but it began spreading itself around the world very quickly, anywhere there are “thinking people”, it will find a home.

The basic premise of the movement is to come up with solutions to the massive issues of Peak Oil and Climate Change but the difference is that the solutions are being sought with the aim of making communities, local areas and regions strong enough, diverse enough, resilient enough to not just survive in a post oil society with a very different climate but to thrive.

If you click on this link, you will find the Transition Primer which will give you the heads up on the important aspects of this movement… it’s FREE so download it today. Of course, there is a book and a website and a forum, so if you are the kind of person who just might be looking for a bit of a plan to help you develop the mindset, the skills set, the community connections and the enthusiasm to face to coming transition with a modecum of style rather than the mass panic developing around the place, these resources could be just the thing you need.

If you click the links you’ll get more information from what I think are credible sources, the books I’ve read (mostly) and are great resources. There is a lot of information and access to a lot of other resources through the links provided above but I’ve also given you some specific links to book that I think are well worth reading. If you are lucky you may be able to borrow them but if you want to or need to buy them, consider doing so via the links below.

The Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience (Transition Guides)

If you have read about Permaculture, are an organic gardener or community garden participant then these books are a logical progression.

Permaculture: Principles and Pathways Beyond Sustainability

is another fantastic book by Permaculture co-creator David Holmgren and while I was searching for that one, I discovered a more recent publication (although as yet I’ve not read it) so take a good look around and find the things that resonate with you.

I hope they are of assistance to you as you continue to educate yourself about the very real things that are occurring all around us. I believe that we each have the power to influence how these things play out in our lives, if we educate ourselves and each other, support each other, work together we will build the kind of future where we can live well without biting the very hand that feeds us.

I’ll be outlining some of the projects, steps and connections my family is making in response to Climate Change and Peak Oil There is enough information (through the links in this post) to give you a really good idea of what is happening and perhaps a few very good resources and ideas to get you started on your personal transition to a low energy future. If we do it together we can make it a graceful journey that everyone can take.

If you would like to ensure you don’t miss out on any of the following “Transition Projects” posts, if you would like to gain access to a whole range of tips and advice on how to save energy (and money in the process) just put your name and email address into the box at the top right of this page. I’ve had so much fun making the videos so I really hope you get some great ideas from them.

Transition Projects #3: The House (part 1)

We first saw our home about 5 months before we decided to buy it. We didn’t even bother to take a look inside.

Nope, it wasn’t for us – too small, wrong position and frankly it just didn’t look like something we would even consider. Not that it was awful, it was just that unless we could buy a house that would meet all our eco-friendly ideals OR get some vacant land so that we could build with those ideals in mind, we didn’t want to waste anyones time.

So what changed?

We took a look at it with new eyes.

We decided that the fact that it faced totally the wrong way (for energy efficiency) could actually be an advantage. We decided that the fact that it was a weather board home would make it easier to retrofit. We decided that since it was quite, quite small that it was a reasonable thing to expand and extend it. And so we purchased this little house, facing the wrong way but with so much potential. Buy it and make it a sustainable home that was the plan and slowly, we are taking our steps in that direction.

So, what did we buy?

It’s a little house, sitting on not quite two acres, with some nice native trees on the southern and western boundaries, with 100 or so productive Chestnut trees to the north, twenty neglected fruit trees and lots of long grass.

Really, we would have preferred a couple more acres but properties in our chosen areas cost quite a bit so this was our compromise. Despite all the things that were “wrong” with our chosen purchase, there was so much we could do to make it better and we really started right away.

We did a couple of things initially to mediate against the Sun in Summer – blinds were attached to all the outside verandahs to stop the sun actually shining on the glass of our windows.

If the Sun hits the glass it acts like a radiator inside the house. Not a good idea when the temperatures are heading towards the 35 degree Celcius mark on a Summer day! We roll up the blinds in the winter and they really do a good job of cutting the heat and the glare in the summer.

In the winter we have a wood burning combustion stove, carpets, lined blinds on the windows and so long as the heater is on we are toasty warm. However, we use a lot of wood.

The ceiling and the walls do have insulation in them, but it’s not very thick and we know that to increase the level of insulation will make a lot of difference both in Winter and in Summer. Still (we remind ourselves) this is why we purchased this particular house.

We just knew we could take something at was doing just about everything wrong and turn it into something that does just about everything right! With that in mind, the plans were hatched to build an extension.

An eco-extension, “out the back”, on the western side of the house. We already knew what materials we would use and for us the material that touched our hearts was straw. Now I don’t know if it’s because I grew up in the wheat belt of New South Wales and was surrounded by paddocks and fields of wheat but this product just sets my pulse racing!

So we did a Strawbale Owner Builders course, purchased a book on the subject and we set about designing the changes to our little house.

This series of “Transition” posts will outline our journey and I really hope you will enjoy them. As I sit writing this today, there is a man on the roof putting on the last few sheets of iron that will finally link the extension to the existing house! Time for a bit of a celebration I think as now we have one roof over our plans and dreams and although it’s still a long way from finished, it is at last – one house.

If you would like to ensure you don’t miss out on any of the following “Transition Projects” posts, if you would like to gain access to a whole range of tips and advice on how to save energy (and money in the process) just put your name and email address into the box at the top right of this page. I’ve had so much fun making the videos so I really hope you get some great ideas from them.