Living the LIFE!

I've been pretty quiet on the blog since we moved towns, but I've been so busy being happy!  We bought 1.6 acres and it is just enough for us to grow our own fruit and vegetables, keep animals and create a generally awesome space to be home schooled in!  I'll just upload some photos for you to update you on the footprint farm happenings...

This is a 1940's truck my husband bought!  I was not impressed at first as he didn't consult me, but it will be dead useful for picking up larger items/moving animals around town, and look at that elevated playspace for Butterfly! 

I LOVE CHICKENSSS!!!  I. Love. Chickens!  They are awesome for eating scraps, fertilising the yard and are bloody entertaining!  This is our Silkie girl, Sookie, with her first baby, Bickie.  Bickie only lived for a day but we will never forget him.

This is Bindi (yep, my daughter has a Bindi Irwin obsession!) She is a poodle x bichon and she and her brother Chase will be coming to live with us in a few weeks!  Butterfly lives and breathes dogs so we are very excited to be able to finally give her some

This is our vege garden!  One day it will be full of vege beds, and I plan to grow the climbing plants all around the edges :)  I'm open to advice, I'm wondering whether or not to plant a hedge along the left side, to protect against wind and the first morning sun for frost damage.  Good idea or bad idea?  I don't want too much shade in there but I found some of my plants did better when we had corn shading them... Also, if I did plant a hedge it would be awesome if it was productive... does anyone know of a hedging plant that also produces something edible or useful?  I've heard tea plants can be used as a hedge... but I'd have to start drinking tea...

Our very first broccoli is growing!  Our family eats broccoli almost every night so this is a big deal for me.  It is so interesting to see how vegetables grow, I didn't realise how big broccoli and cauliflower plants grow!  We have planted purple carrots and purple cauliflowers for fun

Our first carrot!  Butterfly loves pulling carrots out, its very exciting! Having a vege patch has been really good for Butterfly to learn about nutrition, she loves being able to eat things straight out of the garden... yesterday she was in there eating lettuce!  Very unlike her but very welcome! 

This... This is the compost.  Exciting huh?  To me it is!  I added to it for about 8 months and not much broke down, then when I started getting lazy and throwing everything to the chooks and forgetting about the compost... I opened it up and it was surprisingly decomposed!  Lesson learnt... you have to give it a rest if its going to decompose! 

This is Butterfly's craft stash... she is not the kind of child who will tip all this out!  (OK she might have done it a few times, but generally she doesn't) She is very creative and loves craft!

This is our dam, which is now full due to recent rains!  And these are our ducks.  RIP Floyd, our drake and first fox casualty...

This is my mini orchard!  So far I have oranges, cumquats, lemonade, peach, ice cream bean tree, mulberry (white), lemon, dwarf mandarin, 2 x dwarf apples and a dwarf lime tree!  I still have a bunch of dwarf trees I hope to get... macadamia nuts, avocados, plums, nectarines, cherries, almonds, pecans, pears and a black mulberry!  I'm sure there's more I've forgotten!  I have started with the dwarf varieties to avoid getting TOO much fruit, and also so I have room to plant more of a variety :)

PS that white seat is a 100 year old seat from a Tasmanian horse tram.  I'm a little bit in love with it!

Pea plants! Butterfly eats the peas as they grow, raw and straight from the pod!  So far none have made it to the kitchen but whatevs, I'll plant more next year!

This is Butterfly's secret garden!  One day the trees will have grown into a living wall around the edges :) Since this photo was taken we have added a sandpit boat that her Grandma and Pa found second hand and restored for her :)

We really love living here!  Yes, we had to move 3 hours away from our families to be able to afford this lifestyle.  But I haven't regretted it for a second!  When I visit the Gold Coast I miss the sky.  Out here, you get SO MUCH SKY!  As far as the eye can see.  It is beautiful and relaxing. 

I love that we get birds in our yards I'd only ever seen in pet shops or zoos before!  I love the flocks of galahs and cockatoos that come around.  I love the cranes and spoonbills that visit our dam.  I love hay bales.  I love shovelling dirt... or manure!  I love how excited Butterfly gets when she sees a new red strawberry or a new flower!

There are downsides... like the WIND!  Farking hell the wind!  We back onto farmland and sometimes the wind is extreme!  And there is usually some form of wind.  Its pretty good in summer though ;) but not so good when you are trying to hang stuff on the line! 

Also the fencing isn't 6 foot high like in the city.  People can see into your yard.  My neighbours have just had to get used to me running around in PJs and my dressing gown... yes sometimes still at 3pm!  They should just count themselves lucky I don't do nudy runs to the clothesline.



I'll put mice in the downside... they have ruined a mattress we had in the spare room.  But I won't lie... they are cute and I do love seeing them in the compost or the chook pen!

Uber lameness = me seeing my neighbour spraying chemicals all over his yard >:( Tis too close for comfort to my organic paradise. 

I have people telling me all the time how lucky I am.  I guess we are fortunate.  However all of this didn't just fall in our lap.  We had to go out and grab this opportunity.  We had to make sacrifices, we had to take a chance.  And it has well and truly paid off!  My advice to anyone wanting to get out of the city is to just look around.  Even if you think its not possible for your family, you might be surprised!  It truly is a wonderful way to raise kids! 

Peace



I'm a WEANER

I had planned not to wean Butterfly at ALL.  I was dead set on letting her self wean when she was good and ready.

And yet here we are.

I did nightwean her out of desperation for some sleep a few months ago.  That was hard, but we managed. 

Then, I guess about a month ago, breastfeeding was suddenly too hard.  And I mean suddenly.  Its not painful, or draining.  Its an aversion.  Its like her suck changed overnight, and I could actually FEEL her sucking.  That might sound weird but breastfeeding has never felt like that to me.  And I can't STAND it!  I dropped her feeds to one a day, and one to go to bed at night.  That worked for a few weeks, but then it got worse.  I stopped being able to handle breastfeeding at ALL.  So I cut her back to one feed to go to sleep at night, and for a few weeks thats been OK.  Some nights I can hang on until she's asleep, other nights I have to detach her after only a minute because I just can't grit my teeth through it.

Tonight she barely got 30 seconds.

It has been REALLY rough on Butterfly.  She is such a booby monster!  If she had her way she would feed every hour around the clock.  At 2 years and 8 months old!

Its extremely hard to try to explain to her at night.  She bursts into tears when I stop the feed, and tries desperately to convince me to keep going... "but my need Mummy milk cos my don't feel very well!" "but my is hungry!" "how bout we dust try one booboo?" 

It breaks my heart.

People who don't breastfeed, or wean their infants, have no idea what I'm on about.  "Well its about time anyway.  She's probably gotten all of the nutrients she can out of it anyway!".  Ummm... no.  Breastmilk is as good for a child on the day they wean as the day they are born. 

I feel like, despite my good intentions and my grand plans, my body has decided for me that enough is enough.  In my mind I can recall nature documentaries where mother elephants start walking off on their offspring when its time to wean.  So nature does not always let the child choose.

This makes me feel a little better, but I'm still very sad about it.  I've put so much time and energy and effort into breastfeeding Butterfly for almost 3 years, I never wanted it to end like this!  The tears and the grief on her part are difficult to deal with.  All I can do is try to explain to her that I would feed her if I could and hope she understands.  Something that has always been so bonding, relaxing and wonderful is suddenly causing misery.  This sucks!

I've breastfed Butterfly through a c section recovery, with added cracked and bleeding nipples.
I've breastfed Butterfly through periods of intense hormonal feeding pain.
I've breastfed Butterfly through recovery for a life threatening ectopic pregnancy.
I've breastfed Butterfly through periods of hormonal aversion.

This is just... different.  There's no curling my toes and suffering through it this time. 

Its time to let go.

And I just might cry...

Garden on WHEELS!

So the other Butterfly and I pooled our money and splurged on a GORGEOUS concrete owl planter, sorry I'm too lazy to go take a picture of it right now!  Anyway it is amazing, but I've actually found more excitement in upcycling my own planters this week!

Here is what I've come up with:

Planter on WHEELS!  I bought this old truck (?train) from an opshop a year ago.  Butterfly never was that keen on playing with it.  I just drilled drainage holes in the bottom and filled it with organic potting mix and some organic flowers we had grown from seed!

UPDATE: This totally just rotted and fell apart in the weather!  LOL

My Op Shop SCORE today!  $5 old dolls cot! Its quite large, I plan to remove the bottom and pile up dirt underneath it and plant in the centre.  I was going to do a full bed of flowers like this one, but I think this will be cuter!  What would you plant in it?  I'm thinking strawberries?  Lavender?  Just flowers?  I'm keen to know your opinion! 

Another score today, $5 old glass lampshade!  Looks bigger IRL.  I'm going to line it, hang chains from it and hang it upside down and plant flowers in it :)

I am so excited to keep coming up with upcycling ideas for Butterfly's garden!  Ahhh I love op shopping!

PEACE

DIY outdoor percussion instrument

My latest project on the footprint farm is to make Butterfly a "Secret Garden"!  I was going to plant her a "sunflower cubby house" but with the amount of snakes here, I thought it safer to go grander and have more space between walking area and garden :)

This is the view of the garden from the front (obviously the plants are all still very young as they were just planted!) The idea is that the plants will act as "walls" for the garden.  We have planted a green grape vine and a purple grape vine either side of the archway for a delicious living arch!

This is the view fron the other side... we scored the old square bathtub from our neighbour, it will be turned into a pond for frogs to breed in :) (you can get solar powered fountains for ponds!  Eee!) Those logs up the back are also from our neighbour, old bridge sleepers we are making a bench seat out of.

I bought a green and a red bowl from an antique store to make bird baths from (my MIL is a nurse and has witnessed a toddler who was crushed to death by a stone birdbath that the child pulled onto itself... a rare event but enough to warrant me searching for other options!)

In the photo above you may notice an old trampoline frame on its side... that is the frame for our outdoor percussion instrument!  I saw the idea here

To make your own percussion instrument like ours you will need:

An old trampoline frame

All weather rope (its no use if it deteriorates in the sun!)

A bunch of old pots, pans, metal cups, whatever you can find!  Ask your friends and neighbours or raid your local opshop (I just about cleaned mine out!)

Metal spoons for banging

Star pickets

Scissors or secateurs (to cut rope)

Flour

Water

Food colouring

Freddo frog

(those last four are for entertaining your toddler while you work!)

First, we lay the tramp on its side...its surprisingly stable as is but we then hammered some star pickets into the ground and secured them to the frame, just to make sure it doesn't fall down on the children!

I lay out my pots and pans in the position I think I will hang them in while Butterfly investigates the flour packet!

Bang bang BANG! I strung the pots and pans in rows, starting from the bottom. 

I got hubby to drill the old spring holes right through so I could tie the rope through them.  I am no good at knots, don't ask me what "type" of knot this is!  Notice the vine, I planted a passionfruit vine in the hopes it will grow and cover the frame to make it look more purrrty!

I tied each item onto the rope so they don't slide around

Viola!  Upcycled percussion instrument! 

I intentionally made it a little "skew iff" to match my personality!  I don't like things to be inch perfect, thats no fun :) 

I tied ropes vertically to support the horizontal ropes holding the "instruments"

After I took this picture I used the leftover rope to tie onto the sides of the trampoline to give the passionfruit vine more places to climb.

Considerations:

This is NOISY!  I'd be wary of putting one in a suburban backyard.  If you do, be considerate of the times your children bash on it (I'd even ask neighbours if they have babies/work night shifts and need quiet at weird hours)

Try to hang your pots and pans in such a way that they won't blow in the wind and hit each other or the tramp frame... unfortunately this was an afterthought for me!  We have WICKED strong wind here and I don't think the neighbours would appreciate incessant banging in a storm :S So I may have to tweak this!

Make the rope as tight as you can, and make sure the "holes" are large... you want to eliminate any risk of strangulation

Try to pick up some coloured items to create an interesting look, and vary the "types" of kitchen implements you find!  This varies the look and sound of each "instrument".  Coloured tin cups would look amazing!  Why not also hang some metal spoons? 

Construction hazards:

Beware sharp metal peices at the back where you drill through!  (Yes you get the benefit of ME bleeding up a storm to let you know these things!)

Rope burn.  Just... owww

Do not construct in the middle of a scorching day.  You DUNCE!

Beware the toddler who is tired of playing with flour and water alone and is creeping up behind you with sticky, goopy hands...

Just let your imagination run wild!  A friend of mine has a round tramp frame and I'm so keen to see how that one turns out! 

Peace

(but no quiet!)

Cesarean according to a 2 year old

This morning Butterfly and I were going through her newborn clothes, putting them on her dolly (Abby).   For fun, I got out her photo album of when she was born, to show her how small she used to be, wearing the same clothes as her doll!  We opened the book and landed on the photos from her C section.

She stared.  She got upset.  "Whats THAT Mummy?"
"Thats the day you were born"
"Whose THAT?" pointing to the OB holding her, and sounding very upset
"Thats the Dr who delivered you"
"Where's MUMMY?" VERY upset now
"I'm there darling, thats my tummy, see?"
"WHERE'S MUMMY?  WHERE'S DADDY?"  Crying her eyes out
"We are there, but um, they had to take you and weigh you before they bought you to me, see?"
"WHY?  Who is that?" Pointing to the other theatre staff
"I don't actually know sweetheart, people who helped with the operation"

She was in my lap at this point, crying her eyes out, wanting to be held. I'd close the book, but every so often she would open it again and ask some more questions.  Tears tears tears.

The things she couldn't understand were:
WHY was a strange man in gloves holding her?
WHERE was Mummy and Daddy?
Who were those other people?
Why did Mummy have a monitor on her finger and chest?  (She is very sensitive about those things since my ectopic, I can't wear a bandaid around her because she frets so much about my wellbeing)

I didn't have good answers for her.  I wished this had come AFTER Christmas so she had her Mamamor VBAC doll so I could show her how she was born, and how babies SHOULD be born.  (Yes I said should.  Babies should be born naturally, by their empowered mother, not by a surgeon.  SOME C sections are necessary, we all know that, but the rate sits around 30%.  Unacceptable)

I didn't have the doll.  All I could do was hold her and let her grieve and explain that babies are usually pushed out through a Mummy's vagina, but that I chose a c section because I didn't know any better.  Is this too much information for a 2 year old?  No.  Its the truth.  She was extremely disturbed by the photos and I confronted it with her and helped her through it.  I could have closed the book, I could have spun her some sugar coated junk about what it was all about.  But that's not how we roll. 

There is nothing like a toddler to paint things so simply that it leaves you wondering... why WAS some guy holding her up like a trophy?  Where was her MUM?  Why were there so many people there?  Why was Mummy hooked up to machines? 

Answer: Mummy should have been holding you.  Those people shouldn't have been there.  We should have been in a dimly lit room with only those who loved you... you should have been pushed out and caught by Mumma... who was neither hooked up to machines nor being cut open.

Trust a 2 year old to understand how birth should be.  If only everyone did.

Watertank Mud ART!

This afternoon Butterfly and I went out to play in the mud.  We started digging a trench to run water down... and I don't exactly know what happened... but we were soon painting the water tank with MUD!!  It was rad fun, it looks so earthy and cool, and we have clay which is wonderful and smooth!

The beginnings of our art...

Butterfly gets the hang of it... while Mumma paints her some native animals...

Naturally things progressed to body art...

A bit of this and a bit of SPLAT

The madness culminated in a full body mud pack for Butterfly! 

Man we had soooo much fun!  I find the best activities are the ones that happen by accident!  Having said that I'm planning on doing this again (I'm sure the rain has cleaned our slate by now)... so Sausage Mama, do remember to bring some old clothes when you come to visit!!

PEACE

Guest blog... Kids and the Media by MEGGZ

Meggz is a regular on The Smallest Carbon Footprint with heaps of awesome eco tips! I've learnt a lot from her. This week she posted this on the wall, and I wanted to publish it as a blog because I found it so interesting and thought provoking! Thankyou again Meggz :)

"I wonder if any other parents out there who are environmentally conscious include limiting modern technology to their "green" parenting plan ? My youngest daughter Shorty who is 13 does not watch TV, we moved to an area many years ago that does not get any form of TV reception. I have copped a lot of flack over the years in regards to my hippy lifestyle, but the lack of TV really got some people angry (family). It is my child surely I can choose ?? Shorty does not need to watch the weather channel to know what type of day we are having, she has learnt to watch the animals around us eg: cows and horses under the trees = rain for several days, black cockatoos screeching over our property = rain in the next few days, red sky in the morning means bad weather is coming, red sky at night means good weather, ants coming out of the ground = rain. She does not need to watch the news, not because I want her to become ignorant about world events, more because I do not want her seeing the way the media tends to portray these events as bigger than what they are, promoting an over focus on pain and suffering. She does not need to watch home and away or anyother teen program that teaches our children to lie, cheat, sleep around ect. What she does need to know is facts, without all the over dramatised aspects attached. We read books, encyclopedias, we write stories, in short we learn facts then after we have mastered that we add in emotional responses. I have seen first hand how my daughter can react to any situation with a clear and level head, without becoming tangled in emotions. She learns how to "read" people by spending many hours watching animals, their body language and how you can predict accurately what their actions will be without the use of words or language. I hope all of this will help her to become a better person. I am proud of the gorgeous young lady she has become, others see her as a socially stunted child. Yes if she does not like a discussion in the school yard she will walk away and sit by herself, or if the other kids are misbehaving in any way she will detach herself from them. Still I get told "we are concerned she is spending so much time alone" Shorty enjoys her own company, she is not afraid to be alone, she is comfortable in her own skin and most importantly she is respectful and polite, she knows all people are different and we have no right to force our opinions on others. How many of you have thought about this aspect of parenting? Is it a path you think you would like to take ? Or do you like so many people around me feel as though I am doing the wrong thing ? Would really like some feedback :) Oh as an after thought, Shorty is ranked in the top 4% of her Australian peers intellectually, her grades are above and beyond. External environmental influences do play an important role in your childs behaviour, intelligence and judgement.

My reasons for posting my message isnt for a pat on the back or for Shorty to look like a saint, I just hope it may make ppl think a little deeper. I home schooled my now 17 yr old daughter, I found as she grew (teenage years) she rebelled a lot due to her feeling like she has "missed out" on so many things. Living in harmony with nature but seeing exciting things on TV made it hard for her. It was at this point I decided to approach things differently. Shorty (13) has never seen TV ads showing the toys that mum says are bad come to life and talk and become your best friend. She has never seen happy meals ads that transport you to a magical kiddy place while you are eating them. This made living as naturally as we can a whole lot easier. Sure she now sees some of these ads when we visit other ppl but she is old enough to not be interested in them, the foundations were layed when she was little :) I remember a long time ago at a childs birthday party they had a Dora dvd on, all the kids were yelling & shouting at the TV when asked "what should Dora do" Shorty came out with, Dora should make her own decisions, she shouldnt need or want to know what other ppl want her to do lol yes it got some strange looks off the parents, but I realised what I was doing with her upbringing was having a positive effect on her. She knows she is in control of her life, she makes the decisions, she does not succumb to peer presure. I also should clarify we do have a TV we just dont get TV channels. We do watch documentaries on the weekends and Shortys favourite dvd as a toddler was "Baraka" (google it it is a brilliant movie) Shorty attends a very small selective private school, I choose this path as they respect my way of living and support good manners and morals. She finds it very funny when kids at school go on about twilight movies, we love edward we love jacob ect she always says mum how can they be in love with something thats make believe? Its like being a teenager with an imaginary friend. That will do it for me lol I have typed way way too much on your page as it is :) my only advice would be .... Never underestimate the power the media has to undo all of your "green living attempts" and cause your child to feel like their natural lifestyle is lacking xox Much love, light & laughter to all xox"

Meggzy Moo