Recently, we have been considering becoming even more self sufficient then we currently are. What changes we can make to our lifestyle to make financial and ecological changes. Most of these changes have focused around the infrastructure of our house, pretty much going off grid - zero net. So, disconecting from gas mains, electricity grid and doing away with the water meter and providing these utilities for ourselves. I will divulge our plans in due course, but, the issue I have found and want to waffle on about for a while - is that of what an "eco home" is. If you do a simple google search for eco homes, or ideas for eco homes - they always show new builds, wigwams or converted farmhouses that have had hundreds of thousands spent on them. To this date, I have not read of anyone converting a simple 2 up 2 down, or a terraced house into a pure eco home, zero net, off grid house. Why not? Not everyone interested in eco and self sufficiency live in a farm house nor have the skills or capitol to go the long haul self build method. Is it possible to turn a suburban terraced house into an off grid paradise? To retro fit all the things needed? My planning says - YES! No self build, but simple adaptation will be able to provide an off grid terraced home.
This, we are aiming to put to the test over the coming 9 months. What's more - we are aiming to do it on a budget on par with a standard house restoration.
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It is always a bit of a depressing time of the year, the time after you have planted all of your potatoes, onions, a whole array of seeds and the beds down at our allotments look so . . .empty. The soil has been worked and dug over, yet, although we know that things are happening below the surface of the soil, there is very little evidence for it.
The plots look so empty, and as well there is always that doubt at the back of our minds that they may not grow at all. Where would we be if the crops fail? What would we do? For us, as we are surviving on only what we grow and produce ourselves, a decent crop is essential. Fingers crossed! Every time we visit our plots we are ever hopeful to see new growth emerging from the worked soil. our 10 gallons of vinegar arrived today, so oh yeay, we now have enough to clean with for a full year!
The only issue is that it is labelled as “Non brewed condiment” which is the labelling used on this type of pseudo vinegar, as it is simply a diluted acetic solution, and not the brewed, distilled and salted solution that we know as vinegar. This Non brewed condiment is food safe, it just can’t be called vinegar. Personally, I do not care which name it uses, as it is good for cooking and also brilliant for cleaning. Our 10 gallons of vinegar arrived today, so oh yeay, we now have enough to clean with for a full year! The main thing that I want to do this forthcoming week is to pick up hops and grains from the local brewery where I also do a few chists per week. The spent hops from the brewery do make fantastic mulch and compost for the allotment, they are great to spread around the beds to prevent weed growth, and they are also really rich in all the essential minerals and NPK needed for healthy soil. They are also fab to add to the soil at the end of the growing season as they add a good bulk to the soil, and help with water retention. The grains that the brewery throws out are great as well, as the grains make awesome pig and chicken feed, and also do make brilliant compost. If you are ever passing a brewery, pop in and speak to the brewers, they are always more than happy to have a chat over a beer, and willing to see the back of their waste. It’s Sunday again, and the time when the wife and I sit down and review the week. We take a good hard look at what we have spent money on and maybe more importantly, what we didn’t spend money on. This week, we failed to keep within our £5 food budget. Such a shame - but we know why, and identifying the reasons adds to the valuable lessons in life. The reason we failed was because we ran out of potatoes. Our harvest of spuds is not ready as yet, and we ate our last spud about two weeks ago. For the past two weeks we have been getting our carbs from home made bread, but, on Saturday we decided to make a soup from a chicken. A soup is not a proper soup without potatoes, so off I trundled to the wholesale greengrocers and bought a 25kg sack of spuds for £4.99. This being, an over spend. However, the 25kg spud sack will keep us going for the next three months and I will factor in the expense into forthcoming food budgets. Onto the positives of the week. My Friday mooch to the butchers paid off as I was given a big portion of kidneys, several bones for stock (and the dog) and a large locally grown, free range chicken - all for £2,50 Not a bag purchase there. The kidneys provided two meals, the chicken meat 4 meals and the remainder of the chicken is currently becoming friends in the stock pot (hence the need for the spuds), will become at least another 3 or 4 meals for us. So not a bad mooch at all! |
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