Haha, I didn't get far with this meme, did I?!

Thanks for publishing this Tricia. I was just discussing this issue the other day with my cousin, who lives in inner city Canberra on a main road, and has been worrying about how that might affect her children. I'll be forwarding this to her :)

Thanks for stopping by Maria :) We are still working on not spending, though having, of course, to go back to spending more on groceries this month... but we have made some changes to how we spend and are definitely going to keep at it.

Wow, what a roller coaster of emotions this whole experience must have been! Hats off to you for taking it all in stride and getting to the real research needed to manage it. I hope other AS sufferers in Oz (or anywhere) find this page. Also I just followed your traditional foods link and saved your Food Flower to print out, thanks :)

One thing I haven't found yet is a good dishwashing liquid recipe - and lots of other 'homemade' recipe, like miracle spray above in the comments - seem to use small amounts of shop-bought dishwashing liquid. So if you find a good recipe, do share! Once no-spend month is over, a Diva cup is the first thing on my shopping list.

Now that's not a bad idea. I'll have to look through the cupboard and see what we could put on it. I've got flour and yeast though, so there's a beginning :)

I have just read your April 24 post, and it seemed like it was starting to go well, so I'm wondering how it went after that and whether you feel there were long term benefits? I haven't read the book, but I was struck by the idea that Chinese parents demanding more was a way of showing respect for their child. I lot of the parenting material I have read points in that direction, to the idea that by doing too much for our children (eg dressing a 3 year old, who should be able to dress herself), we are giving them the message that they are less capable, rather than the message that they are strong, resilient and very capable. I also wouldn't take it to the point of 2-3 hours of practice, but I *would* like to get my ten year old to practice his cello for 15 minutes a day without nagging or tantrums! And as for the morning routine - getting my 6 year old to get through it in a reasonable amount of time would be bliss!

Thanks for stopping by and saying hello, always nice to 'meet' other Australian bloggers :) We love Goodnight moon too. Our copy got the spine chewed off by child number 1, probably 9 or 10 years ago now, but it still gets read to child number 3 (Eliane) on a regular basis :)

I love the magic of that change of season feeling. It's something I don't remember being aware of in any very real way until I started gardening. Or at least, it had a different resonance: Spring meant my birthday and Christmas and the school holidays were coming, and I still feel the sense of excitement that engendered, as the days get longer (which they are doing now, here in Australia). Autumn mean autumn leaves and The May Holidays (two weeks of school), but nothing else, aside from that obviously it was getting cooler. Now Autumn means the Autumn Flush, when everything seems to suddenly grow quicker, getting that last spurt in before the frosts come. And, preparing in our own ways for winter, though we haven't yet developed a habit of massive preserving and don't have wood heating or cooking. But Spring - Spring is where we are now and it is Wonderful! Frosts don't finish until the last month of Spring here, so planting is still limited, but winter plantings are starting to bare fruit (peas, mostly), and the days are getting long enough to get more done - and Want to get more done. It's lovely. So best wishes as you head into the quieter time of year, that can be lovely too, and here we will be planting and rejoicing in the sun's return.

Thanks for this detailed description of the process from woe to go Asphysixa. I love the idea of sharing the chicken raising and - importantly - killing - with some neighbours. We don't know many near us who might join in, but we do have two other egg-chook raisers nearby who we should perhaps approach with the idea sometime. though one of them (the backdoor neighbour two doors down) we haven't actually met! Just know they have chooks. On the other hand, I do have some other friends in Canberra who might be prepared to share a 'shipment', and though we could both raise our own chickens we could maybe work together on harvesting days. I also used to be vegetarian, and also have always felt that if you are going to eat meat, it would be good to really understand the whole process. I know my kids know that their meat comes from animals, but it seems to me that being part of the process of raising them at least, will potentially give you a greater respect for the life that has been sacrificed for your consumption. i don't have a problem with eating meat per se (my reasons for being vegetarian were always more about the treatment of animals in our farming systems than anything else), but I think it's important to acknowledge that life that's been given.

As far as getting away though - we gave a dog, a cat & chooks, and in the summer time a garden that needs fairly regular watering to survive, so even in ten it can be hard to get away, though we do have parents nearby who will feed the animals if it's just for a few days. but we couldn't be going away all the time.

What a great post. Having written my own post recently about why I am happy staying in suburbia (http://kayoz.typepad.com/blog/2012/07/urban-suburban-rural.html ), I have to admit that the one regret I have is the dream if having our own 'house cow'. We are a bit dependent on milk in this household, and while we get our milk from a relatively local dairy (this side of sydney), who's ethos I am happy with, I'd far rather have our own. But, between the distances and all that extra work? Yeah, the cow dream just can't compete! I love seeing your pics though, and will enjoy 'watching' you make the transition. :)

Oh, I really want to raise some meat chickens (as I think I might have commented on another post), but those little chicks are so cute. Can I do it? And if I doubt myself, how will my kids go with it? We have chooks we keep for eggs, which are of course pets as well. And while I want to raise chickens for meat largely for the reasons you give in your comment above, keeping them from becoming pets could be hard. We've never had our egg chooks at younger than 8 weeks, and still get attached to them...

That's fantastic! And all with virtually no sewing :) I love the process of felting. I haven't done a lot of wet felting myself, just some bits at my kids' school, but I've done some needle felting. Really cool. :)

Ah, this is another thing I've been thinking about, but not quite to the planning to actually do it stage yet. We have chooks for eggs, and my kids of course think of them as pets, so the idea of raising chickens for meat has not met with a great deal of enthusiasm so far :)