A natural-coloured old wool blanket dyed with vegetables. These colours are fast. Purple carrot = purple (of course). Onion skin = orange.  Avocado seed = light brown.

Brown onion skins boiled for 1 hour in water. The fabric is then submerged into this pot and boiled for another hour. The samples above were only in for 15 minutes. While the colour does not wash out it fades over time – then you can simply refresh the colour with another soak.

Boiling up the purple carrot and avocado colour pots.

Last weekend I took Maia and Hugh to do a family-friendly natural dye workshop with Alieta, Leeza and Olin from the Forest Art Collective in Maleny. It revolutionised my thinking about what we can do about making non-toxic clothing – I’m totally hooked!

The learning circle.

Fabulous creative science. Many young children loved this workshop.

I really cannot believe how simple and effective the techniques are and how colouring fabrics this way creates only a tiny bit of compostable waste – the onion skins, boiled carrots and avocado seeds.

The waste from the botanical print dying process – compostable leaves, re-usable twine, and reusable metal scraps.

During the workshop we also experimented with botanical prints using leaves on natural fabrics. Here are the sample strips I did. You can see silky oak, eucalyptus, cinerea, bleeding heart – on silk, cotton, wool and paper.  I can’t wait to keep experimenting and making my own hand-dyed organic clothing. Thankfully there’s a great shop in my local town where I can source un-dyed organic fabrics.

My first go at creating natural botanical prints using natural fabrics and paper, leaves, water, twine and an iron rod.

I moistened the wool strip. (NB: you can see the original colour of the wool here that was used in the carrot, onion and avocado dyes)

Roll the leaves tightly in with the wool onto a rusty iron rod. The iron helps to fix the plant print to the fabric and give the black colour.

Bind tightly with twine to hold it all in place when it is boiled. Wool with

Create whatever patterns you like – here I used cinerea and eucalypt

I added 4 different leaf arrangements on my rod. It is also possible to have a large piece of fabric folded over to create leaf patterned prints.

Boil the wrapped iron rods in a pot of water for 1 hour.

I unravelled my stick as soon as it came out of the pot – so curious to see what had happened. If I’d had the patience to leave it rolled and moist for 3 weeks, all the colours would be far more intense.

We used iron at the workshop, but by wrapping and boiling with different rods you can get different effects. When you boil up in a stainless steel or aluminium pot,  iron = black, copper = blueish tinge, wood = neutral. The metals also fix the colours.

The post Chemical-free clothes: Easy DIY Natural Dye Using Common Foods appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

You can make them as simple or in-depth as you like. Of course, these activities are not just for the holidays – we love to do these things every week. In fact, they form the basis of many of our home education ‘lessons’.

Rock hopping at the upper Mary River.

You don’t need to know anything about the plants, animals, lizards, insects or weather to step outside and begin exploring. Nature is out your doorstep – all you need is to be open to wandering and wondering.

Silent Spring author, Rachel Carson, wrote another inspirational book, The Sense of Wonder.  In this book, written over three decades ago, she shares an her philosophy about the importance of sharing the wonder of nature with children. She says “wonder …leads to curiosity … leads to information …leads to responsibility … leads to action”.  This simple power of discovery and connection is such an antidote to indifference.   

You don’t even need to know what you are looking for, just some curiosity, patience to sit and watch what is going on around you, and an ability to notice things. Draw and jot down your discoveries. Share your findings with each other, and through apps like Bowerbird (Check out other citizen science sites in my previous post: http://our-permaculture-life.blogspot.com.au/2016/09/raising-earthcarers-1.html).

Bring your questions back inside and do some research – in books, on the internet, or find people who can help can.  People who are passionate about their topic are so keen to share it, particularly with young enthusiasts.

There are great lists out there for nature play activities, for example.

Nature Play: Fun Outdoor Activities for Kids 

Nature Play Passport Missions 

We’re going to have a go at these fun, open-ended activities over the next few weeks…

Become a Naturalist (a person loves to study nature) 

Head out on a field expedition or nature quest at different times of the day, to different places with your family and friends. Be a nature detective – step outside, what do you see, what do you hear, what can you feel, what do your wonder…?  

Make a nature adventure backpack – binoculars, magnifying glass, small field guides, pen knife or scissors (for taking a sample from a plant), notebook, pencil case (pencil, eraser, ballpoint, felt-tipped pen, colour pencils), clips (for holding pages), hat, sunscreen, water. 

Draw what you see – a leaf, a seed, a weed, a flower, a tree, a bird or group of birds, an insect, tracks, scats (animal poo), clouds … Make a note of what insect calls, bird calls, other animal sounds you can hear. 

You could go into your backyard, down the street, to your local park, to a local forest, beach or countryside… For a quick expedition perhaps just take a notebook and a pencil.  Make a point of always recording your notes and drawings

(Kids – always make sure someone knows where you are heading).

Bees in the kitchen garden

Become an Astronomer (a person loves to study the stars)

Go outside at night and for some wonderful star gazing. Can you see the milky way? What constellations can you see? Do you know which ones are planets? Can you see a shooting star – why does it do that? How many satellites have you spotted? Do you know how to tell the direction from the stars? Take a picture of the night sky and leave the shutter open for 30 minutes or more (you’ll need a tripod). Learn more about the stars and constellations (get a free app eg: SkyView) 

Night sky at our place by Columbian WWOOFer Alejandro Cappa.

Become a Meteorologist (a person loves to study the sky/weather)

Go cloud watching and look for weather clues.  Learn to read the clouds. What can you tell about the weather by the types of clouds – is wind, rain or a storm coming. Draw the clouds. Research about what the different types are called and what they mean. Get a field guide about weather and clouds – such as Cloudspotter. Use your imagination too – write a cloud poem, tell a story about the pictures you see, can you see an animal, a face…? 

Become a Geologist (a person loves to study rocks)

What kinds of rocks are there in your area? Make a rock collection. Sort them. Find out what they are made of (look in your rock books or online to help with rock ID). What does that tell you about the deep history of your place? Can you find fossils? Can you draw with your rocks? What games can you make up a game with your rock and pebble collection.

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My ‘rough basket’ – first ever go at basket-weaving. This too about an hour. Just a bit of tidying left to do.

Emma showing us different methods of simple basket weaving.

Two woven circles tied together with vine. Add an odd number of spines. Weave back and forth, pulling it closer.

My kids have claimed this as the egg basket. I can’t wait to show them how to do it.

The post I Learned To Weave a Basket Today & Was Surprised How Much Joy I Felt. appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Each week my permaculture livelihood brings something different, interesting and challenging, and connects me with different communities and places. I always learn something new – about a plant, about a way of seeing the world, about an innovative technology… I love my work. This week I learnt from one of the mums from India that they mix Ajwain seeds with tulsi – the sacred basil I grow. Among other things, it can be used to sooth coughs and ease asthma. I am going to explore this plant more.

One of the beautiful smiling children I had the pleasure of working with this week with her mini-wicking hanging garden she made at my workshop at Brisbane Square Library this week.

I arrange seeds in their families and put pictures of the plants next to them for the pre-readers. I get many young people helping me to set up, and many of them who like to just get their hands in the seed bowls and feel them.

Rachel – historian, planner, earthship enthusiast and PhD researcher – interviewed me this week. Her work is focussed on Off-Grid living and with me she mostly explored the questions of why I live the way I do and what influences were in my life to bring me to these decisions. It was great to have the chance to think about and articulate this. I thoroughly enjoyed meeting her and hearing about her research too.

 CHILDREN’S PERMACULTURE WORKSHOPS

I have an absolute ball with the children’s programs and am always delighted at their enthusiasm and knowledge. Together this week at libraries across Brisbane, I led free gardening sessions for almost 100 children.  We made mini-wicking gardens and planted them with cuttings of permaculture plants from my garden. We made newspaper pots for perennial cuttings and egg carton seed trays for a diversity of seasonal annuals. We made origami seed envelopes too. We explored ecological systems thinking, permaculture design ideas, edible perennial propagation and seed saving, working toward a zero-waste system, simple living ideas, and ways to protect wildlife and nurture diversity.

This girl is delighted with her cuttings of garlic chives, turmeric, pelargonium and cranberry hibiscus to take home for her garden. She has made and decorated a mini-wicking pot out of a 3L milk bottle to help her get these plants started.

This little girl is taking home some Brazilian Spinach, Sacred Basil, plus the ever popular Turmeric and Garlic Chives too.

At one of the seed stations, the children are selecting a range of seasonal vegetables, flowers and herbs to propagate in their egg carton seed tray.

My little display at the workshops of upcoming workshops and articles about our garden. I am really looking forward to a Nature Kids program next week and a PDC from August 29 – September 9.

WORM TOWER WORKSHOP

During the week I also ran an workshop for adults at the Forest Heart Nursery in Maleny about worm towers.  The nursery is now the proud caretaker of a new colony of compost worms. Thanks to Hugh for breeding the worms.  My eight year old son, Hugh, is now launching into his second enterprise – worm farming (his first is Hugh’s Bike Shed) to supply locals who want to set up worm tower systems. (have a look at this previous post for more worm tower information)

Chopping a length of pipe for a low-set worm tower (I have used the full length of pipe in my garden).

It’s important to drill lots of hols for the worms and castings to move out of the tube into the garden. We used a 6mm drill bit here and spaced the holes about 5cm apart through the section that is underground. I don’t put holes above ground to prevent flies from finding the compost.

Extracting the compost worms from another worm farm to place in the worm tower. Mound it up, the worms go away from the heat and light. Scrape off some material and the worms go deeper. Keep doing this until you are left with a bundle of worms.

In goes the pipe – nice and level in all directions (I’m a surveyor’s daughter!).  The soil and mulch will be brought up around the tower and the pot will be placed on top.  Inside the pipe we made sure the base soil was loose, we placed some moist coco-peat at the bottom as a bedding We topped it all off with a handful of mulch to help keep the temperature stable and to prevent flies from landing on the food scraps.

ENTERPRISING CHILDREN

Yesterday the kids and I were busy making things for this weekend’s Crystal Waters Monthly Market. We have an abundance of lemons and limes so they decided to make marmalade. They researched and trialled a few different methods and made 24 jars of delicious preserves to sell at the market.  I have asked them to write these up – so hopefully you’ll see these recipes soon. Maia has decided to join Hugh in worm farming and they’ll have worms for sale too. It’s going to be a fun day with lots of friends and neighbours meeting at the village green.

Some of the delicious lime marmalade Hugh made.

Some of Hugh and Maia’s worms ready to be bundled up.

The post Working as a permaculture designer and teacher. appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

The Maleny cows at the Obi Obi bridge.

The crossing tree.

Colourful crochet on display.

Monty thought the library canon looked pretty funny like this.

The Artisan Market bicycle.

The library tree was one of the most intricately decorated tree.

The kids got to explore textiles from the animals, to the weaving to the making.

The RSL poppies.

So many amazing beanies.

…and shawls.

Fabulous weaving using weed vines.

A felting wonderland

Maia liked these little dry felting worlds …

and these cute little knitted/beaded animals.

The post Colouring the Streets with Collaborative Community Art appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

I had been using the paper roll method for years (and a similar version made of wood), but last weekend I came across another method – the origami pot. I like it too because it creates slightly larger pots that are great for cuttings.

I often run permaculture workshops for children. In one of these I show them how to make the pots, how to collect, plant and care for seeds, and how to take cuttings from herbs and perennial plants – great food-growing skills for us all to have.

These little origami pots were in the kids corner at the Small Farmers tent at the Maleny Show last weekend where I spoke about permaculture design thinking. After packing up, I couldn’t resist stopping and making a few to take home for my kids.

The origami pots I brought home from the Maleny show with lettuce and parsley seedlings.

Here’s how to make both the roll and the origami pot…

METHOD 1: THE PAPER ROLL POT

Chop newspaper sheets in thirds. Place the toilet roll insert or paper towel insert at one end. Make sure the roll hangs over the edge enough to grab hold of it.

Roll the paper up and poke the end into the bottom of the pot firmly – this makes it secure and stable.

Remove the insert and it’s ready to fill with compost and seeds.

METHOD TWO: THE ORIGAMI SEED POT

Use a full page of newspaper.

Fold the bottom half up.

Halve again – folding left side to the right.

Open up the previous fold and take back just one corner to make a little triangle pocket.

Turn the whole thing over and do this on the other side.

Like turning a page, fold over the ‘wing’ to see this shape (do both sides).

Take the left corner and fold into the centre line.

Fold this again into the centre line.

Repeat this double fold for the other side.

Turn it over and repeat the double folds for left and right ‘wings’.

All folded up – smooth the lines.

Fold back the top.

Other side too.

Open out the base and there is your pot.

You can keep the flaps out or fold them in. Fill with potting mix or compost then use as a seed pot or for herb cuttings.

Make a bunch of these origami pots, line them up, fill them with soil and seeds. Grouping them gives them stability.

Keep them on your windowsill or verandah until sprouted and be put in the garden or in larger pots.

It’s a good idea to put them on a tray to avoid seepage on your bench.

They can be kept folded and flat, so it’s a nice idea to have some ready for when a spontaneous planting moment arises and you need some little pots ready to go.

Enjoy!

What other origami or paper pots have you found simple and easy to make?

The post Two Simple Newspaper Seed and Cutting Pots: Make them With Kids appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Ayca, my olive mentor, with my jar of olives – ready to be sorted into blacks and greens.

Lesson 1: separate green and black olives

 

Black olives in rock salt. Green olives in water.

Ayca’s instructions on how to process whole black olives

1. Mix chunky rock salt (not sea salt) with the black olives. (no water added)
2. The black olives do not need to be cut, pierced or smashed to accelerate the process.
3. Close the jar and shake.
4. Shake the jar every couple of days for at least a month.
5. Drain off any liquid that forms in the jar. It will be bitter.
6. Keep shaking and draining until the olives taste good to you.
7. If you like, just before eating, you can add a splash of olive oil or other flavourings – it is not necessary to steep in the oil.

Ayca’s instructions on how to process green olives

Ayca demonstrating how to process the green olives before putting into water.

1. Take each green olive and score the skin lengthwise (from end to end) 3 times with a sharp knife – 4 times if they are really big.
2. Place prepared olives in a jar and completely cover with fresh water
3. Change the water every 2-3 days when it becomes yellowy. Do this for 7-10 days until the taste is good for you (longer if they still taste too bitter).
4. Transfer olives into brine for 3 weeks. Ayca said she measured the salt:water ratio by the taste. She doesn’t need a measure, her tongue just knows. I’ll have to ask her tongue when I get to this stage. The key point here – it does need to be very salty. Someone else suggested enough to float an egg.
5. A delicious variation Ayca suggested was to place a few slices of lemon on the top of the jar of salted olives, just under the lid .
6. When the olives are ready, you can eat these straight from the jar, or you can soak them overnight in water to reduce the saltiness.
7. Similar to the black olives, just before eating you could add a dash of olive oil or other flavourings. Again it is not necessary to steep in the oil.

NB: Where I went wrong with the green olives … I didn’t slice the skin before soaking. They will take much long to lose their bitterness.

I also learnt that you need about 8-9 kg of green olives to make 1 litre of olive oil, and about 7kg of black olives to make oil. Ayca says she can get 50 kg off just one of her trees – that’s a lot of oil!

I asked Ayca about pruning too, because I had heard somewhere that olives needed to be pruned hard to produce. She does not prune her trees, only if there is some dead wood that needs to be removed and they produce abundantly. She feels it is better if the tree finds it’s own natural form.

I was curious too about making olive leaf extract – neither of us had an idea what to do but want to find out. This is my next olive quest.

While we were visiting our neighbour, who manages the Crystal Waters Ecopark (camping/van/cabin area) she took us for a walkabout to see her artistic additions to the landscape and shelters.

Over the past couple of months had noticed a few trees around these parts of Crystal Waters shedding their bark very strangely, so impossibly neatly. It was another of Ayca’s nature-art installations.

A gorgeous array of sewn leaf ornaments dance in the wind around the camp kitchen.

Ayca has created lovely double spiral to walk through next to the campsites and herb garden.

New herb garden for the visitors to use. Ayca tests Maia and Hugh’s knowledge of the plants. We were both impressed!

Maia loved Ayca’s ritual circle – a special meeting place made of found and natural materials with a fire pit in the centre (from an old washing machine tub). The arrows point to the North, South, East and West.

Later that day, at the community tree planting, I found Maia busy working away under a tree making her own little ritual circle. A leaf to the north, twigs to the south and grasses east and west.

Earlier in the day, we visited another neighbour who offered a cutting of her kangkong and a grand tour of her established food forest. Thanks Amber!  The kids learnt so much seeing another Amber’s garden – going on visits is a great way to explore design and see the various ways people implement permaculture systems. Thanks too to Ayca for a couple more snips.

Kang kong cuttings – soon to go in the sunken bath pond in my hugelkultur area.

Checking the new children’s native planting done last weekend and adding mulch and extra plants. Maia raised money for this project at her Owl’s Den cafe a couple of weeks ago.

The ground was much softer today after all the lovely rain. Hugh dug a lot of holes!

The post How to process homegrown olives: making your own delicious green & black table olives appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

Today’s shopping at my local coop – plastic free – hooray!!  Bulk organic flour, organic tahini, freshly crushed organic peanut paste, local organic honey, organic buckwheat, organic rolled oats, organic chia, organic nicola potatoes, organic Australian dahl, and toilet paper.

My dinner tonight was salad with tahini, and I’m looking forward to buckwheat and chia porridge with honey for breakfast.

I love taking my own glass jars and buying in bulk – honey, tahini, olive oil, tamari, fresh peanut paste …

Another way I reduce plastic coming into my home is buying loose fruit or veg. I just pop them straight in my shopping basket as is – no need for plastic carry bags. I will wash and peel these spuds before I eat them anyway.

Buy loose vegetables to reduce plastic waste.

My old pasta maker is probably 20 years old and a little rusty on the outside, but it works just fine.

Hugh’s first pasta experiment – organic wholemeal spaghetti and fettuccine. It was absolutely delicious.

In trying to reduce plastic, I also notice that many of the personal items and cleaning products I buy are now in refillable bottles and unwrapped.

In the local food coop, there’s a whole range of household cleaners and personal items available in bulk – dishwashing liquid, laundry liquid, body lotions, conditioners, shampoos and body wash…  I simply take my containers in and refill.

This hand-made soap is made by Self Managed Soap, a South-East Queensland co-operative. They are a community based group who have social justice and environmental ethics. Their soap is made from pure vegetable oils with no added chemicals. Actually, the cold-pressed virgin coconut oil is extracted by the coconut farmers themselves which means the oil is fresher and of higher quality, and more profits stay in the local community.  The world coconut oil trade has been controlled by trans-national corporations, buying copra cheaply from tropical producers and sending it to Europe or Asia for processing.  

I love this soap – unpackaged, palm oil free and really affordable – and just $1.50 a bar. They have a great range of natural scents – my favourites are the peppermint and cinnamon scrub.

Paper wrapped 100% recycled loo paper that’s nice on your bottom.

I sometimes get caught out and don’t have enough cloth bags so I grab a box from the shops instead.  The boxes always find another few good uses – for mulching, for craft projects my children are doing, or for workshops I run. I dislike the poly reusable bags. they don’t last that long, then become rubbish too. I think it’s better to buy or make strong cotton bags instead that go back into the soil when they can no longer be repaired.

 

 

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Over 30 children participated with their parents and siblings.

Exploring the design brief and sharing suggestions of what features might an ecovillage include.

Raiding the resource piles for building materials.

All ages worked collaboratively.

The children made their structures from cardboard boxes, bamboo, hemp string, pegs, clips, old sheets, fabric offcuts, and decorated with paint and found items from the garden.  The structures went up quickly, then the exciting part came – crafting the details, creating ecovillage stories together, and visiting each other’s places in the ecovillage.

There was rich and detailed thought processes embedded in the designs of these ecovillage elements.

Many focussed on getting their structures stable first before adding the detail.

This household complex was complete with garden, energy and water systems.

This little ecovillage house was tucked away in the bushes, away from the central zone.

A ‘tiny house’.

This big collaborative structure became the ‘ecocentre’ community meeting space complete with mailboxes.

Setting up the internal village systems.

There was a big rain the night before this event, and so many ants had come out of the ground. There were quite a few bites unfortunately, but this led to the design and construction of a bite clinic complete with aloe vera sticks inside.

New services evolved as the morning progressed – responding the the needs that emerged. For example, the anti-bite clinic became a necessity, with aloe vera treatments available.

A patient in the clinic – reportedly feeling much better after she’d been there!

The workshop enabled the children an opportunity to explore permaculture and systems thinking in action, and the notion of simple ecovillage living – they considered too what features might be included in such a village.

Bakery complete with a variety of sourdough breads on offer.

The wind-powered cafe – connected to one of the community energy systems.

Careful what you order….!!!

The children were very resourceful, finding ways to use a stack of boxes, bamboo, string and pegs and collecting materials from around their environment to add detail and form. I was so impressed at how focussed they were and how cooperatively they worked together to create a cohesive village environment.  I was so impressed too by the rich fabric of stories woven about the spaces the created.

The children showed intense focus and concentration for a couple of hours while they made their village elements.

Sharing the stories.

Ecological design, creating sustainable living environments and considering what it means to have a sustainable lifestyle are such important skills for this young generation to be cultivating. My goal with designing and offering Nature Kids, Young Ethos Scholars and Earth School programs is to create opportunities for children of all ages to delve deeply into thinking about the future in positive ways, experiencing ecological thinking and action, and finding ways to apply that knowledge and experience.

I think it is critically important for children to hear about and experience more ecological and nature-connected forms of human development and to share this with other children – to explore ideas together, to teach each other, and to explore what a regenerative, positive and joyful future may look like.

The post Healthy Future for Children – Nature Kids design an ecovillage appeared first on Our Permaculture Life.

There was wonderful creative excitement as around 75 children parents and grandparents (in 2 sessions) explored the world of perennial permaculture plants and how to propagate them in their own handmade up-cycled and decorated mini-wicking garden beds.

We nibbled, smelt, felt and planted a range of interesting plants and explored the role they play in our food, our medicine and our garden system – chocolate mint, Japanese mint, Vietnamese mint,  Brazilian spinach, Red Hibiscus spinach, Mexican tarragon, cosmos, sacred basil, pelargonium, oregano, weeping rosemary and society garlic. The workshop room in the Botanic Gardens Library smelt incredible!

Red Hibiscus Spinach

The children made wicking pots from old 2 or 3 litre milk bottles and juice bottles and when we ran out of those we made some smaller temporary biodegradable pots from newspaper.  I”ll post soon with a full explanation about how to make these different pots.

Thanks to the library staff for organising and setting up, thanks to the parents for bringing their children and getting so involved in the session, and thanks of course to the children for being so amazingly enthusiastic about planting and sustainability.

I love doing workshops for kids – just so much fun!  Every school holidays the Brisbane City Council supports me to offer free workshops for kids throughout libraries in the city.  During the year I also organise Nature Kids programs on the weekends to get out in nature to explore, learn and connect.

Here are just a few of the beautiful faces of the children and their creations yesterday.

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