Back To Basics Challenge

Sowing seed or Planting

Hubby brought home some large garlic from our new house.

Planning for The Future - meal planning, the next seasons garden plan, working out storage plans or more long term goals and projects like plans for digging root cellars

I have been looking at hundreds of wild plums laden with fruit. So thinking if we could wildcraft some plums near our new house.

I was studying my Indian Cooking Class book by AWW. Ages ago I wanted to get my eldest to buy some Indian ingredients for me. I didn't know what they were off hand. It must have been asafoetida powder and some jaggery. Of course, you don't need jaggery as you can use palm sugar. I bought some asafoetida powder from Herbies spices, so look forward to making some more recipes from my book. It is the site's fourth selling item.

Working for the Future - storing food, managing stores, preserving, building that home made cob or solar oven, adding house insulation, saving for manual grain mills etc

I didn't realise, but our son found some scooters at the tip. They are electric. One has the parts that the other one needs. So our middle daughter and her Dad have been working on them to see if they can get a scooter to work!

Unfortunately our freezer constantly needs defrosting as we probably need a new one. Hubby defrosted it on Boxing Day to keep our food from getting any softer.

Hubby apparently found some stove elements at the tip. When we bought this house that we live in, the stove looked new and white in my memory. On settlement day we found an old stove. One element was raised up and therefore the pots slightly on an angle. Friday night I saw the top of the stove lifted up. Had no idea what hubby was doing (usually I know but these days it seems no one tells me of their finds etc.) but it turns out I have a new element and hopefully it makes for a much better cooking experience. It saved buying a whole new stove.

Building Community - volunteering, donations, joining an existing community group, forming your own community group, taking a cake to a friend having a hard time, calling someone you just let drift out of your life, etc

I helped my daughter's friend's parents get their Christmas shopping done by having their daughter over for a sleep-over. They like us live a long way from decent shops.

Learn a new Skill

Well, this week I am going to mention a skill that my husband taught our son. Our son was using the shovel, and I assume too much pressure was put on it and it broke. On Wednesday, he taught him how to replace a shovel handle.

On Tuesday I saw our middle daughter manually hedge trimming, and our little girl who is seven sitting up sewing around some material for a sachet for her Nana. Her Dad taught her a stitch she could use and helped her when she ran out of thread. The stitches were quite nice. She had gone around once herself and had decided her stitches were right, that is when she learnt the new ones. Now we are hoping to continue and do a nine patch. So far I have found some instructions. The squares have been chosen, cut out and attached to each other. My Mum gave the girls some material remnants on Christmas Day.

She also gave our little girl some money for her present. On Saturday she took her money to the shop and bought a kit to make a scarf. It is like a basic loom.

I saw in the November issue of the Australian Better Homes & Gardens a pattern for crochet on the tops of towels to hang on the stove, and some washcloths. If I can get my hands on a copy I would like to learn how to make towel toppers.


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