Intentionally

I don't really do New Years resolutions.  I have read a lot about people have words to follow for the year and that has always rather attracted me.  In 4 years of blogging however I have never felt there was one word that summed up my hopes in myself.  This year however a word has been going round and round in my head all week.

Now I have been applying this word to a lot of things to do with the way I live and bring up my family.  

I am intentionally vegetarian, I don't just do it or bring my children up that way for no reason.  

I always attempt to be an intentional shopper, finding fairly traded goods and ethical, organic produce now happens on a daily basis on the majority of my shopping.

I have an intentional relationship with my husband.  After 16 and a half years we have discovered that listening is terribly important as is saying what you really mean to say.

It is this last point that has particularly got me thinking.  I do this with my husband, but do I do it with all those I am surrounded by all the time?  How often do I walk away from conversations thinking that I didn't really get across what I really wanted to say.

Now there are times I think when it may be more prudent to intentionally ignore, rather than labour a point which is never going to be understood.  However with those to whom I am closest I do feel I could be doing a little better.  Too often I go around the houses or just stay quiet rather than say what I really mean - leaving too many opportunities to be misunderstood.

So they you have it, I am now praying and hope you will join me in trying to put it into practice more and more.

Designing and Creating on a Purchased T-shirt.

1. Take one fairtrade cotton white t-shirt from Marks and Spencers £6.00 for a pack of 3.
2. Purchase one tub of dye £2.99
3. Weigh t-shirt to find out if you can dye two at a time.

4.  Turns out I could so into the cold dye they go.

 

 5.  Once dying is finished, cut out some squares using old clothing, enough to spell the word you are going to do - I decided on AWESOME

6. Some letters I did with ribbon. and stitching.

7. Other letters, I used bond a web to cut out and stick some red fabric cut out letters which I then embroidered around.  The remaining ones I did using embroidery thread only.

 

8.  Choosing which way to put the letters took a bit of help from my hubby.

9. The final design chosen was a tick.  After bond-a-webbing the squares onto the t-shirt, I crossed stitched around the whole lot.

 

 10. I am pleased to report that my 11 year old son loved it when he received it for Christmas.

Renewing a Stained T-shirt.

I was really cross with myself the other week.  I put on a cream t-shirt and then went outside to do some gardening.  I know, I know, I didn't even notice the stain until I was doing my ironing after washing it.  I was not happy, there was no way it was going to come out.

You can see the mark in the centre at the bottom.  I was especially annoyed because it is a fairly new fairtrade t-shirt from Marks and Spencers.  So I put my thinking cap on and now have a much nicer t-shirt.

In fact I prefer my t-shirt now to when it was plain - hooray!

The fabric I used was from an old pair of linen trousers which had worn out.  I used bamboo buttons that used to be on my duvet cover until the holes started to grow and I had to replace the buttons.  I used 2 strands of embroidery silk for the central designs and one strand for the edge stitching.  I pinched the heart design from rhonda jean at Down to Earth, she has a free downloadable pattern for an embroidery I am still in the process of! Before doing the embroidery I ironed onto the squares some bondaweb, then embroidered, then ironed the squares onto the t-shirt before finishing with the buttons and edge stitching.  All in all it has taken me a couple of hours which I have done while playing scrabble on facebook!  How smug am I now feeling!  It has been quite good biblical teaching to me as well, as it does tell us in the bible:

Revelation 21: 1-5
And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away and the sea was no more ... I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Behold the dwelling of God is with men ... He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall mourning nor crying, nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away... And he who sat upon the throne said, "Behold, I make all things new."

One Thousand Gifts.

205. Time to make a 'Blessings' bracelet for a dear friends 50th birthday.

206. My faithful dog waiting patiently for my return home.

207. The excitement she shares with me when I return.

208. My husbands muscles and time - sorting out our compost heap!

209.  All this lovely compost, made from all our garden and kitchen waste! Ready to nourish this years growth.

210. Time to walk, and to find my limitations.

211. Crafty hands using scrap fabric, that can take over when my legs are not working properly.

212. Beautiful wild flowers.

213. A new plant for my garden 'Veronica'.  I just couldn't resist a reminder of a friend overseas!

214.  Books to read and stimulate me - currently reading Grain in Winter, full of musings on difficult situations in life.

Ethical Brighton!

Last week after going to visit my dear friend Helen, we continued our journey south to go back to Brighton, on the south coast of England.  We stayed there back in September for a couple of nights and found the best vegetarian restaurant we have ever been to Terre a Terre .  So it was the thought of visiting this and knowing that I had also discovered some great fairtrade shops that we decided to go back.  I had time to prepare myself this time so spent a few hours surfing the net the day before we went, finding the Fair trade shops that I wanted to visit and marking them on a map so that I wouldn't forget where they were.

We arrived late, booked into the same hotel as before (we are such creatures of habit!).  Fortunately they had space we hadn't dared to book anything as the weather had been so unpredictable and there was still lots of snow on the ground.  After a quick freshen up and a cup of tea we made our way down to the restaurant.

We both had potato rosti's, mine with spinach and poached egg, my husbands with spicy halumi tika, this was washed down with a fine local West Sussex white wine.  We then treated ourselves to one of their yummy puddings.  I had a cheese cake that was accompanied with a lemon and rosemary sauce which was just divine, while my husband had something very very chocolaty.  My husband brought me their cookbook for my birthday at the end of last year and so I now feel re-inspired to get it out and get cooking.

After a very warm nights sleep (we could not cool the room down, even with the window open!), we went off for a days shopping map in hand.

First we went to Gossypium which is a shop I have brought from by mail order many a time, they do a superb selection of fairtrade fabrics.  It was lovely to browse, I was interested to see if they had any sale items as they are usually a little bit pricy.  Unfortunately the only bargain I found didn't fit, but I enjoyed the looking.

There are lots of little gift shops in The Lanes, many of which stock fairtrade products, so I enjoyed having a little look around these.

We then walked up Bond Street in the North Laines area.  Here we visited a small gift shop called Evolution, they are almost all fairtrade, and we managed to pick up 3 lap trays for the children that were a little damaged but had their prices cut from £10 each to £2.00 each.  So we got those!  I loved looking at all their FT jewelry, but resisted it knowing I was going to the bead shop.

We passed another shop that I noticed had clothing by Nomads on a rail outside.  So I went inside.... there I found right at the back a whole rail of sale items and managed to pick myself up a lovely white long sleeved shirt (my husband loves me wearing white) for £15.  Another succesful purchase.

From here we went to my very favourite shop Infinity Foods for an organic ethical vegetarian you just cannot get any better.  Here we stocked up on lots of house hold items, chocolate shampoo, seaweed shampoo, lavender bath soak, Weleda rose cleansing lotion, replaceable head toothbrushes for my youngest - we got these last time we came and were very very impressed. We then went into the food section and brought some Vegan Worcestershire sauce, which I didn't know existed, the normal variety, used alot in sauces has fish in it.

We were now laden down with 'stuff', so my husband offered to take it all back to the car while I went on the a bead shop that I wanted to visit.  I eventually found it and spent 20 minutes in my heaven!  I was very restrained, I just picked up a few bits, jewelry fastners, earing hoops and a few packets of seed beeds in colours I had never seen before.  This restraint cost me £6.50, and I have enough 'bits' to keep me going for quite some time, so watch out for some more making.

We then went into Costa Coffee for a lovely fairtrade Late, shared a sandwich and lovely crunchy granola bar.  After a much needed sit down and rest we had a little wonder around the book shop we were in, I managed to find 'The Secret Life of Bees' by Sue Monk Kidd for my mum, I read this several years ago and thought so many bits reasonated with my mums growing up years that she would really enjoy it.  This made the perfect little gift to give her for looking after the children for us.

There was not much energy left in me after this, my husband on his way back from dropping the goodies at the car had managed to find a second hand copy of a jazz cd which had lots of clarinet playing on it - so he got this for our eldest (who has been asked to join the school jazz band).  He had also passed a second hand book stall and saw copies of the original Dr Who books, so he purchased one of these for our son.

I just had a couple of shops left on my list, on the way to one we passed a small tucked away shop called Fair Play, they did not have a huge collection, they had some People Tree clothing and lots of gifty bits.  What did catch my eye was bedding.  This is something we were looking out for for our bedroom, they had some gorgeous sets, but didn't have the one I liked best in King size which we needed.  I got talking to the sales lady who gave me the details of where they purchased them from.  This is the set from   Fairly covered that we are going to order.  It goes just perfectly with the husky pink and deep ruby reds we have in our bedroom.

There was just one shop left on my list but I knew that would be a car ride to make, so we went back to the car and headed off.  Kolkata has some very unique fairtrade clothing and gifts.  What I did find here that I have found no where else is fairtrade wools and cottons for knitting with.  We got a small hair band for my youngest, so that they all had a little gift, and headed home.  We were just commenting on how lovely it had been to spend so much time shopping in our kind of shops when I noticed a huge Co-operative Supermarket shop.  This store is a big favourite as they sell lots of fairtrade produce and we also use them for their ethical banking and insurance.  I remembered that I had a cheque in my purse that needed to be paid in so we pulled the car into the car park and my husband whisked the cheque in.

This made me realise, that if I had to move anywhere in the UK then Brighton would probably be my choice, just because it seems to so support the life style that we have chosen to live.  Moving is not something that I particularly want or would like to do, so for now,  I shall just treasure a lovely time away with my husband, chatting, shopping and eating.  I shall also continue to pray that the area of Hampshire in which we live might be transformed into a similar ethical living style one day.

It was fab to get home and discover there had been no upsets, the eldest went off to her Church run Youth Group, the younger ones went off to bed and we settled down to a nice treat of an Indian takeaway with my mum and dad before heading off for an early night in our own, cosy bed.  Perfect.

Blogging on Bogs!

Finally our downstairs cloakroom has been decorated! We have now been in our house for 7 and a half years and this is the final room to be decorated. There is a reason we were leaving it. We had grand plans drawn up when we moved here and planning permission gained to put and extension on the house which would have meant this room would have been moved. When we had the kitchen done some 5 years ago we had plumbing put into the Garage which is behind the wall you can see in the photos. This meant they had to take the sink off, I took that opportunity to go and buy a new sink knowing we would eventually want a while suite. It now feels as though we have given up on our planned extension - having had to buy another new car there is not likely to be any money available for a very long time.

We have therefore got it decorated.

We have done it all ourselves, I even managed to lay the tiled floor without being able to get on my knees - quite proud of that! The towel rail on the bottom of the cabinet means that the kids no longer try and shove it behind the radiator every time they have finished with it. The mirror is from here , the cabinet is from Ikea. The poster on the wall of the UK is hopefully going to get some information absorbed into my children's head while they go about their business! The blind means the neighbours no longer have to watch our shadowy figures now the evenings are so dark.

It may be just a downstairs loo - but I am really loving having it looking nice.

Ethical and Environmental Living.

I talking to a friend yesterday about Christmas cards, yes, I know far to early to be even considering this! What we were actually discussing is how we felt about receiving non-charity Christmas cards. My friend was expressing her surprise at how many non-charity Christmas cards she received last year, and how hard she was finding it anticipating the same thing happening again this year, but just not knowing how/if there was anything she could do about it.

About two years ago I stopped buying clothing or goods where I could acquire such items either locally, organically or where the goods were fair trade. This has had several significant impacts:

1. I no longer get the desire to go out on big spending sprees - on line shopping never has quite the same 'comfort' as physically going to the shops.
2. Because my choices are limited (especially with regards to clothing) I only try and find things when stuff either wears out or a new need is identified.
3. Though I have to pay more (generally) for items of clothing, I am quite sure I am actually saving money because of points 1 and 2!
4. My children and husband are totally behind the whole project, and are getting very adept at finding 'fair trade' labels!
5. Despite many disparaging comments from folks saying that the whole 'fair trade and organic' thing is a 'fad' - I am absolutely delighted to see Cadburys carry out their pledge to make their dairy milk chocolate fair trade this autumn. (We did write to them asking them to do it!).
6. I never have to put on my clothing and think 'was a child forced to pick the cotton for this instead of getting an education'.

Going back to the Christmas cards, I have made my own cards for the last 10 years, it is something I really enjoy doing, I have tried to encourage my children to only use charity cards when they want to send them. I do believe that we should not be too 'scared' of upsetting people by letting them know how we stand on ethical and environmental issues. However my experience has now shown that as with many things (especially my faith) the best way of attracting other folks to causes that you support is to set an example that is true and honest.

My Ethical/Environmental Living Journey - Vegetarianism.

I recently gave my whole blog a bit of a going over adding labels to all the posts that I had written. I know I should have done it from the beginning, but for some reason I just couldn't be bothered. (With hindsight, I so wish I had, it took an age to do it all!). I was quite pleased to note so many labels to the posts I had written, a pretty mixed bunch of stuff, which I do think reasonably reflects my life - with one exception.

I was appalled to realise that I haven't (unless I missed it) ever blogged about my ethical and environmental journey. I like to console myself with the fact that in most things I am still 'Trying to find me', however on this one subject I think I totally know where I am! I will try and recap now on where this journey started and how it has progressed.

I think the starting point was probably when I met the man who was to become my gorgeous husband. He had been vegetarian since his teens and let onto me in the very early stages of our relationship that he didn't like kissing me after I had eaten meat! I was a little shocked, but not being the sort of person to resist a challenge I very quickly stated that I had better turn vegetarian then - and did. It was an overnight thing, a bit like my spiritual conversion I suppose. I realise now that my reasons for doing so what not really very ethical or environmental, however over the last 15 years I have developed a very keen sense of why I remain vegetarian. It is not really anything to do with not 'eating' animals (or fish) but much more to do with how I feel society treats animals (and fish). I remember growing up when we would go out for a meal and you could have 'steak' as a real treat, these days, it seems you have a right to eat as much of this as you want. It's this demand that is unpalatable for me, as with all demand and supply chains, this means that industry takes over trying to supply as much as cheaply as possible, blow the costs to the animals or the environment. The other side of my argument for being and remaining a vegetarian is that it is how I believe God made us to be. In the Bible we are told that Adam and Eve were given all leaves and grains to consume, it was not until after the flood in the time of Moses that they were told they could consume meat. So it gives me a great reassurance of the future of returning to a 'new earth' when the 'rapture' finally takes place. Considering I eat at least three meals a day, this is not a bad thing to be reminded of on a regular basis.

There is of course another reason - the stubborn part of me is determined to show all those folks who reckon it isn't healthy not to eat meat and fish that it is completely and absolutely possible. And I do delight in every new research article that appears telling us that it is actually possible to be healthier eating a balanced vegetarian diet than a carnivorous one. I am very proud of raising my two youngest (now 8 and 9) in this manner. They know the reasons why I have done this and they are free to choose what they would like to eat when out or when I am not cooking. The one thing that they will often submit to is jelly sweeties (the Haribo variety particularly). I do not purchase this sort of gelatin containing stuff for them but if others give it to them I do make sure they are aware of what it contains but they are free to consume if they wish (mostly they choose to do this!). It does frustrate me that there are not more vegetarian sweeties available, I know it is possible to get non gelatin containing stuff but shops just don't stock them!

I do not mind people asking me why I am a vegetarian, I do not so enjoy it when people try and tell me there are better causes to stand for. Hopefully you will see in the next few posts that be a vegetarian is not my only claim attempting a more ethical and environmental lifestyle.

I have found that as time goes on I am becoming more aware of what I am buying. For a while now I have avoided all leather products (I'm not vegan, but think leather products are in the same supply/demand crisis). Unfortunately I have not been able to do much in the way of shoes, though I do have a few pairs of vegetarian friendly ones (this is due to my foot shape and bone problems). I am very much looking forward to a visit to Brighton next month with my hubby so that we can go and visit the Vegetarian Shoe Shop http://www.vegetarian-shoes.co.uk/, we have had some lovely purchases for him from there in the past.

I am sure I could still improve some more on this journey, but it is a journey that I wouldn't swap for anything.