You Can Never Have Enough Disco Balls

Remember the tiny disco balls I sourced second hand for our Little One’s cubby house?  I just found a large one about the size of a soccer ball (bought at a second hand charity store).  Apparently you can never have too many disco balls!

At any time of the day, light bounces off the large disco ball, adding dancing refections throughout much of our veggie garden beds.  Interesting that I have noticed this scares the annoying black birds from this area.

In conclusion it appears large disco balls, are potentially the coolest scare crows ever – loved by small children.

Mother’s Day Reflections

With the help of Daddy, our Little One gave me a very cute black board for our kitchen – my pressie for Mother’s day.

Now hanging near the drying herbs and garlic braid, I have written some fun ‘rules’ for our family upon the board:

Laugh often
Dance & have fun
Enjoy the moment
Be kind to others & yourself
Make a positive difference
Dream big & believe

I plan to redo our rules to also include ‘gratefulness is king’, which is a good note to conclude on.  Thankyou to all the good Mother’s of the world – especially mine.

P.S. Our Little One also gave me a gift voucher for Diggers.  Soon I will be buying more heirloom seeds and some fruit trees too.  Giddy up!!!!

The Dangers of Eating Sultanas

The game started with me laughing.  At two years of age, our Little One finds ‘slap stick’ humourous.

While chatting on the phone, I was trying not to laugh (not to encourage) as our Little One put sultanas up her nose – so they dangled out. She found this hilarious.

However all laughing stopped when one sultana disappeared from view.  Long story short, we again found ourselves sitting in a medical waiting room.

With what felt like ‘half our town’ also at the medical center, we were in for a big wait. The positive side, was that we were able to chat with a friend who was also waiting – and take this photo (thankyou Ingrida).

Just have to ask “why do these emergencies happen when you are wearing your daggy home renovating clothes?”  Covered in paint because I was again ‘sock painting’ our fence.

This post has nothing to do with sustainability – just a funny little story about family life and raising children.

On a side note, I texted my Mum after we saw the doctor to say all had ended well – our Little One was okay. However the simple act of texting was another reminder of how strange modern family life can be.

My phone has a terrible case of preemptive text syndrome.  Instead of saying that the sultana was up our Little One’s nose, my phone changed the text to ‘santana’. Therefore another text was needed to explain that a musician was not the obstacle stuck in our Little One’s nose.

You got to laugh.  🙂

A Mother’s Conflicted and Broken Sustainable Heart

On Saturday there was a large, evening festival for Wollondilly (our semi rural town area).

Upon arriving at the festival, I immediately knew I was going to be challenged.  Hundreds of helium balloons were being handed out to children.  Every child had a bright balloon attached to their wrist.

How do I as a sustainable Mum say “no” to a two year old child, who’s face shines with pure balloon excitement?

Sometimes being a sustainable Mum is challenging – in ways I never expected before I had children.

As you can tell from the photo, our Little One loves her balloon – even to the point of insisting she sleeps with it.

On Sunday (yesterday) as we ventured out and about, the balloon had to come too.  However as the balloon escape from her hands, it was not our Little One who got upset but my sustainable heart that broke.

I watched the balloon float up to the air, knowing the possible damage it will do to our waterways and marine life, when it eventually comes down.

In conclusion I have to admit that I don’t have advice for better dealing with these unsustainable childhood moments – no deep, profound words of wisdom to offer.  I just wanted to share my conflicted heart with you.

So not to beat myself up, I am choosing to focus on the ‘successful’ sustainable lessons our Little One has learnt (not what she/we still have to learn).  After all, at two years of age she already knows what edible food she can snack on in the garden. Bless her little garden foraging heart!

Reduce, Reuse, Restore, Recycled and RESCUED

Reduce – to limit the amount of our consumer purchases or to buy 2nd hand.

Reuse – finding other uses for items we no longer need, limiting the need to throw out those items.

Restored – old stuff becomes new again with a coat of paint, glue etc and some love.

Recycled – turning unwanted items into new items that we do need.

Rescued – my new ‘R’ word. Rescuing items, other people throw out and giving them a ‘second life’.

These children’s toys where left on the curb, destined for the tip – for landfill.  I still intend to give them a new coat of paint and love (to restore them).  In the meantime they are outside but under cover, near our clothes line.  Our Little One now plays with these rescued toys, as her Mummy hangs out the washing.

Brand new is rarely better. Our belief that new is ‘king’ is robbing our Earth of natural resources, our back pockets of funds and our minds of fun and creative solutions.

Do you get what I mean?

Creating a Cubby House Sign for the Fairies

Ta Daaaa! The fun cubby house sign is completed.

It became evident that having a cubby house sign was important, as the fairies were getting lost.

I still have more plans for the cubby……

Why is it Sustainable to Add Fun for Children in an Edible Garden?

A friend told me a story years ago that profoundly changed my attitude towards gardening and sustainability.

She described her own childhood with sustainable ‘hippie’ parents. Gardening for her as a child was a chore – always work that she, her siblings and parents needed to do in order to ensure food was on the table.

What struck me as noteworthy was now as an adult, she wants nothing to do with growing food, as she holds the belief, it is just hard work.

Her story has impacted my sustainable gardening approach.  I want dearly to create a magical and fun garden for children to love as well as a food growing garden.

Perhaps when building a sustainable edible garden, including fun ‘spaces’ for children is the most sustainable thing we can do – to inspire the next generation.

Fun, inspirational, magical, colourful, creative and beautiful is just as important for our garden, as sustainable and practical.

Every day I am adding new, exciting and fun items for our Little One to discover and interact with in the garden.  These little birds have been ‘liquid nailed’ to our recently repaired back deck rails.  I watched and waited till she saw them – her reaction was pure joy (for me and her).