When I was recipe testing for the book I ended up making nine or ten batches of cold process bar soap. That is a lot of soap for a family of four. Normally, I use Dr. Bronner’s liquid Castile soap in many of my personal and home care products, but faced with a glut of all natural, homemade bar soap, I thought perhaps…
Productive Home
4 Work Problems of Creative People and How To Solve Them
It’s official! I’m a “Creative” and I’m not meant for traditional 9-to-5 work. Pop internet psychology confirmed it, and I see no reason to argue. Like an eerily accurate horoscope, this article nailed many of my own work habits, need for flexibility and motivation in my work. But the article didn’t go far enough. It’s all…
How To Simplify Your Life With A Single Word
It’s 5:30 PM as a write this, and so far today I have received 17 different fully formed “opportunities” for me to give my time, influence or social capital away (for free, naturally). Throw in a looming mountain of laundry and an inconveniently timed dead car battery and it all adds up to the feeling my husband and…
A Look Inside My Fridge
I cleaned my fridge this weekend, stepped back to admire my domestic handiwork and realized I’d become a total Portlandia cliche. My fridge is half fermented vegetables and half backyard eggs. Every container is a mason jar. Oh, except for the basket. Right. There’s a twee basket in my fridge. You see where this urban homesteading thing…
Goals for 2015
I wasn’t going to do a “New Year’s Resolutions” post because, frankly, I’ve reached the age where I know nothing I say after three cocktails on December 31st is going to have any impact on my life or decisions on March 1st. I’ve learned that if something in my life needs improvement or change or more…
The Ethics of Dinner, Joel Salatin and Genesis 2:23
As a writer, sometimes I pull my words like teeth, one-by-one, each painful and like enough to leave a scar. Other times, I build up an article or a post mechanically, like furniture. There is craft, yes, but also an established structure on which to hang my words. Like a table has four legs and…
Income Resilience (Surviving A 20% Paycut)
Early last week, late in the afternoon just before I, with my farmer’s hours schedule, was ready to sign off from my day job for Anonymous Giant Corporation, I received an email from my boss. It had all the hallmarks of something sent in haste, in response to someone else’s urgent email, also sent in…
Seven Solar Surprises!
It’s been three months since we put solar panels on our roof, and there have been a few surprises. There were things about ourselves and the technology and physics that we didn’t expect. So, as part of our ongoing look at Project Solar, here are a few things I didn’t expect. 1) For Easy Energy…
How To Beat Stress Naturally (When You’re Ready To Scream!)
As my regular readers know, last week was kinda icky around here. My son was sick and super cranky (but without losing any of his trademark energy of course), there was a backlog of laundry, a sick kid crawling into bed every night meant sleep was a rare luxury, and nearly every surface of the…
Does Solar In Seattle Work? {Reader FAQs}
In early April, after about five years of deliberation, we had solar panels installed on the south and west facing portions of our roof. On April 15th our panels “went live” and since then we’ve had a chance to evaluate what it means to be solar powered in Seattle. We’ve been sharing moments of our…
Dos and Don’ts for Cheapskates
I recently heard about a show called Extreme Cheapskates that sounded like it might be full of interesting money saving tips. I watched a few episodes on Netflix while I was washing dishes. Man, some of the folks profiled on that show aren’t just frugal – they’re nuts! They are stealing from restaurants, embarrassing people,…
Eat From The Larder Challenge: Week Three Wrap Up
Let’s imagine for a moment that this isn’t a corner of the internet dedicated to growing vegetables, cooking good food, hanging out with chickens and periodically swearing. Let’s image this is Upworthy.com, a website dedicated to sharing mildly interesting and/or uplifting things marketed with the most annoying yet compelling headlines ever. If Upworthy were to…