What I bought this Month...

2 books from the charity shop (1 was for my mum though!)
'The Art of Crochet' Magazine
A kit to make and frame casts of babies teeny hands and feets - a Christening present for my friend and her new baby to get messy with.
A new winter coat - £2.99 from the chazza, I've been looking for a new one for ages - I've had my old winter coat since I was 15!
2 gemstones - a bloodstone and a blue agate
Another book
A LAPTOP!!!!!

I felt it was going quite well until the laptop! It had to be done though really as my old one had died of brokenbatterybrokendiscdriveanddeadharddrive-disease! It was a really cheap one too and had been not-working ever since I got it, so I decided not to get it repaired and just get a better quality one this time (but I'll be researching how to recycle old laptops so it can be got rid of the in best way possible) My new one is shiny and beautiful and I love it!
The crochet magazine was wrapped in a LOT of plastic, which didn't have any markings on so it went in the bin, I shouldn't of bought it really, I know logically that there are millions of resources online to teach me to do just about anything I like, but I think seeing it advertised on TV so much and the combination of getting a magazine, DVD, two balls of wool and a hook for 99p overwhelmed me! I won't falling for that again though I hope!
Also, I STILL need to start going to the library!

Butternut Squash seeds...

I may have mentioned here before that we have very little food waste in our household, except for veggie peelings and stuff. This is mostly because I eat it all up! Nom Nom! So I've been having a bit of a creative think about how I can reduce what food we DO get rid of and I started wondering about the seeds from Butternut Squashes (which mum can't get enough of at the moment!). I saw Jamie Oliver roast some pumpkin seeds on his Christmas TV programme, which led me to much googling and the joyous discovery that ALL pumpkin and squash seeds are edible, either raw or roasted! Which is really good news for me, because I'm vegan and like to eat lots of nuts and seeds because they have lots of nice oils and nutrients in them, but I'm aware that they're not from a very sustainable source (i.e. not grown in England), so this is a really good option for me, cos pumpkins and squashes are easy to grow in the UK!



I scooped all the seeds out and washed them (they're well sticky!), then left them to dry on some kitchen paper overnight (and yup, the kitchen paper went into the compost after!) then oven roasted them with some sunflower oil. They're very yummy too! In the name of seed-research I also tried some raw and they were very tasty - kind of sweet and a bit coconutty I thought.

There are timings and instructions here, but I've copied them out for you too...

PAN ROASTED SEEDS

In a 1-quart stainless steel saucepan over medium-high heat, roast 1 cup rinsed pumpkin seeds in1/2 teaspoon vegetable oil for about 8 minutes. Remove from the heat when they puff up slightly and start to change color. Add Salt to taste. Let cool to serve.

OVEN ROASTED SEEDS

In a 10- by 15-inch baking pan, place 2 to 3 cups rinsed pumpkin seeds.Sprinkle lightly with salt. Bake in a 300° F oven until golden and crisp, about 45 minutes; stir occasionally If made ahead, cool and store airtight up to 3 days. A 14-pound pumpkin yields about 1 1/2 cups of seed.

I wonder if you didn't want to eat them yourself, if the birds in your garden might like them too!

Proud...

My mum works as a teacher in therapy groups for children with special needs, and while the children are in the groups their parents have a cup of tea and a natter. They've been drinking their tea out of plastic cups, but this weekend my mum went and bought some mugs, took them into work and declared to her workmates that she 'couldn't stand the waste of all those plastic cups going into the bin'!

Hurrah!

How to Freeze Cookie Dough...

As well as freezing my buns off making Fred the snowman,

I've also been busy freezing my vegan cookies, so I can just put one or three into the oven when it's on and have vegan zero-waste cookies whenever my heart desires.

The cookie recipe I used here makes about 30 cookies, so to stop myself exploding I scooped lots of balls of cookie dough onto a baking tray and put it flat into the freezer overnight.

The next day I transferred all the cookie dough balls into a plastic box then put them back in the freezer to take out as I need them.

This is the first time I've frozen cookies like this - I usually just freeze the whole lot of dough together then defrost it and make a big batch of cookies. I was worried they'd all stick together, because I didn't use any greaseproof paper or anything, but they seem to be fine - yey!

I got an Award! :D :D :D

The lovely Julia from Easy Eco to Go has nominated me for a Happy 101 award!
Now onto the rules for accepting the award:

List 10 things that make you happy.

Try to do at least one of them today, and tag 10 bloggers that brighten your day.

For those 10 bloggers who get the award, you must link back to my blog.....the last part..only if you want to!

So here are 10 things that make me happy...

My favourite friends :)

My mumFluffy - My Giant African Land Snail, he's incredibly massive, moves v e r y slowly and enjoys baths and showers under the tap - hours of hypnotically slow entertainment!

Stars - I love to see them twinkling in the night sky and I'm so glad I'm living back in the (semi) countryside and can see them again after living in a city for most of last year!

The Seaside - oh I do like to be beside the seaside, oh I do like to be beside the sea!

Vegan chocolate fudge hedgehog cakes - mum makes me one for my birthday and for christmas every year - THE BEST CAKE IN THE WORLD!

Reading - I know it's a cliche but I do really love getting lost in a good book (my favorites are anything by Jane Austen or Shakespeare, the Harry Potters, His Dark Materials, The Beach, The Slaughterhouse 5, The Handmaids Tale...)

Travelling - getting on a bus with my backpack and my travel buddy and driving miles and miles and miles away to an exciting place to sleep in hostels with millions of crazy, inspiring people and eat lots of new food and learn funny phrases in foreign languages and feel excited and free and happy!

Sofa+blankey+DVD = :D

Dr Who :)

The happy thing I'm going to do today is emailing my best friend, who now lives in Brazil, and send her all my news and all my love :)

Ten lovely blogs that brighten my day are...

Eco Experiment
Dandaworld
Blah to Tada
Easy Eco to Go
Kind Over Matter
My Zero Waste

The Rubbish Diet
Sagojyou's Vegan Page

Vegan Lunchbox

Condo Blues

Have a happy day everyone :D xxx

Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies...Biscuit of the week...

This week I have been ignoring my cravings for bourbon biscuits (for now! lol) and actually made some non-burned, non-funny tasting chocolate chip cookies!

I used this recipe, which I like because it has really simple ingredients, it came of the internet *somewhere* but I've changed it a bit so it works better for me (if it's your recipe, 1. thank you! 2. let me know so I can link it to you!)

2 cups of flour

1 cup of sugar

2 tsps baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 cup of veg oil

1/4 cup of water

chocolate chips

Mix the dry ingredients together and the choc chips (I found an excellent new way of making choc chips from the big bars of vegan/soya free/paper&foil wrapped chocolate I buy - but it in an old plastic bag and whack it repeatedly with a rolling pin!), add the liquid gradually and mix together, add more water if needed. It should be a thickish paste, but still quite light if that makes sense. Spoon it onto baking trays and cook for about 20 mins at gas mark 7, swapping the trays round half way though.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to build a snowman!!!!!!!

WOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!

Happy 2010!

HAPPY NEW YEAR everyone!!!! I LOVE having a whole new year full of potential...yey!!! But before we get to all that I thought now would be a good time to take a look back on what eco-achievements I'm proud of from 2009....

• I started a blog!


• I started volunteering at an organic garden


• I went to my first Friends of the Earth meeting


• I went all the way to the bottom of France on holiday without taking an aeroplane


• I haven't used a plastic bag since I pledged to stop during zero waste week


• I've only used 1 plastic bottle since I pledged to stop using them during zero waste week


• I found out where to recycle my old electric toothbrush!


• I hand made most presents I've given this year from reused and repurposed things.


• I started a distance learning course in Environmental Sciences and I'm 2 topics through (despite not studying any science since I was 16 - eek!)
  
• I grew my own garlic! And lettuce and radishes.


• I stopped eating biscuits wrapped in plastic and have started baking my own.


• I've opted out of as much junk and unnecessary mail as possible.


• I haven't bought a new CD all year (since I discovered spotify - woop!)


• I've bought far less stuff than ever before

I started this blog thinking I was on the verge of getting my own house and being in charge of the eco-friendlyness....that hasn't happened for me this year and I'm staying with my Mum for now, so I haven't been able to do as much as I'd like...however, a new home for me is on the horizon (sharing with some of my good good friends - yey) and hopefully a job too, so in 2010 I hope to be having a lot more eco-friendly frolics! Once I'm in my own place I'll be allowed (lol) to make a big veggie patch in the garden, weigh our weekly rubbish, try to convince my housemates that we NEED some chickens, try to convince my new housemates that we can/should decorate and furnish our new home while buying nothing new and have general happy-time adventures! Roll on 2010!

I hope you've done things in 2009 and that make you proud and that you have plans for 2010 that make you feel fizzy inside like a bottle of lemonade (remember to recycle that bottle, y'all!)!!??

And I just want to say thank you to all those who've read or visited this blog in 2009 - thank you so much, I really enjoy being a small part in this eco-blogcommunity that radiates it's awesomeness across the internet!

No More Plastic Post...continued...

As some of you might remember I've been trying to STOP any post from being delivered to my house in those plastic 'envelopes' - because they offend me a LOT! I can't recycle them locally and I want to cut down the amount of plastic that I use (because it's made from oil and what not that's running out).

I'm having trouble with one magazine I am repeatedly sent (from a teaching union I used to belong to when I was studying for my PGCE, that I'm not a member of anymore, because it stopped being free and because I can't find a teaching job! Talk about rubbing salt in the wound lol!) To make it even worse, my mum is a member of the union and she gets sent their magazine every month too - so we get 24 plastic wrapped magazines per year sent to our address!! There is no way to contact this company! There are no contact details on their website or in their magazine, there is a phone number I can call, but at my own expense, so I'm reluctant to do that. I have found a semi satisfying way of dealing with their plastic post though - sending it back with a sticky label asking to be removed from their mailing list - I've done that for the past 2 months (along with the numerous membership packs they keep sending me too) so maybe next month will be teaching magazine free!!!

I also got a catalogue wrapped in plastic from www.expertverdict.com who I've never heard of, but actually have a special 'remove from mailing list' contact on their website - which I'm really impressed with! I added a little note to the end of the part where I had to put my details about how I was trying to reduce waste and that an unnecessary paper catalogue and plastic bag weren't helpful and could they please reconsider their mailing methods. Lets see if it works!

Having said that The Book People have a section for managing mailings, where I opted out of getting catalogues and I still got one last month, maybe it takes a while to process or something, but I'm going to send them a quick email as well to make sure.

Someone from my old university phoned me and asked if I wanted to donate £26 a month for a student fund, which obviously I said no to, and then asked if I wanted to be put on their mailing list, I had a long conversation with the girl all about cutting down my waste and not wanting to get any paper mail, but that I was happy to be put on their e-mailing list (in case I ever win the lottery!). Three days later I received a letter, not in plastic thank goodness, but with about 5 pages in it asking again for a donation. I put it all back in the envelope and wrote an angry letter on the back of one of the sheets, asking to be removed from their mailing list and giving them my email again. I'm not usually angry - but it seems to have worked in this situation, as a couple of days later I got this email (note email not letter! hurrah!)

Dear Susan

Thank you for your letter from which I was sorry to learn that we had failed to act upon your request not to receive snail mail in future. I am afraid this was simply human error, with Sophie failing to make the requisite note on your record. I hope you will accept our apologies and I can assure you that your record has now been suitably amended. Some Aber publications, such as Prom, are not yet available electronically, but I will ensure you receive it this way once it is produced in an e-format.

Best regards

If angry is the best way to beat plastic post then I'm going to have to rethink my tactics!

What I bought this month...

A chocolate advent calendar for my mum
A lush solid shampoo bar
A TV guide magazine
A little green pottery pot - I'd seen it in the charity shop last time I was in and thought it was lovely, it was reduced to 24p this time I went, it seemed rude not to!
A book - also 20p from the charity shop (but I'll take it back to the charity shop so not to worry!)A shopping trolley - like old grannies have, to carry my food shopping home and save my arms and using the car (my old one's handle and wheel broke beyond repair and had a hole it it!)
3 more books - again from the charity shop and to be given back to the charity shop (one of these days I'll get my butt to the library and stop spending money on books!)

So, I think this is definitely better than last month. I obviously need to start going to the library because although getting books from charity shops is better than buying new, I think the whole resource sharing ideology of libraries suits my own ideas about how we should use and share 'stuff' better. Also the purchase of the granny shopping trolley worries me - I did need one, but my thought process went 'I need this, it's lovely, it's £10, I'll have it', then when I got home I started wondering where it was made and what it was made from and if I couldn't have got a more environmentally friendly one from somewhere else. Sigh. At least it will make my trips to the market more happy and arm-ache proof! And the chocolate advent calendar - the outside was recyclable, but I'm pretty sure I spotted the plastic tray in the bin, I need to think of a better alternative for next year!

Handmade Christmas..Part 2...Bags, Mouse Doorstops, Ivy Garlands...

Hello! I hope you've all had a wonderful, magical, happy Christmas time - we certainly did in our household :)

My homemade gifts went down quite well, I think, as well as the few shop bought presents I gave as well, so hopefully next year I won't feel so worried about giving things I've made myself.

As well as the LED fairy lights, earrings and coasters I posted about last time, I also sewed some things....

A couple of reusable shopping bags (all made from fabric from my stash and an old men's shirt bought from the charity shop).

Some mice doorstops, for my mum, these are the most complex things I've ever sewn and I unpicked the seams several (million!) times, but I think they were kind of worth it! Every thing in these are reused, except the eyes, which I bought from a local, independent sewing shop. The fabric is from an old blouse and skirt bought from the charity shop, they're stuffed with some fleece left over from another project, the noses are round beads covered in fabric and I sneaked some gravel off our patio (when mum wasn't looking!) to make them heavy enough to stop doors! I even reused some plastic bags that catalogues and magazines are sent through the post in to contain the gravel before I put it in! See - plastic 'envelopes' are useful for something!!!! the pattern for these is from Sew Hip magazine.

My two best friends and I gave extremely zero waste presents to each other - nothing! We went for a Christmas drink instead!

I also managed to get a photo of the ivy garlands I mentioned before, after the house I volunteer in closed for winter they gave us the ivy ribbons because we worked so hard on them! They've been very beautifully decking our hall (and kitchen) and have just started to wilt after about 2 weeks!

This year we managed to recycle all our Christmas wrapping paper, the council is picking it up with the kerbside recycling. I saved all the foil 'paper' my mum used last year to wrap my presents, and I had enough of that plasticy shiny ribbon to wrap all my presents tightly without sellotape - except three round ones that wouldn't play along! My brother and his girlfriend watched in confusion and amazement as I coordinated a 4 bag system (paper for recycling, foil for reusing, ribbon and tags for reusing and unrecyclable stuff) for collecting and sorting all this wrapping on Christmas morning - they do no recycling in their house (I know!!) and made lots of 'oo we really should start recycling' type noises - I do hope they do!!

We also had no food waste! That isn't unusual in my house (as I usually eat it all!) but seeing as it's Christmas I think it's an achievement! We sent the turkey home with the meat eaters, the left over quorn has gone into the freezer and I ate all of my vegan sausages on the day anyway! The veggies became soup and some of the millions of potatoes fed the birds. We do have a LOT of plastic wrapped snacks hanging around though - I'm not in charge of food shopping and couldn't convince my mum to stop buying them! Maybe next year!