Helping us with real food

Real food by young people for young people

Real lemonade

Kate B. talks about Helpings

Nicki and friend - one of the inspiring young people working for sustainability

A big event of significance in my life recently was the launch of Helpings in Canberra at the Majura Primary Stephanie Alexander kitchen garden. It was a significant event for many reasons. Top of the list would be inspiration from a new generation of young people who are activists in the true sense of the word. Not just talking about change as I did in the 1980s but getting out and changing the world step by step. Acting locally and thinking globally. Running fresh food workshops for school children and serving real food every week at the ANU.  Acknowledging the efforts of locals like the school canteen manager who had the courage to turn around the canteen into a healthy and delicious going concern that no longer sells junk food to children.

It is not surprising that one of the book's authors Charlie Wood was recognised as the ACT's young environmentalist of the year. Charlie helped found Real Food and the connectivity of Real Food's links in the community was evident at the launch. Famous and potentially famous chefs, denizens of local produce and business, scientists, thinkers, writers and musicians. The event was beautiful, eloquent and musical. It was orchestrated to speak to the heart through the stomach. The guest speakers highlighted the crises we face then gave us the hope and optimism to change which is exactly how to inspire human beings to action.

Science writer Julian Cribb pointed out that the population of Canberra (250,000) is born every day but that competition for water gets more fierce and in the end the farmers who need water to feed our planet will be pushed out by the miners and manufacturers. Huge cities were being built with no capacity for independent food production. Without innovation, food and water scarcity are inevitable.

Dietmar Sawyer, of Berowra Waters Inn fame, observed that while on his journey to Canberra he stopped to get petrol where, symbolically, a woman went to the effort to put premium petrol in her car then bought a cheap candy bar and packet of chips to fuel her body.

Charlie reminded us that everything we put in our mouths must be a conscious choice that helps heal our planet and is mindful of the ethics and hidden environmental and social costs of production. We live on a planet where one billion people have too much food and are potentially dying from diet-related diseases while one billion people are starving. Short supply chains are part of the solution.

Growing the growers

Growing the growers and encouraging our young people to go on the land and farm is really important. Check out this amazing project -  I want to support this initiative to grow new farmers, new backyard gardeners and new markets. Alan from Allsun Farms was at the launch and spoke about this project and the City Farms movement. He congratulated Charlie and her  Real Food friends who worked on his organic farm near Canberra as part of their commitment to sustainability.

My children were involved in the production of the cook book from helping test the recipes, singing at the launch and serving the delectable 'real' food made with love by the volunteers associated with the publication of this unique volume. The children were literally over the moon at being part of something big. The book itself has helped shaped their attitudes and response to healthy nourishing food and I find it conceptually so easy for us all to compare 'real food' with the energy-dense denatured rubbish that we sometimes put into our body. We all know the difference and why real food tastes and feels so right. It's a choice that for our family is getting easier to make.

It was a heavenly Monday in a little patch of abundance built by gardeners and growers of children at the Majura School surrounded by crops and produce. Home-made hummus, delectable mince pies, tarts and ginger biscuits washed down with real lemonade showed how real food just doesn't even compare with the horrors of the packaged, preserved and processed food that dominates our supermarket shelves. Real food is fun, bright and beautiful and tastes great. It's good for the planet too. To find out where to buy the cook book visit  http://realfoodcanberra.org/cookbook. The book got some great media coverage and I am still learning from reading it.


Question authority!

Charlie's mum Kate is pretty amazing and one of her personal mantras is Question Authority! All the children are hypnotised by her and will do anything she says including singing beautifully! I don't think I have ever met anyone quite like Kate whose leadership and passion is gentle and inspiring. Kate believes in the potential of everyone and expects great things. A true leader. She makes me feel as if she believes in me and expects great things of me. No-one has ever had that effect on me before except my devoted hubby of course! Kate introduced me to the concept of 'guerrilla gardening' and one Sunday I found myself helping to rescue an ancient tree with a group of willing helpers. We worked to restore the correct amount of mulch protecting the tree. Here is a photo of my daughter taking to guerrilla gardening like a duck to water. She even wore a special outfit! I hope to change the world one step at a time like Kate and her daughter Charlie and I hope to have the same gentle compassion for other human beings on this planet just like Kate and Charlie too!

Fava beans reignite my fervour

The Helpings cook book has a recipe for potato and broad bean salad donated by Hugh Fearnley-Whittingshall whom many of us worship on the telly as he recreates an Arcadian dream in the English countryside.  I've learned lots of tips from the cook book. I didn't realise, for instance, that you should slip the fava bean out of its skin after you cook it.  Before Helpings I nearly gave up on my vegetable garden but broad beans won me over again. I was despondent as my brassicas had either gone to seed or were being ravaged by white cabbage butterflies. I was so busy doing everything else in my life that I hadn't got out into the garden. I thought to myself that it is a much better value proposition to support the farmer's markets and other local growers.  But then my husband pointed out to me that at least our children got to see a cauliflower peek out of its nest of grey-green leaves and beans crawl quickly up trellises. They know where vegetables come from. Then I made a salad with my freshly picked broad beans and nothing could compare. I also re-read Lolo Houbein who emphasises the benefits of companion planting and how difficult it is to protect against pests and diseases. But it is possible with a few minutes every day and a small plot to grow something. I was comforted that night to talk to a friend (one of my faithful blog followers) who had experienced exactly the same emotions. Disappointment over some poor companion planting (snow peas near onions) then inspiration from that Dutch-Australian genius of a woman Lolo.

I've thrown in zuchinnis, egg plant, chillis and beans and loads of marigold and heartsease (a tip from the Burra Open Gardens). My artichokes look sculpturally beautiful and I've cut up a whole lot of white plastic into cabbage butterfly shapes and hung them near my remaining cauliflowers. This apparently tells the butterflies to stay away because the territory is occupied by white 'pretend' butterflies. The children who come to the garden help harvest our goodies and I was thrilled when my older daughter offered to plant the zucchinis.

Spring chickens and mountain wildflowers

A newly hatched chick with proud Mum

Wow! Now I know why tiny chickens that go peep are such powerful symbols of spring time and new life. They are so adorable and fluffy and nothing beats listening to the tapping noise they make while in their shell and their cute little cheeps. I'm as excited about these day-old chicks as if I was visiting a new baby. Our Sussex Light hens went successively broody as soon as the weather turned. The first lady puffed up her feathers, put on a nasty expression with a special 'leave me alone!' squawk and sat on the nest for three weeks. In the last week all three girls have gone broody and shared the nest sitting. They only get up to do one 'malodorous' poo once a day and eat and drink.


How's this for coincidence or maybe scary locational targeting. I googled fertile chick eggs and the first result I got was a house less then a few hundred metres from mine with a fine Welsummer rooster residing in the backyard. We bought four Welsummer-cross fertile eggs from John the retired farmer.      These babies have just hatched. On Thursday I'm expecting a dozen Light Sussex chicks to hatch.


Everyone is ecstatic and our babies took a walk around with mum and have already learned to drink water and eat their special mash.


Walking up Mount Imlay

Eucalyptus Imlayensis

I was lucky enough to do two superb bush walks during the school holidays at Eden on the South Coast. The first bush walk covered coastal terrain which varied from windswept tea-tree to rainforest to wild heath ablaze with gorgeous wildflowers.


The second walk was up Mount Imlay where I saw the endangered Eucalyptus Imlayensis (see photograph). Only a remnant few remain on the summit of Mount Imlay and nowhere else in Australia. They are beautiful and are among a few species unique to Mount Imlay including a boronia. The scenery was breathtaking and I admired nature's landscaping particularly the placement of rocks and ancient grass trees. It all works so beautifully. Did you know that lichen is actually a combination of an algae and a fungus? The lichens down that way are beautiful and one species of lichen colours the ancient rocks a milky white as if an artist had flicked a paint brush to create spots.


We had to cleanse our footwear to prevent the spread of the dreaded Phytophthora cinnamon fungus which is killing the trees. I'm interested in the work of the Australian National Botanic Gardens and the seed saver network and intend to investigate further.

Real Food Canberra and love of a laminex table


Two special books are being launched around this time. Love of a laminex table from the owner of Benedict House artist Kate Shelton was launched recently and I intend to get myself a copy. I dined at Benedict House in Queanbeyan and was charmed by the deceptive simplicity of a menu based on homegrown and regional produce. Brown rice flecked with puy lentils and citrusy salads with fennel, candied walnuts and a scattering of luscious pink pomegranate. The atmosphere of Benedict House is incomparable and nothing like it exists in Canberra. http://www.benedicthouse.com.au/ My friend Karen and I ate unbelievably good corned beef and talked about Lost Gardens with Monty Don on ABC TV and the stand of arctic beech in Barrington Tops National Park, NSW.


Real Food Canberra are fantastic dedicated folk and their sustainable cook book for children will be launched on 21 November at Majura Primary School. They have worked many hours on producing a resource that will benefit our children and engage their passion for real food and healthy eating. It's also a great literacy tool.


Burra Open Gardens


Burra opens its gardens again in 2011 with seven beautiful gardens for our enjoyment on the weekend of Saturday 29 October and Sunday 30 October. All the gardens sound spectacular and proceeds help the local community. A rest for refreshments in the Burra Community Hall or in one of the gardens is recommended. I don't know how we'll fit them all in but we'll give it a go. Roselawn was created around the remnants of the original 1930s garden which features a Monet-inspired footbridge.  The garden is planted with old fashioned iris, drifts of evening primrose, lavenders, rose and penstemon.


My own garden is looking a bit sad so I shouldn't really be traipsing off to look at other gardens but it will be my birthday treat. I have lots of work to do but I've decided to take a heritage based approach and turn one part of the garden into an orchard on the same site where an orchard was created by the wonderful gardener who lived here years ago. When he died all the trees were removed except for an oleander, some hibiscus, a fuchsia and the lovely camellias. My potato garden is flourishing and promises to rehabilitate the soil ready for future autumnal planting. Our vegetable garden needs supplementing but I've successfully seeded purple carrots and have snow peas growing. Many of the winter brassicas went to seed so I've donated those to our chooks. Raspberry canes are growing madly. I'm looking forward to planting some Lolo plots based on a culinary theme. I will ask my friend Linda to post some information about heritage plantings for the Ainslie area onto my blog.

Native orchid near Eden

Down the garden path

Real heritage, I learned today, is not what is locked away in museums but is when history lives on with purpose and meaning connecting past lives with the present.

That connection happened today as people walked the streets of our village community and heritage and knowledge was shared in the gardens of local residents where everyone was filled with spring joy and community spirit.

Carefully tended gardens with chooks, vegetables and spring blossoms were the stars of the day punctuated by our beautiful children selling flowers, herbs and old-fashioned lemonade straight from a CWA cook book.

'Down the garden path' was an initiative of Ainslie School and the hard work and enthusiasm of organisers Libby and Robyn who had an entire community behind them.

The deputy principal of Ainslie School stood on the steps of that beautiful Art Deco building and shared with me how proud she was to teach at a school that really is a showcase of the kind of living heritage that some historians say is what really counts. Fathers and sons, mothers and daughters walked through those doors today then began their pilgrimage around a few small but special streets where children, love, friendship and laughter were abundant.

It is wonderful to know that we are transforming our gardens into productive beautiful spaces that are not just about lawn or specimen trees. Like those who first planted the gardens in our suburb of Ainslie we are nurturing heritage plants and reclaiming productive space to grow food for our families and friends. Our large garden blocks are a rarity and we are endeavouring to use this space as it was always intended.

Today I remember my great friend Daphne an original Ainslie resident who passed away several years ago whose garden kept alive her mind and body until the end. She reared baby chickens during the war and grew vegetables to support her family in between working at Parliament House while her husband was away at war. Even frail and crippled in her 90s against doctors' orders she would get out every day propped up on a pair of old tomato stakes and tend to that garden which has been producing vegetables since the 1930s. I miss her annual show of sweet peas and the friendship we had that transcended our age differences.

Here are some highlights of the day.

Childhood is everyone's country

 A particular garden helped shaped my childhood memories and experiences. I thought I had lost those memories and connections forever due to a terrible fire which nearly destroyed my life. Living in that little town in New Zealand was a period of stability, innocence and magic and I hung fiercely to the jumbled images in my mind.

Forget-me-nots in the streets. A red and white fairy mushroom ring in a woodland where I roamed free. Fat goldfish in a series of rectangular ponds lined with alyssum.

Most beautiful of all was the memory of a crystal clear river that swirled its blue waters around limestone rocks and held a natural whirlpool that gently whirled me around.

Rose Street was high on a hill in the little village and lined with beautiful Victorian homes and gracious gardens. Next door to me lived Miss Bibby, a beautiful elderly woman with a black cat. Her house was flanked by a white crunchy gravel circular driveway and I loved to visit. Embedded in my memory is a sunny day when she combed out her long silver hair to dry.

The fire that destroyed my home 32 years ago

At the bottom of my garden was an old Victorian-era rubbish dump and I would find little porcelain dolly legs and other treasures. My father built me a tree house in an apple tree and one day I slipped and fell. I lay on the ground without a scrap of oxygen in my lungs.

I thought the photos were gone but as you can see here I have some visual remnants of my childhood found at the back of a drawer at my nana's place. Years later I visited Waipawa and drove past briefly but didn't see anything that reminded me of that magic and sparkle all those years ago. Recently something amazing happened...I googled 9 Rose Street, Waipawa and was amazed to discover the website of a local sculptor, historian and community-minded person Jan Gosling. She lives in the house next door and her mother lives on the site of my former home.

Jan's research and stories opened up a whole new world and I found out about Miss Bibby and the famous Bibby family including Jan's direct forebear who was a famous New Zealand artist and all-round fabulous woman who was anti corporal punishment and home schooled her children. Jan's life story itself is fascinating and her sculptures made from a white volcanic stone, haunt me with their beauty and connection to the forest and the forces of nature.

Please visit Jan's website - her work is amazing. I guarantee you've never seen anything like her sculptures.
The history of Waipawa is great too and Jan organises a rubber duck race each year along that beautiful river I remembered.

One of the photos below shows me standing in front of a bird bath. Years later Jan's mother found the base of the bird bath after the fire and kept it. The photos of the fire came from Jan's family too and I saw these for the very first time recently not that I will ever forget seeing the flames after my father dragged me to safety that dark and terrible night.

Making those memories real and cementing them with local history has been very important to me. That garden was my spirit place for so long and I truly believe children create and infuse spaces with their spirit and imagining. Children need backyards or places where they can play, imagine, explore and believe like I did.

The next day

My garden 

My grandmother Marje, me and a monstero deliosis

Backyard bliss

The gardens of Bundanoon; bike tracks; our first egg

I have a theory that Bundanoon is populated by a secret society of gardeners on steroids. A walk around the tiny village in the NSW southern highlands is full of horticultural highlights and whimsy such as a bronze cupid holding an urn of kangaroo paw. A clipped cypress hedge contains a white gate and archway framing a glimpse into a gracious garden and more layers of clipped hedge echoing formal Chinese framed vistas such as those in the humble administrator's garden. A massive dry stone wall terraces several blocks on Railway Parade and an amazing mauve pelargonium has a life of its own oblivious to the freezing temperatures (I have a cutting). I visited Bundanoon during the school holidays with a group of friends and their children. Bushwalking and bicycling are great activities in the middle of winter. The garden at Bundanoon Youth Hostel is beautiful and carefully tended by the dedicated staff at the YHA.

An exciting development in terms of natural play spaces is the new mountain bike track built in a day by volunteers based on the international mountain bike association guidelines. I'm told it created international interest and a similar track was built on the other side of Bundanoon. Our children spent hours focused on riding their bikes around the track and over the small obstacles created from fallen trees, logs and small gradients. One of the YHA people told me there is a clip on Youtube of a bike track that is also a permaculture garden with vines growing off the obstacle course. Couldn't find the clip but sounds fantastic.

Here are some photos of the bike track.

I have learned so much from Tessa Michaels' brilliant website  Tessa Rose Landscapes (see my gardening links). I have passed on the links to others and there is a presentation recommended for staff training that shows how simple it can be to link plants and natural play elements into the curriculum or program of a child care centre. I'd like to find out how plants can be established without being damaged by child's play - that seems to be an obstacle in some people's minds to loads of lovely plantings. Children are encouraged to observe the cycle of life and adopt a plant to nurture. Instead of choosing boring reliable plants, Tess recommends we embrace the diverse beauty of flora and unique foliage in a natural play space setting where discovery, imagination and sensing abound. The bike track at Bundanoon is a logical extension of this thinking and part of an international movement aiming to getting our children connecting with nature.

Our first egg
I haven't blogged much about my Light Sussex Chickens but they are proving an integral element to our garden and their production of manure and bedding straw is the cornerstone of my revived interest in creating a thermophilic reaction. My composting efforts have been misguided possibly through lack of access to raw materials to enable the right ratio of carbon and nitrogen etc.

We adore our five girls who roam a section of our yard and keep the bugs down and mow the grass for us. The compost is in this section and I have learned to store up layers of food scraps so that I create a heap with the green waste and nutrients and pile it all up at once with all the carbon ingredients plus the chicken manure. I will know I've truly made it when my heap gets hot in the middle. I've been reading a terrific book on composting which goes into great detail about all the different methods including bokashi and worm farms. Is that a bit weird to read books on composting avidly and eschew my book club novels? Did you know that worms thrive on milled grains in a worm farm and that Bokashi is a type of fermentation but not real composting. I had it all wrong which is why I never got the heat needed to kill the weed seeds and nurture all that biological life. I've rescued an old compost bin which I use for layering and storing kitchen waste that the chooks don't eat while I store up the leaves, newspaper, straw and so on. A work in progress and the straw is about to be used for our temporary potato garden which will restore the soil in a hot spot over the next year.

I love hanging out the washing and having a chat with my chickens although my husband would equally lay claim to 'his girls' and rushes out every morning to tempt them with food scraps. They now have bright red combs which contrast beautifully with their black lacework feathers and white bodies. Their chook house was designed and built by a local woman for Canberra conditions and is ergonomic and fox-proof. Foxes have been on the rampage in Ainslie so I'm thankful for this feature. We have already had a casualty from our dog early on when the chicks were young and we accidentally left a gate open. That little lady is buried under a birch tree and died quickly thank goodness - we didn't think the dear old dog had it in him but he dragged himself off the couch, snuck out and grabbed her by the neck in a rush of predator instinct.

We added two extra to our flock and watched them grow over winter. Today I opened the chook house, saw the ladies perching and looked down to see our first EGG!!!! The other day I put some good soil around my dormant grapevines and came out later to witness all five chickens having a glorious dirt bath. They gyrated and luxuriated in that dirt in a way that was so pleasurable it made me sad to think of those poor little chickens locked up on the floor of a battery farm. Our girls are so curious, sociable and intelligent. Let the egg hunt begin! I'm brushing up on my quiche recipes and looking forward to sharing fresh eggs with friends.

Lolo again

Lolo inspired me to get out into the garden in the middle of winter. I spent the weekend mass planting violets and using wet newspaper as mulch. It's brilliant and I intend to re mulch sections of the garden in this way. She has also got me collecting garden hardware and I intend to grow purple carrots in my front yard vegetable garden by piling up sandy soil in a box placed on top of the garden bed rise which has the onions in it. What a great idea - just plant in a waxed box and grow stuff if you don't have containers or space.

She has a tip for possums and says she knows of farmers and friends who use adapted solar powered flashing lights at night to deter the possums. It's a jungle out there and Lolo uses every form of barrier or protection possible such as mesh and cloches to keep pests off produce organically. She's a realist and says the picture perfect garden is either inorganic or not a reality - we need our hardware to protect our plants.

I'm also going to plant an artichoke hedge with some seeds I bought from an Italian deli. What a great idea and if they germinate directly then the artichoke hedge will be beautiful and practical. I was so inspired by Lolo's book One Magic Square I have potted up six indoor herb pots to sit in a sunny place and grow different types of basil and some coriander. I didn't realise but you aren't meant to leave some herbs out in the frost - they need protection and some people even use horticultural fleece to lay over their herbs at night. I have relocated my lemon balm and sage and noticed they are faring much better. I've added asparagus crowns and raspberry canes to our little patch and one of the children tied up the snow peas and broad beans to a frame. The cauliflower and cabbages continue to grow but the leeks are not looking at all like something Hugh Fearnley Whittingshall would produce. They are still thin and spindly.  I have planted lots of garlic and loved reading that after the winter solstice is the time to put in your garlic bulbs. Lolo is a big fan of growing your own garlic and storing the plaits. You can even pickle them in olive oil and use it as a flavouring throughout the year. Go Lolo and thanks for getting me back out in the garden again.

A kimono-inspired river of rocks

This is the top slope of the river bed

Gardeners Tony and Cathy Marker 

Cathy Marker got the inspiration for the flow lines of her dry creek bed garden from a beautiful silk kimono. Cathy woke up one morning, saw the imagery and knew that was the shape for their flowing river of rocks which combines traditional Japanese design elements with an Australian eco-solution that is beautiful, functional and zen-like in its delicate and respectful mimicry of a natural environment.

Cathy, like many of us, has a fascination for Japan shared by her husband. As a teacher of Japanese, she is particularly immersed in Japanese culture and she and Tony have designed an eco-friendly house and garden that integrates many Japanese design principles and traditional favourites observed in their travels. Their dry creek bed is sheer genius, solving a drainage problem when their sloping block is hit by occasional localised flooding due to heavy rain. The dry creek bed diverts water running down the hill and sends it to a settlement pond in the front garden.

There are no lawns to mow and the river bed is an instant hit with all children who visit. My little visitors were balancing up and down the rocks constantly and did not want to leave this beautiful space after our tour. We had been kindly invited by Cathy to look at the potential of the dry creek bed as a natural play space.

Swales of river rock are buffered by plantings which work to stabilise the sand and mortar base. The dry creek bed leads up to an Australian native garden which sweeps around to a terraced herb garden, veggie patch then takes the visitor into a Japanese courtyard with traditional maple and verdant ancient ferns. The combinations all work wonderfully and are a tribute to the melange of influences and ideas the Markers have channelled into their garden.  

Intense shots of colour are an antidote to winter in their welcoming front garden.  Blue and red blooms pop up through the winter coat of fallen leaves from the giant trees in the neighbourhood including a Chinese Sappora. Red coral maple show their winter beauty and complement the colour scheme of the house which includes palettes of red and blue in the various built forms and garden adornments. A Japanese rain chain, for example, links the gutter to an exquisite red-hued pot which also channels water.

Cathy and Tony inhabit a beautiful space both internally and externally. The front garden creates a highly visual and contemporary first impression based on a series of gentle curved pathways that connect and frame the base of the dry river bed which can be glimpsed from the front. Azaleas form some of the plantings  and pay tribute to the Asian species lovingly cultivated for centuries in Japan and Europe. Cathy explained how she briefed her landscaper to plant in multiples of three, five and seven according to one of the rules of Japanese garden design. The deliciously dark slate paving offset by white pebbles, is something you would also see in Japan, Tony and Cathy told me. We left the garden feeling inspired and uplifted. A design solution that is beautiful in itself and unites an Australian bush essence with zen principles in a river of rocks shaped by the forces of nature.

Every window has a vista 

Vegies, natives and lots more

Japanese rainwater chain

This kimono's lines inspired the river bed flow

This Japanese-style path is  set in mortar.

The coral maple adds winter beauty

The front garden takes you on a journey

Beautiful textures and contrast

Unexpected shots of winter colour

A very Japanese paving style

I'm gladioli met May Gibbs

May watched the bridge being built from her studio window. 

The middle of winter is a perfect time to visit Nutcote at Neutral Bay to lift spirits and be inspired by the creative life of a remarkable woman who lives on through her home and garden.

From the moment we stepped onto the ferry from Circular Quay we entered another world as the sun glittered off the harbour. We docked at the ornate arts and crafts gateway of Neutral Bay Wharf and wandered past a miniature beach strewn with little boats and on towards the former home of author and illustrator May Gibbs. Nutcote has been famously restored and is staffed by the Friends of Nutcote.

Those generous and charming women welcomed my children and I in between tour groups and we had the place to ourselves on a sunny Sydney morning. They let my children dress up in gum nut baby attire and we went exploring. The garden is divine and starts to reveal some of the sources of May's inspiration and whimsy. I particularly loved the trumpet-like creamy brugmansia plant which flanked the path down towards the harbour.

Inside her house everything has been restored and retained as a museum of her adventurous and somewhat unconventional life of creative endeavour. The exquisite dark wood joinery inside oozes the charm of the era. The house itself is a departure from the surrounding arts and crafts style and is Italianate in design. She briefed BJ Waterhouse to design a home with compactness and charm and her studio is central to the floor plan. Her illustrations sit in the studio as if she'd just got up for cup of tea from her tiny little kitchen which is compact but functional. The adjoining dining room is set with exquisite deep blue porcelain tableware.

Photos adorn the house including holiday snaps of May setting off with her husband in the car to a tiny little village - of all places - in the Canberra region - one of their regular camping jaunts in the Dodge with their much-loved Scottish terriers.

We became big fans of The Complete Adventures of Snugglepot and Cuddlepie after our visit. Despite the cuteness of the iconic imagery the stories of the gumnut babies are quite dark as they deal with the dastardly Banksia men and my children were fascinated for quite some time.

Nutcote truly is a place of enchantment and heritage and I will never forget that perfect day.

My own Gumnut babes in front of Nutcote.

Wysteria hysteria, marry gold...literary witticisms abound

The garden of Nutcote is full of whimsy.

Mazes, labyrinths and the good life

The television show The Good Life with Felicity Kendall (as admired by The Young Ones) and my mother's copies of Grass Roots magazine are two things that immediately make my brain manufacture contentedness serotonin. Somewhere floating in that mish-mash of childhood influences is Bilbo Baggins, cups of tea, elevenses and his warm retreat by the fire in that mythical village when the little Hobbit was not out fighting the forces of evil. As an only child in slower times of the 1970s and early 80s with plenty of time and space for reading and dreaming, I would envision my own little world where everything was grown on the plot in a self-sufficient retreat. Throw in the tree-lined country lanes of Anne of Green Gables and my imaginary world of safe and peaceful domesticity was complete.

There is something deeply appealing to most of us of course about the idea of home and growing our own food, baking bread, keeping livestock, producing eggs on our plot of earth that connects us to the idea of the village and the earth and times past. The reality, of course, is far from the romantic idyll depending on where you live and your resources and whatever phase you are in life. Nostalgia is one part reality and two parts fantasy!

Studying economics 101 a decade ago made me consider and appreciate the efficiencies and lower opportunity cost of mass production and specialisation and I felt secretly embarrassed about my childish version of The Good Life which I didn't realise at the time was actually parodying fanatical self sufficiency and middle-class snobbery! Apart from a few conservative diehards, we all know now, however, that the one resource that was always unprotected by economic principles of supply and demand is our planet Gaia.

With our planet in serious need of rescue, the idea of a self-sufficient home takes on a new appeal and a place that does not create an ecological drain on resources and energy is becoming increasingly fused with our ideas of home and what constitutes contentment in our private interior spaces of domesticity. In adulthood I have begun dreaming and imagining again and the idea of a house that regenerates and sustains based on human innovation and technology has replaced the hippy influenced 'Grass Roots' idyll. There's also something sci-fi and futuristic about using technology to heal not harm.

The sustainable house

I've just discovered Michael Mobbs and his sustainable house built 15 years ago. His book Sustainable house has been updated and re-released. This very weekend he opened his house for tours which explain:
What’s happened after 1.5 million litres of sewage has gone into the garden?
How have the solar panels lasted after 14 years?
What’s worked and what hasn’t?
How has the house saved over $30,000 in water and energy bills?
He calls his sustainable house 'the little house that could - and yours can too!' I look forward to buying the updated version of the Sustainable House or borrowing a library copy.

Built for the bush

It's the opening weekend of Built for the Bush which showcases green architecture of rural Australia at the National Archives. I've put this on my to-do list and note it is open until 11 September. The exhibition explores the energy efficient features of Australia's 19th century country homes and the reappearances of these traditional practices in contemporary sustainable architecture. I have planted ornamental grapevine to grow up and over my pergola and can't wait for its foliage to cool our home in summer following in the footsteps of many a 19th century country verandah.

On Friday night I attended the Institute of Building awards in the new hall of the Art Gallery. I met a couple who have designed and built a sustainable house for their family in my beloved suburb of Ainslie. They won an award for the project on the night. The bloke in the partnership is an expert in sustainable design and building. I am looking forward to seeing their house. We have told them that if they want to truly fit in here in Ainslie then they need to get chickens as soon as possible. We were only half joking. A few years ago it seemed like everyone in Ainslie of the yuppie persuasion had a Subaru and a sheepdog!

Children's play spaces

One of the goals I have set myself in starting this blog is to learn more about designing children's play spaces in gardens. I'm currently developing specifications to construct a sandpit at my children's childcare centre and while researching on the internet I have found out lots of exciting things about the value of sand play. For example, did you know that playing in a sandpit can really help calm children down as it is 'soft play' and should balance 'hard play' wherever possible near swings and hard surface play equipment.

I discovered the website of a landscape designer Tessa Rose based in Sydney who creates spaces all over NSW for children including mazes and labyrinths. My friend Libby explained that the meditational and spiritual qualities of the labyrinth help children deal with bad behaviour and give them time out to reflect and calm down. Did you know about the international labyrinth society? Their website hosts an international labyrinth locator. Tessa Rose explains that labyrinths introduce a powerful element of restful movement into children's play spaces. Mazes, on the other, hand, make kids charge around with mystery and excitement as they duck, weave, run and hide immersed in a giant green puzzle. I will never forget that cold crisp and bright winter's day in Berrima a year ago where our kids rampaged with joy.


Harper's Mansion maze 

The maze at Harper's Mansion in Berrima is truly fantastic and last winter I organised a big group of us to meet there for a rampage. The children loved it and the magic of the maze is something I hope will stay locked in their memories. As parents, one of the most important things we can do is create happy memories of childhood - the rest is up to them. They have a fabulous garden at Harper's Mansion which recreates what they grew in the 1830s. You can also get fabulous cheap propagated plants including dogwoods and butterfly bush at the back of the garden from the National Trust gardeners. They get a bit of help from the local prisoners. The maze and mansion are only open at certain times so check before you visit. The mansion itself is a beautiful building and the whole place is quite special.

We also visited the museum at Berrima which explains the floating city during World War I created by German interns - there's a mini-series in that story for sure! Opera, flotillas, music and creativity. These men who were merchant seamen in the wrong place at the wrong time created a beautiful world in their captivity but lived with dignity, beauty and honour in peace with the locals. The kids loved seeing the exhibition of toys from last century.

Bee baths and why I love Lolo!

Okay - I know it's a little unhealthy to worship people you've never met or even those you have met.  But I am starting to ADORE Lolo Houbein. I have ordered her book and The Life and Love of Trees from the Book Depository and as I delve deeper into Lolo's book One Magic Square I realise that it could be one of the best books I have ever owned. I knew as soon as I opened the page where she mentioned the loquat I would be enamoured of Lolo the plant whisperer. The loquat, you see, is a source of fascination for me due to its exquisite glossy unusual foliage. Properly manured every Autumn and pruned after harvest it apparently produces great fruit too.

A bee bath should have a rock placed inside it.

One Magic Square is just SO practical and tells you everything a gardener needs to know in a wholistic manner. The book is deeply enriched by Lolo's years of experience, skill and practical knowledge and those who have learned through trial and error will nod in agreement with Lolo's observations. Everything has an end in mind which is mostly fabulous practical and healthy vegetables to cook - she makes me salivate with her descriptions of salads, soups and stir frys replete with herbs and seasoning. I feel a stirring for healthier eating which is more vegetarian than my current diet but all about flavour, texture and colour.

I could waffle at length about the fabulousness of the information in One Magic Square. Bee baths and bird baths feature in her 'top tips'. Lolo recommends putting many bird baths around the garden so that friendly birds can see the water from the air and be encouraged to visit regularly. She also recommends a shallow bee bath like the charming mosaic dish I photographed. A dish of water with a rock in it gives the bees somewhere to drink in the heat of summer and encourages pollination. How cool is that? I'm off now to read more gems from Lolo such as why you shouldn't pick asparagus spears for the first three years if you want your asparagus crowns to thrive.

One magic square

Last leaves of Autumn in Canberra

 Lots of inspiration this week but not much time for pursuing my dreams in the garden or even reading about them. One Magic Square is a beautiful book by Lolo Houbein that I have flicked through and feel I need desperately to buy. Now I understand why Sheryl, who loaned me the book, was so enthusiastic. It really is brilliant. It has a series of food plot designs and wonderful narrative from author Lolo Houbein who experienced severe food shortages as a child in war-time Holland. The book begins:

To start growing your own food without delay, put down this book, go out in the garden and select a spot in the sun. Dig over one square metre with a garden fork and remove all weeds by hand. Pasta/pizza plots, salad plots, bean plots, winter vegetable plots - the list of combinations and her beautiful designs is comprehensive. She describes how to take your produce from garden to table with practical suggestions for cooking great wholesome food. It's not a book - it's a manual for self-sufficiency and has a magical feel to its pages. She has thought of everything and trawls history, culture and travel to bring in useful vignettes such as the Greek horta - a description of how Greek women would go into the mountains and gather wild greens for their cooking pots.

There is no free lunch. There is no cheap food. The cheapest and best food is the food you grow yourself - food that does not accumulate added costs for transport from other states or continents, needs no refrigeration because you pick it minutes before preparing, does not add to pollution because it only travels from garden to backdoor, is free of costly chemicals and needs no packaging. Consider the real cost of a cucumber in a plastic jacket, grown in a temperature-controlled poly tunnel, refrigerated, put in the jacket, transported a great distance and displayed in an air-conditioned supermarket under burning lights. The cucumber you grow yourself just has to be fresher, tastier and healthier than that, doesn't it.

Lolo warns about peak oil and future fruit and vegetable shortages that may occur. Lolo says food gardening is the most intelligent adult endeavour on earth and her techniques allow people like me to start small, gain confidence and enjoy moving towards greater self-sufficiency.

My living table decoration of alfalfa

Now - don't shoot me but I have a balanced mildly economic rationalist view - I agree we should all be growing our own food and that food shortages and price hikes are real threats.  I also think it's great that we have a horticultural industry and that you can buy tasteless rock-hard tomatoes bred for transport in truck if you want to. I agree the hidden costs are high but our population deserves access to cheap, healthy food - how the real cost of that food is made transparent is another matter.

Conversely, any endeavour in the home or community garden that is real, practical and achievable is what I support.

Dickson Wetland community planting day


This event sounds great. A community planting day at Dickson Wetland, Hawdon St, Dickson.


Saturday 4 June 2011
11am-3pm


Carrotmob at Ainslie IGA 11 June

I've never heard of Carrotmob until this week but this new type of consumer activism is working towards our 40% greenhouse gas reduction target. Here's some of the blurb from their website.

To contribute to and highlight the ACT's newly adopted 40% greenhouse gas reduction target, Canberra Loves 40% and partners present 'Carrotmob'. 

Carrotmobs are a fantastic way for business and the community to work together for sustainability. 

Carrotmobs are a global movement of community organisers who use consumer activism as a way to help change businesses in their communities. In a Carrotmob campaign, businesses compete at how socially responsible they can be, and then a network of consumers spends money to support the winner.

Ainslie IGA has won Canberra's first ever Carrotmob by committing to put 100% of the money spent by the ‘mob’ on Saturday June 11 into reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. The SustainAbility Advice Team has donated an energy audit to help Ainslie decide how to get maximum emissions reductions with the mobs money.

The more of us and the more we spend the more they can do! Join the mob that's creating a more sustainable Canberra by registering on our website www.carrotmob.love40percent.org

The Land newspaper

I've discovered The Land newspaper thanks to the gentleman farmer of Crookwell. I so don't enjoy mainstream media (yawn!) but was riveted by stories on how to crack a stock whip and what qualities to look for in a plucky sheep dog. The issue I read had a lift-out on sustainable farming including the lovely free-range pig farmers of Temora who sell at Epic markets and the success of Milkwood Permaculture (see my blog links).

The Land sells out quickly I'm told. This latest issue has a special on eggs in its 'Farming small areas' lift-out. Quail eggs are becoming very popular. There is a feature on Majestic Mushrooms at Murrumbateman, farming in suburbia, alpacas and chainsaw safety - love it. Even the ads are interesting with solar-operated gates and interesting sheds. I note Joel Salatin is back in Australia again - on 2 August he'll lecture at Jamberoo on how to create a profitable, diverse 'beyond organic' farming enterprise.  It's a one-day workshop on the techniques from Poly-Face Farms. If The Land is anything to go by it sounds like farming practices are evolving and regenerating and things are moving in a different direction.

Acoustic soup 

I keep missing Acoustic Soup nights at the ANU due to a clash with children's activities. They are organised by Real Food Canberra for uni students but everyone is welcome. Last Wednesday's theme was Mexican May. This was the delicious-sounding menu:

• Sopa de Zanahorias
• Sweet potato and Bean Chile
•  Mexican Rice
•  Cornbread
• White-bean and silverbeet dip