6/14

The days here are cooling down – but somehow not getting cold enough to make a priority of preparing firewood for the pot belly stove. We get cosy and warm with socks, jumpers and woollen hats, and go to sleep early enough to avoid the winter night chill. It's a great house for passive solar energy, with the sun streaming in from the north to heat the cement and tiles through the day, keeping the warmth in at night.

The past two weeks have been very exciting and emotional for me on a very practical level. I am buying the half share of this land from my best friend. Her life is fixed in the city right now, with responsibilities to support her family making it hard to put energy here. So now, with a bit more mortgage debt, I am fully responsible for looking after this land, creating slow, small, simple dreams to share with you and all my friends and family for the years ahead.

So please, come along and visit and together lets shake off some urban toxins and create this sustainable lifestyle! We can build a Slow school, meditation huts, horse therapy centre, straw bale studio, pizza ovens and of course an inspiring permaculture garden and food forest. Our imagination is our only limitation. And I have another request – can you help me decide on the name for this property? I had thought about ‘wamirai’ or ‘mirai-no-wa’
(my version of a circle of the future), but perhaps just ‘yukkuri’ or ‘slowlight’…

I have also been very busy at Pacha and Yani’s school. Now I find myself with a long list of unpaid jobs, P and C president, food garden coordinator and school choir organiser – but someone has to do it! Last week I drove the minibus for the kids who made to the big long distance running competition.

And we are organising the school fete along with an event I am creating called: ‘Living the Good Life’ festival. I’m not sure how it will all go, but we’ll never know if we don’t try. We still seem to exist with very little income (around $150 per week at the moment), eating very simple foods and not buying anything new. There is so much variety, challenge and stimulation in our lives, and work combines with pleasures – like the act of planting a new fruit tree, or digging holes for posts to extend Ollie’s paddock – or writing this blog!

Today is a glorious day. Pacha and Yani have already been playing with Ollie the horse, who is infinitely patient with them. The pictures here say it all. We welcome you to come along and share this life.