I just watched this episode of Grand Designs Revisited, looking at an almost entirely wooden house build in the forest in Sussex by a woodsman, using volunteer labour and materials almost entirely from his own woods, crafted by his own hands.


It's fully self sufficient in water and energy, and almost so in food.


The roof is wooden shingles, the frame coppiced sweet chestnut, the walls weatherboarded but lined with straw bales and lime render.


The toilet is composting and a wood burning stove provides hot water and heating, although it doesn't need much heating since it is so well insulated.


The straw bale walls were carved and curved around the windows to let more light in.


Never has a project tempted me more to leave everything behind and live self sufficiently, somehow!

It's got pretty quiet on here recently - same as much of LJ it seems. So here are some spring woodland and ruined castle pictures from Scotland for you. I've also updated the community layout - it was looking a bit broken and generally rubbish, and it's much prettier now :). Come back and post and talk!



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From 31st December 2009 the government intent to make all vitamins, herbal preparations and supplements available on prescription only, from your GP!!!.

Anyone who objects has until 5th September, yes that is FOUR DAYS, to sign the petition which is at http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Vitamins

Tell all your friends, swamp the petition site!

There are several reasons why this is a bad idea:

1. This would effectively kill Herbalism..........which has been effective for thousands of years
2. Doctors are not trained to prescribe herbal preparations, it is a separate 3-4 years of training!
3. All our health care products would be in the hands of the big pharmaceutical companies

What is appalling is the fact that this has been kept so damn quiet by the idiots who call themselves our representatives!!

The plants of this planet have aided humankind for thousands of years, and up until the past 60 or so years were in common useage in every household in Britain and are still widely used, even if many people are not aware of them. The majority of pharmaceutical products are simply patented plant derivatives......and there is the crux of the matter. Pharmaceutical companies cannot patent the whole herb...it is a naturally occuring entity....so they aim to get it outlawed!!!

Is your GP going to do the extra training..........I doubt it very much.

Last month I was taught tablet weaving by an archeologist and I love it. But being tied to the fabric by a belt feels awkward to me. Does anyone here enjoy weaving bands? Do you use some kind of loom or plank?

These are my first tries:



Now I got some finer wool (cotton) to make a trim for some clothes. The thick wool you seen on the photos is nice and soft but a bit too much for this purpose. =)

I am looking for a nice drawing of a twig of cherry blossoms for a window image. After searching the web's clipart and other image resources I came up with some boring stuff only. I remember that last year there have been a couple of nice pics. Don't know if they delete those from time to time....

If someone has seen a nice picture, I'd be so thankful if you tell me!

Hi all, I'm looking for product advice. I'm looking for a subtle, sound-based alarm clock. I currently use my phone set to it's quietest and most inoffensive, gentle tone, but it recently didn't go off one morning when I turned it off at night (it should) and now I'm too nervous of it not working to turn it off overnight, which I want to do. So I'm looking for an equivalent alarm clock.

This may be hard to believe for some people, I know, since most people seem to need a fire-alarm level noise to wake up, but I'm a very light sleeper and wake at the slightest thing, plus I don't want to disturb Gordon any more than necessary when I wake up. I don't want a light-based one (light doesn't wake me up), nor vibration, just very subtle, quiet noise. So my requirements:

- Sound-based.
- Volume adjustable, with soothing, quiet noises. No beeps, loud ringing bells or annoying tunes!
- Preferably no lit up display of any sort, or if it must, one than can be turned off or down.
- Preferably no radio / CD feature - I have no use for this.
- As small as possible.

Does anyone have any suggestions? I'm clearly in the minority in my requirements, since such a thing is proving nigh-on impossible to find!

A faux HDR image of some Apple & Hawthorn Jelly I just made. The under exposed image is pasted into the overexposed image. The bright one is attached to a layer adjustment layer, and version of it is pasted onto the layer mask and blurred. This brings through the highlight details only, resulting in the appropriate exposures from each image.

I don't fully understand it myself - I just followed the instructions in the November 08 issue of Practical Photography! To be honest, a regular image would have been just as good, but I wanted to try the technique.

As for the jelly itself:

400g hawthorn berries
~800g eating apples (Cox, in this case)
sugar
lemon juice

Boil the fruits (separately) with just enough water to cover until well reduced, mashing occasionally. Once boiled, drain each overnight through some muslin to get the juice (squeezing the muslin will make it cloudy). Next, heat the juices together in a pan with as many ounces of sugar as there are fluid ounces of liquid. Boil for 10-15min until it's ready to set (when it gets a skin when a wee test bit is dropped on a cold plate). Decant into sterilised jars.

This is how much I got, but I think I overcooked the apples, and I definitely overcooked the haws! I've only tried a tiny bit so far, but it seems nice.

The nights get frosty though we enjoy a splendid Indian summer over here. Never the less, my mind starts to wander. A jar of mead is fermenting in the corner of my room (1 litre water, 1 pound honey; heat; skim; add yeast when luke warm; add a little hops; wait and wait some more until the yeast stops; then decant; and wait some more time - maybe until Christmas).

This year I want to make plumpudding. I never tried before. When do I best cook it? Do you have a favourite recipe? Hints on what not to do?

I hope it's OK that I post this here...

I just found out that on June 25th Kathy Lee Gifford, host of The Today Show, made a derogatory comment about pagans. I first found out this morning in an e-mail and then found it on a group on CafeMom. She was doing a wedding segment and asked people why the wedding ring was worn on the left hand ring finger.

Kathy Lee: Why do you wear your wedding band on your left hand ring
finger? Is it because (a) most people write with their right hand? Is
it (b), because Egyptians believed that finger follows the vein of
love to the heart, or (c), the Pagans -- the nasty, bad Pagans --
believed it was bad luck to wear metal on your right side?

OMG! A lot of pagans are writing The Today Show to demand that she publically appologize. If she had said something like this about any other religion then there would be a public outrage.

The video of Gifford's comment can be found at the link following, about 5 minutes in: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/25368216#25368216

E-mails can be sent to : today@nbc.com

Also, a petition has been started http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/quotnasty-bad-pagansquot-protesting-hate-speech-on-nbc

Website: http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/21134540/vp/25368216#25368216

Telephone: (212) 644-4249 (press 1 and ask to speak with Jim Bell, who is the Producer of the Today Show, and complain directly to him)

*hugs*
Jess

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