Saturday ramblings

Miss Piggy is squashed between the porch light and the house.  By choice.

She/he/it was there last night when I last let Professor out.  I'm not sure why she chose a sleepover but there she is. 

We had another visitor yesterday when I got home from the stores.

It was curled up on the porch when I let Professor out this morning but gone when I let him in.  I suspect foul play.

I'm getting there.  And by there I mean getting more things done around the house.  Being more frugal and more environmentally responsible.   Sometimes they are the same thing.  I don't really like the term green because it doesn't really describe what I think of as taking care of Nature the way She takes care of us.  It isn't about spending thousands of dollars to buy equipment that plain old sweat and exertion will do. 

My husband was puttering around in the kitchen over his vacation and asked me why we didn't have a mixer.  I said we had wisks and a hand mixer. No, he wanted an electric mixer.  In the first place, I don't have a place to put one and in the second place why would I want one when I have gone twenty years almost without one and done just fine.  If you've got one and use it a lot, that's great.  But buying one just to have on hand in case you cook something that might need a mixer, isn't so fine.

I feel better when I'm in my Earth Mother mode, which is where I am now.  I spent the morning hanging clothes on the line, including the ones from the dryer that didn't dry.  I suspect lint in places I can't get to but I'm not up to taking it apart to find out.  I'll use it for a few minutes to remove the lint and then out onto the clothesline for the rest of the drying.  This winter, I hope to use the clothesline as much as I can but I have wooden racks for when I can't. 

Most of this is as much about needing to save money as it is saving Nature. 

I've been looking through doily patterns because I'd like to pick up my crochet hooks again and I'd like an orange altar cloth for Samhain.  I don't know why; I just want one that color.

I harvested my sunflowers today a bit early but I don't want the birds eating them just yet so they're in the kitchen window catching the morning sun.  They're the black sunflowers, not the striped ones.  I apparently got the wrong seeds.  But it's okay, they'll eat them.  I'm enjoying my garden this year, even if it was miniscule.  Before I planted gardens out of necessity and didn't enjoy it but this year, I'm feeling a connection to my plants. 

I'm recycling my dishwater into the garden by means of  dishpans and a bucket that sits beside the refrigerator.  I've got the boys on board and they're doing their part.  We're in a dry spell right now so it's necessary to water the garden almost daily.  And with our water bill gone up by 50% I'm doing all I can to save on water.  Plus I think we've been in drought conditions since we moved here 13(?) years ago. 

I'm also trying to buy more basic ingredients and cook and back from scratch both for savings and for packaging.  I can use the space in the garbage bin for clearing out the garage and the basement (aside from what we can freecycle and give to the thrift store.)  Plus I can use the storage space.  We have a wood burning stove out in the garage that isn't hooked up to a flu yet but whenever one of the vehicles goes down in the winter we have to survive on one, which uses up a lot of extra gas, because there is no heat in the garage and it's too cold to work on them in the driveway.  My goal is to clean it out so we can get one of the vehicles in there and work on it if we have to.  I have lots of branches at the back of the property that we could burn if we have to.

Otherwise I plan on burning it in my Weber grill/homemade fire pit this winter when I'm out in my faery garden doing rituals.  It's cold in Wisconsin in the winter.

Even though there is still a lot of stress in my life, I'm finding my spiritual life peaceful and fulfilling.  I didn't have that before so this helps me handle the stress better.  There are trade-offs, of course.  My only social life was at church and even though I didn't have contact with anyone outside of church, it was something I had to look forward to, somwhere to go to get dressed up a bit (although I'm not a dressy person) and I knew there were people there in times of need.  I don't have that now.  I never dress up anymore and don't go anywhere to socialize.  I worry sometimes that an emergency might crop up and I would have no one to help me.  But I'm not going to buy trouble where there is none for sale.  Yet, anyway.  I'll cross that proverbial bridge at a later day.

But now I am going to take my fluffy dry clothes off the line and put them away so I can shred zucchini while watching a dvd with Zach.