Leibster award

Thanks to Liz, from Eight Acres, for nominating me for the Leibster award. I enjoy reading Liz's blog, as their climate is very similar to ours, and she attempts to find natural solutions to challenges in life. She also has a lot of farm critters which I enjoy reading about.

I received a Leibster award back in 2011, and discovered they now included 10 questions. Which I think is kind of fun! So after writing my answers, I look forward to creating 10 new questions, and nominating the recipients at the end too.

1. If you had a big lottery win what would you do with it all?
I'd pay off the mortgage, so my husband could take the time to swap careers, as he's been wanting to do. I'd also purchase some commercial land on the edge of our local retail district. Where I'd set up a permanent farmer's and artisan market. It would be designed with permaculture principles, including a community garden and picnic areas too. It would be run by a group of members, elected by the community, which would become a not-for-profit organisation.

2. How do you think you'd fair in a zombie apocalypse?
Has anyone watched i-zombie, on Stan? I don't, but my daughter and her dad do. It has a different take on the zombie mindset though, where an underground brain trading market exists for civilised zombies, hiding in the population. It got me thinking if zombies would actually want to set up an underground economy for their "secret" food supply, letting the rest of the world get on with its business. Rather than the traditional social anarchy model we're use to seeing advertised. Either way, because I'm insulin dependent, I'd have to go uber paleo, in order to survive my pancreas.

Source

3. If you had six months warning do you think you could grow all you needed to feed yourself and your family?
Sadly, no. We need to get our water storage sorted, before we can grow anything dependably. But I do think we could forge some community networks to ensure "some" food would be available. We'd probably lose a lot of weight!

4. What life-skill should every child have to learn in school?
How not to need a school, to learn anything important.

5. If you could live anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?
Gully Grove. Because I did a lot of travelling as a child, and as Dorothy says, there's no place like home. ;)

6. What advice would you give to someone who wanted to live more self-sufficiently?
Change the way you think. You can do this by enrolling in a permaculture course, or reading extensively about it. While you're at it, read about Natural Sequence Farming too. Lastly, learn about Indigenous food gathering traditions in your region - especially, the interaction with native wildlife. Because whatever your personal desires of self-sufficiency are, it can only be framed within your specific landscape. So learn to read it, what it needs and interact, accordingly.

7. What's your most hated food?
Brussel sprouts. Offal comes a close second. I even hate the smell of them both.

8. What is your favourite quote/saying?
It's hard to have one favourite, as many have cropped up in my lifetime, with some significance. But there's a Chinese proverb, which sums up human involvement with nature that I'm partial too...

Source

9. Is there a time you've made a massive fool of yourself in public that you laugh about now?
Yes, and it WAS embarrassing. I was a teenager, dating my boyfriend who was from Canada. It was young, innocent love. We were at the local national park, on a busy weekend. My boyfriend told me a joke (as he was quite the comedian) with a word in the punchline, I wasn't familiar with. I couldn't laugh at his joke because I didn't know what the word meant. I asked him to tell me, but he thought I was joking. I asked again, but he said I should know. Frustrated, I turned around and yelled across the park, "Muuum, what's a clitoris?"

10. If you had a warning label what would it say?
Never presume I know what you're saying.


Now for my nominees: an eclectic group of ladies, from different walks in life, who write sincerely about their journeys.

Bev from foodnstuff.
Nana Chel from Going grey and slightly green.
Emma from A simple living journey.
Linda from Green haven
Nicole from Early Bird farm.


And the 10 questions:


1. What is your inspiration, and your favourite speaker about that inspiration?
They can be well known or a personal acquaintance.

2. What is your go-to remedy, on a bad day?

3. If you could improve one thing in your community, what would it be?

4. Was there ever a moment, you thought you were weird?

5. If you had a time machine, what pearl of wisdom would you tell younger you?

6. What was your favourite game to play at school between classes?

7. Do you have a favourite musician or style of music? What do you like about it?

8. If money wasn't an issue, what course of study would you take?

9. Have you ever wanted to start your own business? What would it be?
10. If there was a dessert on your table, to rule all others, share your precious temptation.


Thanks for nominating me Liz, although one of my answers probably revealed a little too much. ;)

UPDATE: Because I didn't leave easy instructions the first time around. Here are the recommendations: 

If you have been nominated for The Liebster Award AND YOU CHOOSE TO ACCEPT IT, write a blog post about the Liebster award in which you:

1. thank the person who nominated you, and post a link to their blog on your blog.

2. display the award on your blog — by including it in your post and/or displaying it using a “widget” or a “gadget”. (Note that the best way to do this is to save the image to your own computer and then upload it to your blog post.)

3. answer 11 questions about yourself, which will be provided to you by the person who nominated you.

4. provide 11 random facts about yourself.

5. nominate 5 – 11 blogs that you feel deserve the award, who have a less than 1000 followers. (Note that you can always ask the blog owner this since not all blogs display a widget that lets the readers know this information!)

6. create a new list of questions for the blogger to answer.

7. list these rules in your post (You can copy and paste from here.) Once you have written and published it, you then have to:

8. Inform the people/blogs that you nominated that they have been nominated for the Liebster award and provide a link for them to your post so that they can learn about it (they might not have ever heard of it!)

* Chris again: if you want to upload either of the Leibster Award logos in my post, right click your mouse on the image, and press "Copy Link Location". Then when writing your post, look for the add an image by URL - and right click your mouse in the box provided. Then click "paste". This should work. :)

Its meant to be fun and light-hearted though, so if uploading images makes it too complicated, skip that part. ;)

Kreativ Award

I was recommended for an award by LindaM, over at her blog "Hello, it's me!" I was really thrilled to receive it. What do awards really mean though - I wanted to know, because sometimes I look around my small part of the world and wonder why what I talk about, deserves any kind of mention? Especially the lovely things LindaM said. :)

When I got to thinking deeper about it though, blog awards are really about the relationships between different bloggers and how we each have a unique story to tell. We each speak something unique in our own way. We speak our voice to others, even if that sound seems all too familiar to ourselves, LOL. And I love listening to LindaM's voice over her side of the equator. Camalids, chickens, bees, plants - all my favourite things!

The Kreativ Award has also introduced me to other blogs, such as Rubye Jack, who originally nominated LindaM for hers. I guess, even though I got nominated by Linda in return, I think the real fun is in passing it around - so we get to discover other unique voices we may not have come across otherwise. In this way, I really do feel honoured to receive LindaM's gesture.

So onto the seven things you absolutely cannot leave this world, without knowing about me...

1. I'm naturally cautious around others, but don't let that put you off. I'm really quietly in love with the world and all it's unique beings I haven't gotten to know yet.

2. I'm still discovering my voice and I'm learning new things about myself every day. Two years from my forties, and I'm just starting to accept it's okay to be wrong, to change and be someone you told yourself in your 30's you'd never be!

3. I really admire my husband. He's everything I shouldn't have picked in a partner (LOL) and that's what makes him absolutely perfect. He opened my eyes to the beauty of others I don't inherently understand. So for that, I really admire his stamina and unashamed confidence in being himself. :)

4. It may surprise others to learn I'm a Christian with no subscription to any particular version of Christianity. I just read my bible and listen to the spirit within. It's often what gets me through those times I cannot handle reality. I figure if God can have trust in people, knowing what we're capable of, then there must be something very important about learning to trust others.

5. I'm an artist, even though my biggest works to date, are found in the garden. It's my 3D living sculpture that will constantly be a work in progress, LOL. I also believe dirt has healing properties we are yet to discover. 

6. Most of my family (both sides) have direct connections to the United Kingdom. 

7. My great, great, great grandfather was a Missionary to Australia, and wrote a lot about the social needs of minority groups of his time. He often made a lot of recommendations about the benefit of keeping family connections in-tact, even though the religious norm was to separate and assimilate back into white society. I'm proud to know this voice of mine, which instinctively questions "norms", came from such a legacy. And I was doing it before I even knew what the family tree branches extended back to. Way to go, Triple G!

Now to the blogs I nominate. It probably won't surprise you, most will have a gardening or building theme of some variety! But all very creative blogs in my humble opinion.

Happy Earth, to me is a wonderful blog about change in your own backyard. They didn't move away from the suburbs to live the way they wanted to. I love their info about edible plants and how they've gone about designing their garden. Happy Earth, is a happy place to visit.

Abdallah House, takes others on the journey of building a house (and subsequently living a life) centred around the permaculture principles. I love how they've fashioned their own niche of Victoria, according to what they believe in. They also want to help shape the perception about their community, with other community builders.

Our Old Miners Cottage, is another home building adventure which I really want to nominate. I know how hard they are working and probably wonder if their blog is of interest to anyone. I just wanted to recognise them as very creative people, at a time in their lives with so much work to be done! What they cannot achieve with lime plaster, I honestly don't know. Keep up the good work guys. :)

Life in the Dome, just has to be my absolutely favourite chicken themed blog in the entire universe! Jacqui, you're one of a kind!

Joyfulhomemaker, is a busy (former Queensland) family that upped stumps and moved to Country Victoria. They are making a new home for their family, while home schooling all their children. MaShelley (I hope I can call her that, as it's from a discussion forum we are familiar with) is a unique person, extremely creative in all that she does and someone I'd bake a cake for and invite around for coffee! If only she lived closer. I will have to settle for reading her blog instead. I know you will love their renovation pictures. :)

Plain and Joyful Living, really says it all! They are another home schooling family, living in the US. I love how their home business centres around making things from wood, with no preservative treatments. They try to live lightly, on less, which isn't always easy. But Tonya is faithful and honest about the process as she can be.

Eight acres of eden, brings me back to Australia again. It's one of my favourite reads. Ann doesn't always have the time to write on her blog, after all, raising a large family, home schooling and renovating a home (snap!  I've got a lot of those in my list!) takes up a lot of time. When she does write though, it's worth sitting down and reading.

Phew! I wasn't sure if I had enough in my blog list to nominate, as seven is such a large number to come up with. But I'm surprised how many quality blogs I would nominate for such an award. They really are quality reads and I'm glad I took the time to share them with you all.

Thank you LindaM for nominating me - I love visiting your blog and pondering new ways of looking at the world. :)

Liebster is German for favourite (I think)

I was kindly nominated for an award by LindaM at her blog, Hello it's me... It's was a lovely surprise to find us there with some wonderful new blogs, I've been introduced to, thanks to the gesture of the Liebster Award.

I did a little internet research and discovered this particular award has German origins, and was designed to shed light on blogs with less than 300 followers. Kind of inspiring for the little guys, which I would definitely classify as - although technically, my clothes would disagree!

The rules are simply to link to the blog which nominated you for the award, then nominate three other blogs of your own. I wanted to focus on a group of blogs which I don't technically fit into any more, but nonetheless I'm very inspired by. When I left suburbia to live on small acreage, I said goodbye to one life and hello to another. Those who continue to live simply in suburbia however, do so against a backdrop of consumerism that is hard (as I can testify) to live simply by.

Nonetheless, these particular blogs do it so well, and I'm really happy to nominate them for the Liebster Award.

Life in the Dome: Jacqui lives in the Blue Mountains, which I think is a beautiful part of Australia, and she loves chooks! So much so, that I cannot help but love her chooks also. They are gorgeous. I also love that she's a bit of a Dr Who fan too. Sorry for outing you like that Jacqui, I hope you can forgive me. :)

Mountain Wildlife: Still in the Blue Mountains region, and there's a family of four who've just found a new place to call home. I've enjoyed following their adventures in home ownership and how they try to grow as much as they can from their backyard. I also love their chooks! Do I have a theme developing I wonder?

Little Farm in the city: A lovely local I've had the privilege of meeting in real life, Emily and her family, grow as much as they can in their backyard. I love their wicking beds and have seen them in action towards the end of the drought. And yes, I also love their chooks - and a wandering duck that decided it was so great in their backyard, it would stay. :)

That's my three nominees for the award. I do have one last blog I'd like to mention however. I'm not sure if they have under 300 followers, as (like me) they don't have a widget to show. But I'm going to mention them anyway, Little eco footprints, because Tricia and her family do a great job of bringing environmental issues back to the burbs.

A special thanks again, to LindaM for nominating our blog for the Liebster Award.

Happy reading everyone. :)

A big...

Thank you...

I have to apologise for being late in replying to a most generous award. It was given to me by Nicole over at Going Green. She has a very colourful and vibrant blog, which is always delightful to visit.

Like Nicole, this is my first award too, so a big thank-you!

"This award acknowledges the values that every blogger shows in his/her effort to transmit cultural, ethical, literacy and personal values every-day".

Likewise, it gives me great pleasure to nominate a few blogs with this Premio Dardos award:

(drum roll please)

Our Old Miners Cottage

Simply Suburbia

Cross Roads

Gobblers Run


I love to visit these blogs, plus many more - but some have already received this award. So I will leave it at these particular nominees and congratulate you all on a job well done.

For those nominees, when time permits, please pass on the Premio Dardos award to those blogs and sites which inspire you too.