stuff i'm doing

thought i'd show you some of the things i've been up to besides knitting hats. these are the pics of some sweaters (mostly lambswool and cashmere) that i have felted and am re-constructing into armwarmers, ear bands, hats and bags.

these are in different stages of deconstruction/ re-creation. i love recycling stuff. the possibilities are endless!

fiber goody giveaway and a chance to help

saw this on facebook (thanks DeAnna!) and wanted to share it with everyone.

Pete's Greens, an organic CSA in vermont, suffered a devastating fire recently. Juniper Moon Farm is having a giveaway in an attempt to help. you can enter the giveaway whether you donate or not, but every dollar will help this guy get back on his feet before the growing season! they have raised over $5,000 already. check it out here:

Juniper Moon Farm Giveaway

they are giving away an enormous amount of cool stuff, from books, yarns, fibers.....and again, you do NOT have to donate to enter.

kudos to Juniper Moon Farm for their huge hearts!

knitting worms

"what is that?" you say. "what are you talking about? worms that knit?"

nope! knitting a worm! heidi has me all in a dither. with all the new found time on my hands after restructuring my life a bit, i have been able to delve into, and actually bring together, several passions. today it is homesteading (vansteading to many of us!) and knitting......

last night i emailed heidi to remind her that Brian the Younger had been doing vermiculture (composting with worms)in his rv when i met him in pahrump. i have some pics somewhere of the cute little guys and the resulting rich, black compost they produced, but thought heidi might be able to get brian to contribute his experiences to the vansteader information pool since i, as i told her,  don't know much about worm poo. i have long been interested in trying it (making it, not eating it) but becoming semi-mobile put a stop to that.....

or has it? i was interested when i saw brian's set-up, but he has a much larger rv with room for that sort of thing. i immediately dismissed it as impracticle in the rondyvan, which is a very silly thing to do. i should know by now that ideas should never be dismissed, only shelved temporarily until heidi gets me all inspired again, and ya throw a whole network of vandwellers and such into the mix :-)

so, the knitting, what about the knitting?

i remembered a discussion on vermiculture in small spaces that we had on a group called ishcon, where friends of ishmael gathered. it took some digging, but i finally found the thread, and lo and behold! i not only found the website of the marvelous woman who created "worm-ware", the sustainable answer to composting on the go, but a pattern for knitted worms! all on the very same website! now ya wonder why i think my life is pretty amazing?

i'm gonna quit rattling on here, and give you some links to check it out yourself. enjoy!

travels with worms

knit one red worm

cityworm

i can't wait to see where heidi goes with this! kylie, you too!

laundry

 heidi just did a post over at vansteaders  on doing laundry. i recently got a new laundry plunger and she has inspired me to finally get to posting about it. i first heard about the mobile breathing washer  from steve spence at green trust.org

for years, in between trips to the laundromat, i have done my laundry in a 5 gallon bucket with the rapid washer from lehman's hardware. the big tin-plated steel washer was one piece, too bulky for vandwelling, and had a tendency to rust, so i was pleased to see the newer, portable version.

in my van, i use the 3 gal. paint buckets available at lowe's. as you can see, i cut a hole in a lid for the plunger. i need to do smaller loads, obviously, than with the 5 gal. bucket at the farm. i have a small washboard i use in my collapsible sink for small stuff.

the breathing mobile washer is very sturdy, and disassembles easily. i got mine on ebay for $15 with free shipping. it works just as well as the rapid washer did, and is easier to store. i'm going to do some experiments with heidi's ammonia method, and i'll report back my results in a later post.

vansteaders!

i am very excited to announce a new blog that is the blending of so many things close to my heart:

vansteaders

i am so blown away by this, and shouldn't be. heidi is one of the most creative people i know, and when she puts her mind to something, it shines. she shines! this is so timely for me. when i got home in may, i expected to be on the road again  by july. that got pushed back, and now is on hold indefinitely.

being at the farm has been really good....the time is well spent. i have enjoyed my family and friends so much. my homesteading urge is all stirred up, though, and i peruse my container gardening bible and poke around searching out edible wild plants. and dream of doing it on the road....

another thing i have at the farm, that i don't have in the van, is a studio. my creative juices are at their peak when surrounded by the yarns and fiber and tools that i so love, hanging from hooks and draped over furniture where their colors and textures inspire me. there is no re-creating that when i have to lift the mattress and dig under the bed in the rondyvan.

but a solution to that has been dreamed up by another dear friend of mine. sandy has created a little vardo that would be a perfect little pull-behind studio/shop. he has invited me to come to BC and he will teach me how to build one of my own.......isn't that sweet?  i can so picture selling hats out of the side of that rig, and having skeins of yarn, baskets of fiber, and my spindles always handy and ready....

i am going to use my time here in the east well. it is an opportunity to make some changes, and increase the dream. vansteaders will be a great resource! thank-you Numees!

no 'poo four....update!!

i learned how to cut and paste links in my blog posts, so i can harvest comments from various places and put them here.

this from lindy, the bus dweller, from over on facebook....
"hey, katie, i've been no-pooing....here is my "feedback" i've been mixing in one of those bottles that hair salons use for coloring (mine was new) and i use six ounces of water to wet my hair with the bs in the bottle, then about that much water to rinse it out...then another 6 oz. for acv...then another 6 oz. to rinse. i am using conditioner on my ends and leaving it in. my hair is past my shoulder blades and is medium in thickness :-) so far i love "no poo". "

and for the record, blogger would not let me cut and paste after all. argh. had to hand-peck it :-(

from janene:
"so i did the soda thing for the first time today. it is a touch less clean than i am used to on wash day...but usually if i go without conditioner, my head goes all kinds of frizzy--and it did not do that today. so i am expecting good things. also...i'm going to experiment with frequency, this may mean i need to wash more often, or i may be able to stay on my five day schedule...we'll see.

on this skin thing...i recalled this recently--i used to brew basil tea as an astringent, and i think i am going to do so again. it can be harsh, but for my semi-oily skin, it's really pretty mild. also plan to experiment with raw aloe as a moisturizer....."

a further update from janene here:

http://terrapraeta.wordpress.com/2009/09/15/not-to-poo/

DeAnna of knit-n-nature had this to share:
"i've been experimenting with just cutting out a lot of the products that we've been trained to buy. i haven't used shampoo or conditioner for 8 months or so. i don't use anything else either. the first couple of months was pretty rough as my scalp re-acclimated and learned that it didn't need to over-produce natural oils. but these days a quick rinse in plain warm water every couple days works just great. really. my hair doesn't look greasy or dirty. i work a job with the mainstream public, and i still "pass" just fine.

i'm off soap and deodorant for about 2 months now. again, just a good water rinse seems to work just fine. i do sometimes notice that i do smell a little strong for "mainstream" (never bad, just strong), but i figure my body hasn't had a chance to acclimate yet.

i'm pondering my relationship with toothpaste. i'm not ready to try it yet, but i'm wondering if brushing with water would work just as well, once your body adjusted to it.

laundry detergent only comes out if there is something really dirty, otherwise, just plain warm water again.

water...turns out it is pretty amazing stuff."

i had some good comments from vickie, but can't find them? i'll add them later...i know they are out there....

just wanted to mention that i used shampoo/conditioner last week just to see what would happen, and how long it would take to get back to "normal" after using it. my hair was silky soft but absolutely flat and limp. went immediately back to my baking soda routine, and my hair was it's bouncy lovely self right away. i guess my oil glands didn't have time to get befuddled :-)

hope to hear more updates. i have experimented with no deodorant, "natural" deodorants from the health food store, and just using alcohol or baking soda on my pits, and the results were grim. mutt didn't mind, but i didn't go out in public and raise my hands, let me tell ya. i think kylie reported good results with baking soda? kylie?

keep those comments coming!

oh, i almost forgot. Numees had a good link for us:

http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/

thamks, numees! i love you!

No poo three

i just have to come back on this topic. i just love my hair.! i am so glad i went down this path. i am now using 1 tablespoon baking soda in 2 cups of water, mixed in my zyliss shaker, every 2-3 days. i will never use shampoo again, even if it was free....my hair is that good.

after a question from nicole about the necessity of wetting my hair first, i tried applying the 2 cups of baking soda solution to dry hair. it was more than enough to saturate my short, but growing in, hair. it doesn't take much to rinse it, so this is a good low-water solution to hair washing, for those times when i'm doing it over a bucket in the van, or behind a bush on hwy. 1 in california.

nicole is going to try it out this weekend. hopefully she'll weigh in here.... but remember the adjustment period...it took my hair over a week to adjust......

janene has also commented on alternatives to other body products. we're gonna do some experimenting, so if anybody has any ideas to throw in, it would be appreciated!

no poo two

just a quick update on my no 'poo adventure.....

in the previous blog post i said that i wasn't interested in trying out the baking soda/vinegar route, because what i had read indicated it would involve alot of mixing and measuring and timing and rinsing. then vickie left some comments about her experience, and how after a little time, she was so pleased with the baking soda routine. apparently it just took some time for the oil production to level out. anyhow...i decided to give the baking soda a try before i ruled it out. all i can say is wow. just wow.

it is so simple. i use a 2 cup shaker bottle, put in a cup of water and a tablespoon of baking soda, pour it over my hair, massage my scalp for a minute, and rinse. contrary to other people's experiences, my hair rinses with alot less water than i needed with shampoo or dr. bronners. right now it seems that washing with baking soda every 2-3 days is more than adequate, i rinse my hair with plain water other mornings if i want to get rid of bed head. or wear a hat :-)

check back later today for a post on baking in my Banks FryBake pans.....

to poo or not to poo

okay, so this is not about pooping. but i hope i got your attention. pooping will be for another post, after i am sure you all love me enough to come back after reading it. some people don't do well with discussions about body functions, and i don't want to discourage what readers i get. but after all, we all have body functions, and vandwelling raises some challenging issues of dealing with them. but for the record, i have never, ever passed gas in my whole entire life. no kidding. just wanted to make that clear, as there are some who might pass nasty rumors about me. same thing with snoring. nada. unlike my numees, who makes stealth vandwelling a thing of the past for sweet mike. just repeating what he said. anyhow....














this post is about shampoo. or more specifically, no shampoo.

in my efforts to simplyfy my life and downsize my gear, i spend alot of time evaluating stuff i use, and whether i can find items that are multi-purpose to eliminate redundancy. for instance, i use dr. bronner's for both my bath soap and dish soap and dog shampoo. i have used it as a shampoo, and in a pinch as a toothpaste. i also use it for handwashing clothes.


my usual routine for doing my hair has been to use Aussie's shampoo/conditioner combination. the perfumes they use are not too overwhelming, and it definitely leaves my hair soft. but it has been impossible to find these last few months, so i began searching for an alternative. dr. bronners peppermint soap does clean my hair really well, but i didn't want to add a bottle of conditioner to my toiletry kit, so i was googling around the 'net looking to see if there was a different dilution of the bronner's i could use to get softer results. what i found was a whole lot of info and blogs about the no 'poo revolution.

seems there are as many reasons to go shampoo-less as there are methods of doing it. some folks want to cut down on the amount of plastics they put into the environment, while some want to cut down on the chemicals they put in their body. some do it for economy, and some for simplicity. after reading some of the websites and blogs and the hundreds of comments from people who have done it, i thought that all of these reasons were valid.


if you click on the blog title above, it will take you to an article that will answer some of your questions. blogger is not letting me add extra links for some reason, so google "no poo" or "shampoo alternative" for some great blogs on the topic.


my experience so far has been interesting. the baking soda wash with the vinegar rinse method seemed to be a little too complex....the mixing and the waiting and the "put this one on the roots and this one on the ends only" was intimidating, along with the comments that stated alot of rinsing was necessary. of course, there's that multiple bottle issue....


what i have found that works pretty well is washing my hair with dr. bronners every 2 or 3 days (no conditioner)with just a quick rinse with water and a scalp massage on the days in between. my hair feels different. it has taken some geting used to. it doesn't feel greasy, just different, and cathy says it doesn't smell funny.


my hair is super fine and has developed alot of natural wave in the last 2 years. i only have a few threads of grey so far, so it is still very soft. what it doesn't have is body...it is very limp and fly away. since cutting out the shampoo/conditioner routine, my hair has alot more body and curl. the kind of body that i could only get using some kind of styling lotion like "curly sexy hair". (which i hated the feel of, so rarely used it.)


so, ultimitely i have come full circle.....seems i washed my hair, stripping out the oils, so had to use a conditioner to prevent dryness. then i had to use a styling product if i wanted any kind of control or body.....


now, i've eliminated all the in-between steps, as well as costs and bottles of stuff, to use a mild soap (not toxic, like detergents in shampoo). the oil production in my hair has leveled out, and what i get is just my hair in a state as close to natural as possible. i'm really liking it, considering i used to feel i could do without a daily shower if necessary, as long as i could wash my hair. i am now in the process of growing my hair out, so we'll see how it goes as it gets longer.


i'd love to hear from any of your experiences if you have tried this, or any comments on hair care on the road.........

the first thing you see

"at some point in life, the world's beauty becomes enough." toni morrison

how true. how much of my life i squandered, looking for The Reason for Being. only to find out that the whole point, after all, was just to be here. now.

i have this thing, like a quirk. (okay, if you ask my therapist, he'll tell you that i have alot of them). but my big thing is what i see first thing every morning. i believe it sets the mood for the rest of the day. wake up in beauty, walk in beauty. that's one of the main reasons i prefer to sleep outside.

the top picture is the view out of the back of the van when it is parked across the road from the house. i sleep there alot, don't waste gas driving anywhere. i don't need to. i am fortunate to be surrounded by open spaces right where i am.

the bottom picture was taken one morning from underneath a leanto behind my house. you can see my breath clouding in the cold. i don't blame folks for thinking i'm nuts, sleeping outside at my age. but what a rush, opening my eyes and the first thing i see is that sky. it imprints in your brain, setting up a buffer for the garbage that assaults your spirit the rest of the day.

pretty cheap therapy, if you ask me.