As an Aussie with a Mediterranean heritage, gardening is practically part of my birth right. One, because my ethnicity is based on eating, laughing, enjoying good food and.......ahhh did I mention eating?
I grew up with little to nothing so as I developed, my palate also acquired an appreciation for every meal we had. Thus, as an adult my affinity with nature and respect for where our food came from matured into something profound.
Both my parents also always grew herbs and vegetables in their gardens. Propagating my own food came as a natural progression from my families sustainable ethos. Though, as a child I thought it was very daggy and that it was something only old people did.
Firstly, I took interest in the versatility of herbs. Studying their usefulness for home remedies and then the important role they played in the kitchen. Particularly a Mediterranean one.
When I started renting initially I had two pots of herbs. Then, as I moved around they seem to multiply into more and more until eventually I started establishing modest patches with tomatoes and the like.
Finally, when I moved into my own home I knew I would create a vegetable plot though, never did I for see I would have the mother of veggie plots and that it would consume all my time.
It took me four years to landscape the barren earth I started with after building my first home. Check out the before and after pics. I still can't see myself ever finishing it. I think that is the amazing thing about nature. It is forever changing and needs constant looking after.
Landscaping and growing your own fresh produce is a bit like having a baby;
- It needs to be nurtured;
- Feeding;
- You have to follow your intuition;
- Keep a watchful eye over it as it grows;
- Reap the benefits of your hard work.
When people come to my house and ask me what is growing in the garden firstly, I take them to my herbs and walk them through which ones I have and their uses. Of course, I don't bore them with all the details but just cover the cooking stuff. I always find it amazing that most or all people have little to no knowledge of herbs and rarely use them when cooking. Personally I would find food very bland without them.
Since the advent of Australia's worst draught over the past ten years- unless you had a wog background - people started living off the land and re-gaining an appreciation of Mother nature. The ole backyard veggie patch has grown in popularity once more and are cropping up in the most unusual places throughout Australian suburbs. Take the apartment veranda for example.
Bill Mollison and David Holmgren, gave birth to the agricultural earth science named Permaculture during the 70's in Australia. It is based on the premise of enabling human settlements to live sustainably among nature that can be practised in any ones backyard when applying specific design principles.
I have adapted this ecological design to my suburban home setting and find it useful and inspiring.
Now, after having my daughter I've realised the importance for her generation to have a connection with nature and the earth as we sit more and more behind our PCs and Wide screen TVs. Therefore, I hope that my efforts and passion for mother nature will inspire and instill in her, as she grows, the benefits and value of living sustainably.
I'd love to hear more stories of how you share your time in the garden with your children.
25 January, 2012
20 January, 2012
Much ado about my boobs
Over the past ten months I have had so many in-depth discussions about my boobs I feel like they have taken on a persona of their own. I almost talk about them in the third person. Not quite knowing what they are going to do next but, having a sixth sense about their existence and function.
Because of these conversations its as if the world has been watching them and their development. Almost as if they have been submitting posts on Utube. They might have as well. In fact, I have spoken about my boobs more than I care. Though, I have gotten some cheap laughs from them and some disturbing memories too.
Before my daughter was born I was adamant that she would be breast fed. I am one of the willing followers of the "breast is best" philosophy until I realised how hard breast feeding was. It has been an uphill struggle for me since the day she was born. After my milk came in-If that was a chapter in my life's memoirs I think I would dub it "the day I thought my boobs were going to explode."- I didn't have any difficulties with attachment so I thought I was one of the lucky ones and breast feeding was going to be a cinch. Ha Ha!! not so after all.
For the first two months I struggled with cracked nipples, if that was another chapter that would be named "the weeks I thought my nipples were going to drop off!" It was so very painful for the first few weeks and I was obsessed solely with correct attachment. Then, after my nipples healed my daughter seemed so unsettled that I became preoccupied with low milk production. This continued everyday. If it wasn't one thing than it was the other.
Of course, every time someone asked me how everything was going I would launch into detailed conversation about my boobs. For years I never thought much about them. I have always had relatively small sized ones and always considered myself blessed by the boob fairy. Now I was starting to think that I had been scorned.
So, after much pumping, attachment-every hour, and gallons of water to the point where I thought my bladder was going to fail, and a very unsettled baby for weeks on end I finally pleaded mercy and gave my daughter a top-up bottle. She slept like she had never slept before and so did I.
Initially, I felt physically maimed when I gave it to her, like I had just been punched in the stomach, but as she drifted soundly off to sleep for the first time I could see, she had been hungry.
Its so hard when your a first-time mum to know whether your baby is getting enough to eat and why they are crying. In the beginning it is so confusing to know whether you are reading your babies signals correctly. People tell you that you will understand their cries-I didn't. Others would ask questions like "Are you also pumping", "feed them more often", as if every ten minutes all day everyday wasn't enough!! and then relaying their horror stories about how so and so's milk wouldn't come in or how this person did this and it was alright.
Even after speaking to many health nurses in person or on the phone and seeing a lactation consultant I received so many mixed messages I did what I thought worked well for me and my baby.
Therefore, I continued to top her up with a bottle and breast feed for ten months now. Contrary to all of the 'good advice' I have received this has been the perfect solution to mine and my daughter's settling problems.
Frankly, I do still strongly believe that breast is best but only if all parties are happy, settled and comfortable with this option then so be it.
Has anyone had similar experiences. What were your reasons? why have you personally made this choice?
Because of these conversations its as if the world has been watching them and their development. Almost as if they have been submitting posts on Utube. They might have as well. In fact, I have spoken about my boobs more than I care. Though, I have gotten some cheap laughs from them and some disturbing memories too.
Before my daughter was born I was adamant that she would be breast fed. I am one of the willing followers of the "breast is best" philosophy until I realised how hard breast feeding was. It has been an uphill struggle for me since the day she was born. After my milk came in-If that was a chapter in my life's memoirs I think I would dub it "the day I thought my boobs were going to explode."- I didn't have any difficulties with attachment so I thought I was one of the lucky ones and breast feeding was going to be a cinch. Ha Ha!! not so after all.
For the first two months I struggled with cracked nipples, if that was another chapter that would be named "the weeks I thought my nipples were going to drop off!" It was so very painful for the first few weeks and I was obsessed solely with correct attachment. Then, after my nipples healed my daughter seemed so unsettled that I became preoccupied with low milk production. This continued everyday. If it wasn't one thing than it was the other.
Of course, every time someone asked me how everything was going I would launch into detailed conversation about my boobs. For years I never thought much about them. I have always had relatively small sized ones and always considered myself blessed by the boob fairy. Now I was starting to think that I had been scorned.
So, after much pumping, attachment-every hour, and gallons of water to the point where I thought my bladder was going to fail, and a very unsettled baby for weeks on end I finally pleaded mercy and gave my daughter a top-up bottle. She slept like she had never slept before and so did I.
Initially, I felt physically maimed when I gave it to her, like I had just been punched in the stomach, but as she drifted soundly off to sleep for the first time I could see, she had been hungry.
Its so hard when your a first-time mum to know whether your baby is getting enough to eat and why they are crying. In the beginning it is so confusing to know whether you are reading your babies signals correctly. People tell you that you will understand their cries-I didn't. Others would ask questions like "Are you also pumping", "feed them more often", as if every ten minutes all day everyday wasn't enough!! and then relaying their horror stories about how so and so's milk wouldn't come in or how this person did this and it was alright.
Even after speaking to many health nurses in person or on the phone and seeing a lactation consultant I received so many mixed messages I did what I thought worked well for me and my baby.
Therefore, I continued to top her up with a bottle and breast feed for ten months now. Contrary to all of the 'good advice' I have received this has been the perfect solution to mine and my daughter's settling problems.
Frankly, I do still strongly believe that breast is best but only if all parties are happy, settled and comfortable with this option then so be it.
Has anyone had similar experiences. What were your reasons? why have you personally made this choice?
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