Living the Good Life

I'm currently reading an interesting book from the library called `Living the Good Life', sub titled `how one family changed the world from their own backyard'. (It reminded me of that TV Show we used to watch with the similar name) Linda Cockburn and her husband and 6 year old son decide to be completely self sufficient for 6 months and not spend any money in that time except for essential bills and medical care. They buy an electric bicycle, a lactating goat called Possum, use the library, walk everywhere and get a lot fitter. They live on a normal sized block of land and I was intrigued to note that they also lived in our town at the time of their experiment, in fact only about 10k from us. They try to grow as much as they can (all organically), and they barter for what they can't grow, which is quite a lot. Like us they have no trouble growing organic herbs, cherry tomatoes, oranges, lemons, limes, paw paws and pumpkin, but not much else. In a sub tropical climate because of fruit fly and other pests you really have to spray stonefruit and mangoes and zucchini and similar vegetables. If it was me I think I would have sprouted seeds as you can do this indoors. Anyway it was a very inspiring read and I enjoyed it. I think they have now moved to Tasmania to a more suitable climate for growing food, and they are building a Straw bale home. I wish them well.

Here is a recent photo of our Passionfruit vine, really loaded with fruit and fully recovered from the winter frost. Last night as we had visitors, for Dessert we had Vanilla ice cream with fresh passionfruit and genuine Canadian Maple Syrup. This was a really yummy combination :) Oh and I can report that yesterday the temperature hit 40C, but the cool change came through at around 6.00 pm, just in time for our barbecue. Today is a lot cooler :)