DOWN TO EARTH

Signed copies of my book

2012-01-28T04:04:00.002+10:00

I'll be sending in an order to Penguin soon so I can sell signed copies of my book. If you'd like to order a signed copy, please send me an email (rhondahetzel@gmail.com) with this information: your name and address the number of books you would like to order the name you want me to write in the inscription I don't want to over-order and be left with books here. If you read this at the forum

Weekend reading

2012-01-27T04:17:00.001+10:00

This is my regular Friday feature in which I share a few things I've read or watched recently and some blogs that have inspired me in some way. We all know the internet is an amazing place, with many nooks and crannies to explore. I hope these links reveal interest and beauty you might not otherwise have found. Wabi-Sabi Wanderings blog Adalyn Farm blog - chickens in the snow Peppers

How far is too far?

2012-01-26T05:13:00.000+10:00

Happy Australia Day to my fellow Australians! Whether you celebrate quietly with Vegemite on toast while watching the cricket, or at a BBQ with a lot of people, fireworks and wine, I hope you enjoy today. We have a lot to be thankful for. ~~~~~*~~~~~~ Just after Christmas I had to go to town to buy a couple of things at the post-Christmas sales. I grabbed my trusty small brown leather bag

Making ginger beer from scratch

2012-01-25T03:52:00.001+10:00

We had a nice supply of ginger beer going over Christmas. It's a delicious soft drink for young and old, although there is an alcoholic version that can be made with a slight variation on the recipe. Ginger beer is a naturally fermented drink that is easy to make - with ginger beer you make a starter called a ginger beer plant and after it has fermented, you add that to sweet water and lemon

Simple, hands-on living

2012-01-24T04:24:00.000+10:00

I live a charmed life. We live here, on this fertile land with a creek running by it, at the end of a one-lane street, surrounded by a few neighbours and bushland. We use our land; it is one of our assets and to not use it productively would shame us. We grow food and keep chickens and that allows us to eat fresh organic produce that we would not be able to afford if we had to buy it all the

Pre-ordering the book

2012-01-23T04:07:00.001+10:00

With less than a month to go until the book is released, there has been a lot going on here behind the scenes. Hanno and I are planning our trip down south and the publicity and promotion have step up a notch. Penguin have added a "look inside" feature to my section of their website. If you go there, you'll be able to see the table of contents and a couple of pages of the book. And for

Weekend reading

2012-01-20T04:47:00.002+10:00

This is my regular Friday feature in which I share a few things I've read or watched recently and some blogs that have inspired me in some way. We all know the internet is an amazing place, with many nooks and crannies to explore. I hope these links reveal interest and beauty you might not otherwise have found. mkhandmade - a beautiful blog by Michelle Handmade At Home - Kelly in UK

Summer knitting

2012-01-19T05:00:00.000+10:00

Of all the things I do during the course of a normal day, the one thing that is guaranteed to help me relax is knitting. Who would have thought that winding a long piece of wool or cotton around a couple of bamboo sticks would clear the mind and produce such wonders. And it's such an old craft, unchanged over all our years, and more. I always have some form of knitting on the go. The repetitive

Rising child care costs

2012-01-18T05:34:00.002+10:00

There is no doubt about it, the cost of living continues to rise and unless we take stock of what we can do in our own lives, we'll be swept along with those rising costs. I watched a TV report on child care costs last week. Apparently, in Australia, those costs are about to rise. When I looked into it further online, Australia isn't the only country this is happening in. I found information

Routines and how to build them

2012-01-17T05:28:00.001+10:00

By the look of the comments yesterday, there is a need for another bread tutorial. I didn't have time yesterday to answer the bulk of your comments and I'm flat out busy today but later in the week I'll do a tutorial at the forum and you can ask questions as we go along. If you have a photo of your problem bread, you can post it and I'll see if I can work out how you can change your method and

Bread and potatoes - simple food

2012-01-16T04:07:00.002+10:00

These are delicious! Kartoffelpuffer - or potato pancakes, are one of those dishes that can be part of a meal of a meal in themselves. Hanno's mother taught me to cook kartoffelpuffer and I remember as clear as a bell when she told me that when they were cooked, they had to look like lace. A few weeks ago Hanno made dinner and produced not plain kartoffelpuffer but kartoffelpuffer topped with

Interesting reading

2012-01-13T04:38:00.000+10:00

Fridays this year will be about sharing links I think you might find interesting, or even enriching. It might be a blog, article or website but it will always be on our topic so I hope you'll find time to take a look. Pickles from Norway - without a doubt, my favourite knitting blog. Beautiful photos of amazing creations and many free knitting patterns. I love this blog. Ivynest is

Cold food on hot days

2012-01-12T04:52:00.001+10:00

I've been swanning around all summer thinking I live in the perfect climate. We usually have heat and humidity from November onwards but for the past couple of years that hasn't happened, we had a lot of rain instead. This summer has been mild with temperatures around 25 - 28* (77 - 82F) but when Monday dawned all the hot weather hit us at once. This is a quote from our local weather site, http

Bartering 101

2012-01-11T05:00:00.000+10:00

Earning money, then spending it, isn't the only way we can obtain the items and services we need in our every day lives. Bartering is trading items of similar value without exchanging money. It's a good way to obtain what you need without having to pay cash. The essential thing when you start bartering is to identify what you have to barter, and be realistic about it - it has to be something

One step, then another

2012-01-10T05:00:00.000+10:00

When I first gave up working for a living I did that hoping that if we were thrifty, if we cut back, if we gave up a couple of the things we used but didn't really want - like pay TV and a second car, that we would be able to live on much less that we were at that point. The key to this of course was that we had no debt. We'd already put in the hard work to pay off our mortgage - which took

Hello 2012, let's get cracking

2012-01-09T04:30:00.000+10:00

Today is the beginning of my work year. I had such a good break with Hanno; we've been watching cricket, snoozing on the lounge, laughing at the chooks, talking and reading, and while he's been doing odd jobs in the backyard, I've been knitting and sewing. I feel thoroughly refreshed and I'm looking forward to the year ahead. I'll take this opportunity to send my sincere thanks to so many of you

A sense of community

2012-01-04T08:14:00.000+10:00

As we've "progressed" through to this present age, we seem to have lost our communities along the way. Gone are the times and places when we used to meet in communal areas - at the corner shop or market, to talk about this and that and to remain connected to those we share our towns and suburbs with. Like me, you might miss this type of community but you can find something similar online. It may

The summer backyard and chicken update

2011-12-30T09:38:00.001+10:00

Things are very slow here. We're doing what we're supposed to do at this time of year. We're enjoying the sunshine in the backyard, watching cricket and relaxing. I hope you're able to do something similar. If you're north of the equator, I hope you're enjoying warm fires and brisk walks. I'll be back writing regularly soon but I thought you'd enjoy seeing what our backyard is like this morning.

Looking back and looking forward

2011-12-22T04:30:00.000+10:00

It been a very big year at the Hetzel home. Our main excitement and joy was to welcome the first two members of our family's next generation - Jamie and Alexander. I love being a grandma. It's more than I expected and it has given me a new direction in my older years. There are so many good times ahead for us as grandparents to our little boys. During the year, I finished writing my book,

Make it yourself, do it yourself

2011-12-21T04:30:00.000+10:00

My thanks to the men who commented yesterday. It was really great to hear your opinions and learn a little about how you work. ~*~*~ As I waited for a meeting to start on Monday, I browsed through some blogs I'd never seen before. It made me really happy and optimistic about the future to see so many people making gifts and food hampers from scratch. Hand made and home baking has become part

Is homemaking different for men?

2011-12-20T05:00:00.000+10:00

I received this email from a reader last week and I have to admit I'd not really given the topic much thought until then. "I was recently introduced to your blog by my husband and his mate, who has been a big fan for a while (they made your laundry detergent on the weekend!). I was wondering if you could do a blog about husbands being the homemaker instead of the wife? My husband is about to

Meet the peeps

2011-12-19T04:00:00.000+10:00

Many of you would know we had a broody hen die a couple of weeks ago. She hatched one egg, that chick also died and the remaining five eggs didn't hatch. We're not sure what happened but think it may have been a spider bite that did her in. We were hatching those chicks to help supply us with eggs in the coming months and years. Our current flock has decreased to only six hens, and all of them

On my mind ...

2011-12-16T04:45:00.001+10:00

This is a Friday photo feature that anyone with a blog can join. To take part, post a photo on your own blog, write a short caption explaining it, and link it back to here from your blog by saying you're part of "On my mind". Please write a new post, don't link to an older one. When you've done that, come back here and add a comment below, with a link to your blog. This is what I'm

The death of a reader's son

2011-12-15T04:00:00.000+10:00

There will be some readers who'll prefer not to read today's post. You can see by the title what it's about. But I am writing for a reader who needs our help at this time. The fact that it's Christmas and everyone is full of joy is irrelevant. We are real people living real lives and when a world collapses, it is healthy to reach out and connect. If you only want to read about simplifying,

Washing up - again!

2011-12-14T04:00:00.000+10:00

I was asked at a recent workshop what liquid I use to wash up. This is such a painful question for me because I've been chopping and changing, searching for something that feels right. Older readers here would remember that we gave away our dishwasher a couple of years ago and had a new sink unit installed recently. Well, I love the new sink. It gives me the room I need for large pots to be