Mullumbimby Local Food Festival

Yesturday was the most glorious day for the food festival held at the Mullum Community Gardens. It was such a great turn out with live music, kids activities, yummy food and drinks.
A great gathering of wonderful people from the community. There were many volunteers and people committed to the change through selling safe seeds, organic seedlings and running workshops like bamboo structures, also presentations on biochar and talks by other inspirational peeps.



www.forkinthefield.com





The kids whipped up the best salad dressing i have ever tasted.



Evie harvesting beetroots.



This little product is used to make small newspaper pots for seedlings.



This is Alison Drover from Fork in the Field who put together a wonderful kids activity area along with a couple of other crafty people.



Me and Joel.







The pizza oven.





Nicko has a giant squishy custard apple heart.





chai chai chai



Biodynamic Cowhorn prep





Raised garden beds. www.mandalagardenproducts.com.au



Safe seeds for sale through seed savers at the Mullum gardens.



www.mullumcommunitygarden.wordpress.com
www.communitygarden.org.au/

Wild raspberry jam

Over the weekend a friend and i spent a couple of hours picking 2 buckets of wild raspberries in the paddock next door. i made jam and am now selling it for $5 a jar.





this is the kitchen at jasper hall the community i live on in upper coopers creek.


Washing and sterilizing jars ready for pouring the jam into.

14 jars from 2 buckets of berries.



everyone here at the community has been loving the jam. selling fast at $5 pop. :)

Byron Movement

Im really glad someone has started the byron movement. There are so many wonderful people in the area and their stories are now being shared through www.byronmovement.com



With Common Ground, Byron Movement and the trusty Echo how could you miss a beat.
www.commongroundaustralia.com

Byron Movement Launch Festival is at Durrumbul hall this saturday the 16th JULY

Suffolk Park Community Garden

The space circled in red is where i think a great community garden could exist. Somewhere people can relax, garden, socialize, and eat tasty organic food.
Obviously there is a lot to consider when looking into a project like this. Such as aspect of the land - soils, flooding, sea breezes, sun direction. Then there is social community wants and needs, education, funding. Also catching and storing energy such as solar panels, and water tanks. And of coarse there is Design to ensure a productive garden.
Design concepts consider all of the above as well as what kind of garden beds would be appropriate (raised beds, herb spirals, mandala etc). Is a seed raising nursery needed and how would this fit into the design.



So iv started with researching how to turn an idea into a reality. www.communitygarden.org.au has alot of info on how to do this.
Iv started with writing up a plan to show council, i downloaded the template from the above website.



This picture is from CERES. org.au
(Centre for Education and Research in Environmental Strategies)
Iv not visit this garden yet though iv heard great things. They have an onsite CAFE, Seedling nursery, Shoppe, Aquaponics system, Education facility and market garden a couple of K's up the road.



Everyone loves to go to the farmers markets on a thursday morning. Not only does it mean you are buying local food and keeping the money local you are supporting families who farm in the area. We know its a great place to spend your morning, with buskers playing beautiful music and a good coffee. So lets continue this through to our community garden, connect the dots and keep the community alive.

Got Worms?!

Instead of a Bokashi bucket iv chosen to use a worm farm to minimize our household organic waste. It's small, takes up hardly any space and if managed properly can work really well.




The bottom tray catches the worm tea which can be watered down to make a fertilizer for the garden. while the worm castings which get left in the bottom tray are also great to add to the soil in your garden.



This worm farm is made from an old bath tub. Many people do this in their garden because you can put larger amounts of organic matter in as well as producing more worm tea, and castings, I's great to use a recycled bath tub if you have the space instead of using new resources.

permaculture journal

My first journal entry for my certificate III Permaculture is to do with personal goals in studying and practicing permaculture.
I had been wanting to learn about the subject for the last 2 years though was in the middle of studying fashion design and did not know what to do. So i listened to my parents and completed what i was doing.
Now im on a new venture, one that feels so right. iv not felt this happy ever before. i think its because as humans, we too are living beings as is the micro organisms in the soil and the plants that surround us.
Most people in society have become so disconnected with the world we live IN that we think it is the world we live ON and therefor seperating ourselves from the true natural connection to food, nutrition and environment.
For me this coarse is about learning as much as i can about permaculture principles, landscape design and garden skills so that i can pass them on to a younger generation.



My aim is to complete the coarse with a strong understanding of each aspect of permaculture to be able to teach it to children and enrich their lives as much as mine.



Since starting the coarse 3 weeks ago iv started my own garden along the north side of my rented house which i have planted some shallots, lemon verbena and basil.



The compost seems to be doing well it just needs some worms to help everything breakdown and leave castings.
A bokashi bucket is the next purchase so that our household of 3 can create compost tea to put on the veggie garden when i plant it in the near future.

giving up free time

Today a i did something iv been reluctant to do in the past, that is working unpaid for someone else.
iv always thought if your going to work you should be paid for it, after all apparently time is money.
Experiencing the giving to another was such a great feeling and i learnt a lot as well. You never know what might open up if you just share a little. :)
Thanks to Greg and Ness at Farmers Choice Organics in Myocum, im able to do some work with the little baby seedlings
Greg gave me some tips on composting and my first garden bed. I received some free soil, and comfrey to add to the compost.


comfrey enriches the compost



Book -COMPOST by Ken Thompson - somehow this book makes compost look incredible.



I also did a delivery of seedlings to Eden at Byron this afternoon so if your looking for some little organic babies to plant you can find them there and at a few other retailers or at the Byron and Bangalow markets. <3

Today i learnt about vermiculite. Iv always wondered what those little GOLD flecks are in your seedling or herb trays or attached to the bottom of you fancy lettuce. Vermiculite assists in the germination of seeds and holds moisture. There are many uses for vermiculite check it out on www.vermiculte.com.au