Farm Friday

Eye makeup remover ingredients

A few random thoughts and things for Farm Friday:

I continue to strive towards more sustainable living.  One project this week was to make my own eye makeup remover.  It's not aesthetically pleasing but it seems to get the job done.  Maybe if I put it in an opaque rather than clear container, I wouldn't notice the off color.

I've also started baking my own "no knead" bread with pretty good results.  I've never had much success with bread making - and it actually scared me.  But this recipe, which seemed too good to be true, also was too good to pass up.  I'll have to share the recipe in another post.

Since my reflective period back in September, I've been trying to reduce my energy consumption by driving less and cutting down on the loads of clothing that I wash and dry.  Since it's not growing season, we don't have to make multiple trips to make CSA deliveries and to sell at the farmer's market so I've gotten more deliberate about grouping errands.  For instance, we got our pork processed at a USDA facility so we could sell it.  The processor is about an hour away and is on the way to Greensboro, NC where I shop at a natural foods grocery store.  So, since I had to pick up our pork, I first visited the grocery store, picking up a variety of things, including cans of organic olive oil, safflower oil, fair trade organic tea, bulk organic oatmeal, and bulk organic spelt flour.  Now I won't need to go back to that area for a while, thus saving gas and wear and tear on my vehicle.  I also started using my portable drying rack more, hanging many of my clothes to dry rather than using the clothes dryer.  

As part of our commitment to the environment and our community, we decided to get more involved with the anti-uranium push in our area.  As I mentioned earlier this week, we attended an important meeting on this topic on Tuesday night.  This afternoon we attended a press conference at which our lieutenant governor announced his personal support of continuing the moratorium on uranium mining.  You can read his official statement here.  It's great to get his support but the struggle is far from over.

In doing some research on the uranium topic, I found a "pro uranium" blog that had an infographic showing how many mined materials go into solar panels.  A very valid point.  No matter how we generate our power or manufacture our goods, it is important to know we are still using valuable resources and must treat them as such.

A final note:  When we built our house, I made sure that the windows in our main living areas faced our best view.  What I didn't plan for was the spectacular sunsets that the view includes.  I need to remind myself not to take those sunsets for granted.

Have a great weekend!