Monday, January 25, 2010

“Family shrinking their earthly footprint (Owen Sound Sun Times)” plus 2 more

“Family shrinking their earthly footprint (Owen Sound Sun Times)” plus 2 more

Family shrinking their earthly footprint (Owen Sound Sun Times)

Posted: 25 Jan 2010 06:32 AM PST

Posted By BILL HENRY SUN TIMES STAFF

Updated 1 hour ago

Their house faces the sun. That makes a world of difference for Georgie Donais, Alan Shisko and their two small children.

After 20 years in dark, downtown Toronto, the family is spending at least a year in a 1980s-era passive solar home in The Beaver Valley, and doing their best to live a low-impact, greener lifestyle.

They've got a rooster and three hens, to start, a composting toilet to manage much of their own waste, and they try to control their consumption. They have plenty of plans -- a solar-heated shower, an outdoor kitchen, outdoor fireplace, a permacultured vegetable garden on a south-facing slope.

But reducing your environmental footprint isn't always easy, they said Saturday morning as warm winter sunlight streamed through a wall of south facing windows.

Cutting consumption "cold turkey" is more difficult with children, Donais said. The rural location means reliance on a vehicle, and using it as little as possible takes planning and "mindfulness."

"In that respect, living here is more consumptive than it was in the city," Shisko said. "We had a car but we almost never used it. I think about it a lot, because it was such a smaller part of my life in Toronto and it's a big part now, and frankly it's not something I'm particularly comfortable with."

Their new rural environment offers a lifestyle that allows the couple to better understand their place in the world, the impact they have, and how to apply years of reading and research.

"This house faces the sun, which for me was one of the most important aspects of living here," said Donais, raised in rural Saskatchewan, Canada's sunniest province.

It means heating the house only in the evenings, while the sun warms it during the day. "Just being in a house that's facing the sun makes a difference," she said.

"I have been without sun for 22 years. It's been like a physical need in me, a craving to be somewhere where I can be outside in the sun, or I can be inside in the sun. Just by being here, and by virtue of being able to stand in the sun, we have already moved leaps and bounds ahead."

Donais is an artist, builder and graphic designer who recently resigned after 10 years designing The Dance Current, Canada's national dance magazine. Shisko is a musician and motion graphics designer, creating moving titles for TV and cinema.

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That means both can work from home, with flexible hours, and time to homeschool their children, Emory, 8, and Sophia, 6, and time for other pursuits.

Donais took an interest five years ago in cob building, creating structures big and small with clay, straw, sand and water.

When health officials closed down a summer kitchen facility at their neighbourhood Dufferin Grove Park in Toronto, she spearheaded a community art project to build a 65-ft. cob wall. It includes kitchen facilities and sinks, a baby changing station, a cooking fireplace and other amenities.

More than 500 volunteers helped during the summer of 2005, and the project cost the city just $3,200 to meet health and other regulations.

"You mix it with your feet and you put it on with your hands. It's just about as elemental as you can get and anybody can do it," Donais said.

But a follow-up project to install a cob building to enclose a donated composting toilet became mired in red tape, miscommunication and neighbourhood opposition. That, in part, prompted Donais and Shisko to start looking beyond the city, toward a simpler, greener lifestyle, with more opportunity to live creatively, they said Saturday.

The experiment is to live closer to their food, and closer to their shelter, Donais said.

"We needed some place where we could go and where we could try stuff and where we could make mistakes," she said. "I want to be able to try stuff. If it doesn't work, I want to take it apart and do it again."

They learned through someone in their homeschooling network last spring that Kimbercote farm, near Heathcote and run by a non-profit ecological cooperative, was offering a live and work opportunity at the property. Their proposal was accepted in April, they moved to the farm's staff house in late May, where they function as caretakers and facilitators for groups who use the property.

"When I got here it was everything and more that I could have imagined," Donais said.

"I'm pretty won over" on the rural, greener lifestyle, added Shisko.

But both said so far, they've only made a start at reducing their environmental impact.

Future plans for the family could eventually include building a cob dwelling, they said, after more research and experimentation.

"I'd like to get closer to the fundamentals, like how do you put a roof over your head without hiring architects and bringing in backhoes and getting experts to come in a do all this stuff."

Donais said the most satisfying example of their low impact lifestyle is "humanure composting" which means using an outhouse and adding their own waste to the compost pile. It's something she's wanted to do for years, but couldn't in the city.

"To me it's an extremely satisfying way of closing the loop of eating and giving back," she said. "There's absolutely no other intervention. It goes into the bucket, goes into the compost, turns into compost to add to the soil and there's no waste."

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Homeschool Buyers Co-op Offers Free Photo ID Card As One Of Their Many Homeschool Resources (PRWeb via Yahoo! News)

Posted: 25 Jan 2010 06:05 AM PST

little sister buzzed up: 117 Russians in hospital after drinking holy water (AP)

13 seconds ago 2010-01-25T09:10:02-08:00

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Rain rests, locals play (The Signal)

Posted: 24 Jan 2010 05:08 AM PST

Sarah Elroy exerted her pent-up energy on the basketball court Saturday after a week of stormy weather kept her inside and inactive.

"I'm just physically active as it is and when you're cooped up inside, you kind of get cabin fever," said the 22-year-old Valencia resident.

Elroy took advantage of Saturday's sunshine with some friendly one-on-one basketball. A panoramic view of snow-crowned mountains against blue skies surrounded Elroy and friend, Tim Winter, as they played at the Santa Clarita Sports Complex.

"I'm trying to get some fresh air, some sun, and soak up some vitamin D," said Elroy, a personal trainer.

The sunny and 50-degree weather brought other local residents out of their homes and into activity centers, parks, paseos and even swimming pools.

"I didn't want to come in the rain so as soon as the sun came out, I thought, I want to come to the Aquatic Center," said Erica Bristol, of Canyon Country.

Bristol's lack of motivation to swim in the rain over the past week threw her off a weekly routine, she said.

Santa Clarita Valley residents can expect to enjoy at least one more day of rain-less weather today with temperature highs reaching 60 degrees, according to the National Weather Service. All evacuation orders in Acton were lifted as of 7 p.m. Friday. The service forecast a slight chance of showers late Monday afternoon and likely rain on Tuesday.

Bristol said she'll just have to swim in the rain "and not be lazy."

Lori Rivas and her family took the opportunity to host a garage sale for victims of the Haiti earthquake. Rivas said she kept an eye on Saturday's forecast all week to make sure they could pull off the sale.

The Newhall family raised more than $700 Saturday that will go directly toward relief efforts in Haiti, Rivas said.

Rivas has two married friends who live in Port-au-Prince. She has and will continue to wire money to the couple. The money is then used directly in their community for immediate needs, she said.

Currently some of those needs include antibiotics, IV bags, cotton, adhesive tape, gauze, analgesics, antiseptics and gloves.

"They're housing 16 extra people in their house right now," she said. "He's the director of a school and they're converting the school into a hospital."

Rivas said she also sends packages to the family through a private pilot. She will do the same with the donations raised through the garage sale, she said.

"It's the least that I can do," she said. "I wish I could do more."

Donors to the garage sale included Free Cycle SCV, We Homeschool Youth, Homeschooling Explorers, Helping Hands Homeschool Co-Op, and friends and neighbors of Rivas' family.

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