Cargo bike article in ReNew magazine. I'm published!

The latest issue of ReNew Magazine features an article by me on cargo bikes. It's great to be able to share the cargo bike love! Here it is:

If you've got any comments or questions fire away.

End of year stats

Well, another year has come and gone. We'll be away for the next two months, so I thought I'd get this out before we left.

Gas and electricity use is up a tiny bit this year. I can't tell what the reason is, but it seems to be due to electricity use rather than gas. Since we've had solar hot water our gas use has dropped from 16kWh a day to between 8 and 9.5kWh.

The chooks are laying less, we're on course for 1,000 egss after 1,400 last year. One of our old Australorps died this year and the old girls are definitely laying less. It also seems that our Hi-lines are laying less. They are one year old now, so I'm a bit surprised at this.

Transport has been a winner this year. I've been riding the Fr8 to work three times a week most weeks. Our aim of halving our car kms from 2010 levels hasn't quite succeeded, but we're on course for 10,000kms this year which isn't too bad.

That's it for now. We're off to Europe to blow our carbon budget for the next few years! But this is the topic of another post...

Have a safe and sustainable Christmas.

Have reusables, will travel

So, we are off to visit family and friends in the UK and Europe in a few days. With blowing all that carbon (18.53 tonnes of carbon for which 111 trees need to be planted, to be precise), the least we can do is try to avoid some single use plastics while we are away.

I've been collecting and making a reusables for a while now but I've also made a few purchases to facilitate travel sans plastic. Most of which will fit in my snazzy new bum bag:

Among other things, I'll keep with me one emergency cloth pad, home made lip balm, a bamboo spork, my lucky Onya bag and a hanky.

Quin also has a new bum bag. He will carry with him his spork, bamboo straw (apparently essential), Onya water bottle, and a minifigure (also essential).

I'm banking on Ads to lug around our big water bottle, keep cups, containers, camera, map books and all the other heavy stuff. Bless him.

I've also given some thought to my toiletries. It's easy to have your home made stuff at home, but I do wonder how they will travel. Glass might break and my deodorant might melt! But I'll try anyway. I'm packing my home made hair treatment, toothpaste, washable make-up pads, deodorant, essential oils and a base oil and my toothbrush.  I've given up my contacts which came in disposable packaging and I'm contemplating going make-up free. I think it will work - we'll find out if our personal hygiene is up to scratch if people ask to move seats away from us on the plane!

Of course, there will be other regular bits like panadol, bandaids, colgate for Quincey etc, some things we can't avoid and I'm certain I will end up with bloody plastic straws at some stage, but we will give it our best shot - by the way, there are a few other good plastic free tips on the Plastic Free July website (just a little plug!)

So, we are just about ready to hit the road - wish us luck!