Shoreline Farm Supply- the Back Story.

My wife gave me two bible verses one day.  I am positive her intentions were not to point out my faults, but was reminding me of God’s calling for us.  So, one night as I crawled into bed, I noticed I had a post-it note on my pillow.  Written on it were two references of bible verses from Thessalonians.  Can’t say I ever read them before, honestly I had to look up where Thessalonians was. The verses were a warning about the dangers of being idle or lazy and hanging out with those that are.

1 Thes. 4 10-12

…we exhort you, brethren, to do so more and more, to aspire to live quietly, to mind your own affairs, and to work with your hands, as we charged you; so that you may command the respect of outsiders, and be dependent on nobody.

2 Thes. 3 6-15

Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ that you keep away from any brother who is living in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us. For you know how you ought to imitate us; we were not idle when we were with you, we did not eat any one's bread without paying, but with toil and labor we worked night and day, that we might not burden any of you. It was not because we have not that right, but to give you in our conduct an example to imitate. For even when we were with you, we gave you this command: If anyone will not work, let him not eat. For we hear that some of you are living in idleness, mere busybodies, not doing any work. Now such persons we command and exhort in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work in quietness and to earn their own living. Brethren, do not be weary in well-doing. If anyone refuses to obey what we say in this letter, note that man, and have nothing to do with him, that he may be ashamed. Do not look on him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother.

Shoreline Farm Supply

About 6 months ago I was becoming frustrated with the availability of non-GMO, open source seed, good quality local feed for our animals.  It was nearly impossible to get.  What was available was filler byproduct feed from the large Agri-companies was very abundant and filled with stuff I wouldn’t dream of feeding my family.   I presented my wife with a thought.  We should open a feed store. I can’t remember what look she gave me or why she agreed.  I am sure she didn’t really know what she agreed to…although I didn’t know what I was getting into either.  About 5 months ago, we formalized the beginning of our new feed supply business- a venture my 8 year old is very proud of (she tells everyone my dad and I started a feed business).  My father joined us in this venture as well, a big step of faith for both him and me considering our challenged relationship of the past.  Staying at home with my two girls and continuing to push or responsible living series, this gave us the sort of needed flexibility in the workplace I needed.

Sourcing as much local, open seed source, sustainably farmed feeds seems like a simple good idea.  Not overcharging for it seemed like a good idea too.  The mission of Shoreline Farm Supply was hence defined.

The First Feed Run

With $500.00 and just enough gas to make a round trip my father and I made our first feed mill pick-up.  It was a grueling start, we had truck problems almost ran out of gas, and was hauling feed with my two young children and a dog on a 5 hour turned 14 hour adventure.  But we made a friend at the mill; Tom, the owner.  It wasn’t until 5 weeks later that we realized that we had a friend.  He was a hard nut to crack and eventually he came around to embrace our business model- cash up front only, we will never ask for credit…oh yeah…and we are a little bit out there.  He still probably thinks we are crazy.  After it was all said and done, we figured we made about $0.50 on the first feed run- if you don’t count the cost of the gas or vehicle repairs, don’t pay ourselves or reimburse ourselves for anything and add $400 in my dad’s money, but we did it.  Things have improved a little bit since then, although not much.

We have since cultured wonderful relationships with customers, farmers, mill operators, warehouse managers and family.  We are now talking about moving tons of feed versus bags.  We are supplying feed to hundreds of customers, helping out small struggling farms and families when we can and using good old fashion bartering and hard work where necessary.

I am not sure I am a good business owner, only time will tell.  I am sure that I couldn’t do it without my wife’s or father’s support.  Of course, when it comes down to it, we are only God’s stewards of what He has entrusted to us.  God willing, we will continue.

What we do about shopping?

Purchasing products may seem like a simple task when looking at our responsibilities as Christians trying to live more sustainable lives.  While we do look at local responsibly grown, packaged and distributed products, one thing is more important to us; and probably should be to more Christians.  Let me start by asking this simple question: Why do Christians insist on being consumers on Sundays?  I am not interested in debating which day is traditionally the Sabbath or which day should be the Lord ’s Day.  As Evangelicals, we observe Sunday as the day set aside to focus on God.  What is more important is asking ourselves what our obligations are to those in the community who have to work on Sundays because of our demand of their business.  What are we telling them about us, what we believe and how important they are to us…as Christians?  We are not talking about essential services, but think of all the coffee stands, grocery stores, gas stations, restaurants, department stores, real estate agents, and any and all non-essential services.  I am not advocating hurting business, but adjusting our spending habits to allow businesses to adjust theirs.  It is about wants versus needs. So what can one Christian do?  Let’s see.

What are we doing about our natural resources?

Natural Resources

§  In one of Jesus’ parables (Matt 25:14-30) three servants are entrusted with the wealth of their master, each one only received what they were capable of handling.  The first two servants worked with the resources they were given and doubled their master’s value. The last did nothing and sat on the wealth they were given.  The last servant was punished for being lazy with what they were given.  Why did Jesus tell this story?   It tells us something about how God deals with us, his servants.  The parable speaks of the Master's trust in his servants; he leaves them with his property to use as they think best.  This was a test to see if the Master's workers would be industrious and reliable in their use of the property entrusted to them.  The master rewards those who are industrious and faithful and he punishes those who sit by idly and who do nothing with what they were given.  The point of the parable seems to lie in the servants' conception of responsibility and stewardship.  The servant who hid away the master's wealth was irresponsible.  The master expected his servants to be productive in the use of his wealth.  What do the laws of economics have to do with the kingdom of God?   The Lord entrusts the subjects of his kingdom with resources and graces and he gives his subjects the freedom to use them as they think best. With each gift and talent, God gives sufficient the means (grace and wisdom) for using them in a fitting way. As the parable shows, God abhors indifference and an attitude that says it's not worth trying. God honors those who are faithful with even a little and they are entrusted with more! But those who neglect or squander what God has entrusted to them will lose what they have.  We have obligations to use what was given us in the Christian life.

We are given a command to be good stewards of what is given to us and are expected to utilize what is before us.  Trying to live a sustainable life forces us to rely on God to provide, but also helps us be good stewards of our resources, never exploiting or wasting what is given to us. 

What are we doing?

Rainwater harvesting

It may seem like a ridiculously easy thing, but we have learned that it may not be so simple.  Often we see rain barrels provided by various garden groups and counties.  Sometimes we see 4 or 5.  We recently passed a local church that was growing a large vegetable garden, I am assuming to donate to food banks.  It had three large (45 gallon) rain drums set up on risers to collect from the church gutters and water the garden.  It was very pretty looking.  Like this church we also started small.  We purchased and installed a large 100 gallon tank.  It was 7 feet tall and about 2 feet in diameter.  We set it up next to our small garden that measured about 10 feet by 10 feet.  It was very pretty and impressive; we even painted it to match the house.  In the start of the late spring / summer dry spell we were able to water for about 2 weeks, watering every three days.  Then our garden was dry for 3 weeks before any substantial rain came.  It wasn’t pretty anymore.

King County- 35 gallon barrel waters what?  It will irrigate a 4 foot x 4 foot garden for less than 2 weeks, watering every 4 days.  I know what the county pamphlet says, but we measured it.

We than thought bigger and installed a 3,500 gallon rain cistern.  Required us to be much more intentional about our decisions.  Our neighbors though I was making beer when they first saw the giant 10 feet tall, 10 feet in diameter cistern in our driveway.  I don’t drink beer, especially that much.  What do we do with that much rainwater (when it rains and fills in 8 hours of moderate rain)?  Flush all our toilets, wash all of our laundry, irrigate our entire yard, and water all our miscellaneous animals.

Note: Rainwater harvesting using existing buildings no longer is bound by natural resource depletion laws or runoff requirements under the Washington State Department of Ecology.

What it did was enabled us to use the money spent here, elsewhere.

Worm bin and composting

By utilizing our worm bin, it helped us reduce our garbage, allowing us to go to a small garbage can and save over $30.00 every bill.  It also teaches our kids how ecology works, provides us with worm tea concentrate (fertilizer), worm casings (compost) and worms for the birds (they have to eat too).  In short, we are using everything God gives us, even the waste byproduct.

Recycling and Yard waste myths- reduce, reuse, and recycle

Yard waste is a waste.  We need to use what we produce, even the byproducts. Grass / brush clippings and food scraps to worm bin or animals.  Food waste back to ground as compost (done correctly).

Recycling—why should we be concerned with reduction, reusing and recycling when the real problem is source packaging.  One of the very few good things I can say about Costco was their initiative to reduce overall packaging by changing the specs of how food and commodities were packaged.  Their incentive was to reduce the weight of packaging, thus reduce the cost of shipping. We need to push this business case to large scale producers.  Many intentional decisions we make are at least partially based on packaging.

We have a garden

What better natural resource that your own land.  We grow what we can and what we cannot grow on our property, we use local suppliers.  Apples, peaches, pears, strawberries, wild blackberries from the local green spaces.  Can and / or freeze everything for use out of season.

Why should we look at this radical change in behavior?

o   Helps us to be a good steward of what God has given us.

o   God honors those who are faithful with even a little and they are entrusted with more! But those who neglect or squander what God has entrusted to them will lose what they have. 

o   We have obligations to use what was given us in the Christian life. We are given a command to be good stewards of what is given to us and are expected to utilize what is before us. 

o   Trying to live a sustainable life forces us to rely on God to provide, but also helps us be good stewards of our resources, never exploiting or wasting what is given to us. 

Worm bin basics….

The time has come to review the use and the startup of a home worm bin. 

The first thing you need to do is get your hands on a bin. You can purchase pre-made worm bins from me directly, it’s fairly inexpensive. You can also look online or at your local nursery. Whichever type you go with, the size should be able to handle the food waste your house produces.   Generally each family member will generate about ¼# of food waste a day…on the average.  For a family of four (1# per day) you would need a 3’ by 2’ bin minimum and about 2# of worms.  The height is less important as the worms usually only live and eat in about 10” of material.  I generally recommend 12” in height.

Keep in mind that the bin does not need to be very deep. Red worms live and eat in the top six to eight inches of material.

Worms can be dug out of your garden, but there are two varieties of worms that are specifically raised for vermicomposting, composting worms do a faster job of breaking down organic matter from beginning to end. Go with red worms (AKA red wigglers) for a successful worm bin.

So, now the set up.

1.     Bedding- The most commonly used bedding material is newspaper, mostly because it is so readily available. Cardboard and peat are also good bedding materials. I prefer the shredded bill pile under your paper shredder.  Regardless tear up the paper or cardboard into fairly small pieces or strips- about 1” wide max.

2.    Moisture- Worms will not survive in a dry environment, so you need to moisten the bedding materials. Place your bedding material into a clean bucket and add some water. You want your bedding material to feel like a wrung-out sponge. A couple of drops should be released from the bedding if you squeeze a handful of it.  You may need to add more water or dry bedding to get the right level.  Break up any large clumps of bedding to allow for air to circulate…or worms. Add it to your bin…should be half full.

3.    Grit-  Add a shovelful of garden soil or finished compost to your bedding material. It will provide grit for the worms, as well as introduce microorganisms that will help the contents of your worm bin break down faster.

4.    Rest- Cover up the bin. Let it sit a few days without adding food so that the worms work their way down into the bedding.

5.    Placement- Where you place your bin is important. The bin should be kept in an area that stays between 55 and 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperatures outside of this range can be detrimental to the worms and slow production in the bin. Location must also be convenient. Favorite locations include under the kitchen sink, mudrooms, and basements.

6.    Feed your worms.  Spread the food scraps onto the bedding and bury slightly.  Try to keep it in one area, picking a different location every time.

Remember-  worm bins need your veggie scraps, tea bags, junk mail, cardboard (unwaxy).  Never feed dairy products, meat or oils. 

Enjoy!

What is the difference between Thrift and Sustainable Living?

Thrift (Synonyms: frugality, penny-pinching, scrimping, skimping) implies that you spend your time researching to find the cheapest product.

There seems to be a bit of confusion about Sustainable Living.  It is a thought that I am struggling to counter.  I frequently run into articles, blogs and websites that link sustainability with thrift, extreme seclusion from society or other varying degrees of isolation from the mainstream.  One thing that needs to be understood is moderation.  Sustainable living is a cycle, one that impacts many if not all areas of your life without really going to one extreme or another.  Pushing an ideal to the extreme actually disrupts the sustainable cycle in one or more ways.  Being thrifty definitely has a part in our lives, but not enough that we feel like we need to spend much time on it.  It is more important to look at how your decisions help you continue to live sustainably.

We always look for the best product that meets our specific needs, this may be the cheapest product, but it also may be the most expensive.  We always keep our financial sustainability in mind when making intentional decisions—no matter what we are doing; we still need to stay within our allowed budget.

One example for us is milk.  We purchase from Twin Brooks Creamy.  Milk is priced significantly higher in this case, but it is worth it to us to purchase this product.  It is what we are looking for in milk; tastes better, local creamery, pasteurized, non-homogenized, Christ centered dairy Mission Statement, family business.  We simply had to ask ourselves if we could afford it.

Another example is soap.  We found a “middle of the road” as far as cost and is actually cheap for specialty natural soap.  Our requirements were simple; it has to actually works, ALL ingredients are natural and locally sourced when possible, doesn’t irritate ultra-sensitive skin, and local (Made in Shoreline, WA).   Additionally we have developed a bartering relationship with the owner to customized requests of products and barter for items I could supply him.

In a nut shell (Our purchasing directive):

Look at not only where it is made, but sourced.  Local first, Regional second, USA third, Purchased at Source fourth, Quality standards - We expect what we purchase to last a reasonable lifecycle and perform properly.  Does it meet our financial sustainable requirements?

We choose this path to help develop and continue a local demand to keep the market growing, support our local business and local community, and help build community interactions to counter the anti-Christian mentality.

In short, we don’t look at cost first, but how it will perpetuate a sustainable lifestyle.

Joys of worm bins

Who wouldn’t like a worm bin?  Here are our top five reasons...

1.       Utilizes food scraps that your backyard animals can’t eat or if you don’t have backyard animals yet.  Hint, hint…yet.

2.       Keeps it out of the waste stream (even if you still believe all yard waste becomes compost).

3.       You can feed them all those shredded bills that the city can’t “recycle”.

4.       Makes a dark rich compost byproduct that adds nutrients to the soil without chemicals.

5.       Come on…its worms.  Educational for your kids; hands on and just plain fun to play with.

6.       Who wouldn’t like a worm bin…are you dead inside?

Red Wiggler

A little bunny TLC to bring back to optimum health

Bunny in a bucket.  A little bunny triage to keep it healthy.

Nothing like a warm bath.

Warm towel completes the day at the spa.

Not for the lazy soul

I have to admit that I still struggle with the title of this posting.  I don’t know how to convey what I am trying to without offending people.  I am not proposing that we are better than anyone else.  We came up with this title while looking only at ourselves and it doesn’t reflect or imply anything about anyone else.  As we have stated before, we are personalizing our sustainable living goals.  What I am trying to say is that I cannot cling to my past practices, the results of being lazy on the inside.  We had to counter that drive.  Those that know us may see things differently, but the hard reality was that we didn’t choose more sustainable patterns in our lives because deep down I was lazy.  Don’t confuse motivation or drive with laziness—I have to continuously remind myself that we do nothing small and everything is possible with God.  We cannot be afraid of what might happen because we don’t want to address issues as they arrive. 

Two verses that we come back to are: Proverbs 21:25- “The desire of the sluggard kills him, for his hands refuse to labor” and Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men”.  The latter verse was written specifically about slavery.  But taking that context and applying it to our own lives just makes sense…we are slaves.  One important fact that we have come to realize is that the work is never done.  You can make list after list, cross out item after item, but the work is never done.  As we said earlier, relying on God is hard. You are going to have to work.

In addition to the hard work, you will get burned, accept it and move on.  This is an underlying characteristic and a frequent teaching moment that we share with our kids.  One of my favorite and frequently used saying is “Our actions are not defined by the actions of others”.  Of course I usually follow up with our actions WILL not be defined by the actions of others.  One example that we use to put this into practice is the person standing on the corners of the off-ramps panhandling.  We may have strong feelings with what the people are doing with the money, but what if it is Jesus asking for money on the corner?  We also don’t want to make that call, I would rather help and get burned than not help and find out later that I judged the person incorrectly…as if I am qualified to judge that person’s intentions in the first place.  Our actions will not be defined by the actions of others.

It is hard work.  During one of my wife’s and my brainstorm sessions, I was feeling pretty drained and started questioning if we could maintain what we were proposing.  My wife reminded me of what we call the Summer Camp paradigm.  Both of us have worked in summer camps (that is actually where we met) and both found it profoundly exhausting, but inspiring and life changing.  During our work at the camp, we had no exposure to commercialism, little to no carbon footprint. We managed to be fed, had clean clothes, dressed simply, worked 12-16 hours 6 days a week.  We also had clean air, chapel daily, and ample opportunities to work hard.  We didn’t feel tired, we felt fulfilled.

Why do we bother with sustainable living?

When my wife and I started to really get serious about changing our lives to live more sustainably, one thought seemed to consistently creep into my head:  If I can ignore the sustainable living patterns we identified; changes that will alter our lifestyle, change how we look at our livelihoods and impact our entire family for better or worse… that would be acceptable.  Not only acceptable, but definitely reasonable for me to handle and maybe the only “sustainable thing” we can control. So I asked my wife: “Why should we bother with sustainable living?”  I am not sure if she gave me an answer, or at least I do not remember the answer, but I decided the easiest thing for me to do, was start small.  Family time.  We decided to start reading in bed every night after the kids were in bed—for me a major step forward as I can remember only 3 books I actually ever finished in my lifetime.   The book I picked was Decision Points by former President George W Bush.  I had heard an interview that the former president had with I believe James Dobson.  I was intrigued by his resolve to make decisions that would have a positive impact on his life as a whole, affecting all aspects of his life.  One thing he talked about was reading through the Bible.  It wasn’t the first time, but he said he matured and wanted to see if his perspective had changed since he was more mature.  Since I was so obviously more mature since I last read through the Bible, I thought that was a great idea.  So I started out again, at the beginning, to read the Bible. This time though I would keep in mind all the discussions I had regarding sustainable living.  I quickly was reminded of how little control I actually had.

We are called to be stewards.

In Genesis 1, God talks of us ruling over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures - God has made us rulers over the rest of His creation.  Since we were created in the image of the diving King, it was delegated authority that was bestowed on us.  We were told to go forth under this divine benediction- flourishing…exercising dominion over the other earthly creatures.  We bear the image of the Creator and sharing, as God’s servant, in God’s kingly rule.  As God’s representative in the earthly realm, we are stewards of God’s creation.  We are not to exploit, waste, or despoil them, but to care for them and use them in the service of God and man.  

In Genesis 2, The Lord put us to work to take care of His creation. We were now charged to govern the earth responsibly under God’s authority.

In Psalms 8, it is reaffirmed that God has made us ruler of the works of our hands and everything under our feet, all the creatures.  Our rule over nature is real, but not absolute or independent.  It is participation, as a subordinate, in God’s rule; a gift, not a right.

(References: Gen 1:26, 28-29, Gen 2:15, Ps 8:6-8)

So what is Stewardship?

Merriam Webster Dictionary defines stewardship as the careful and responsible management of something entrusted to one's care <stewardship of natural resources>.

Stewardship fits neatly into a sustainable living cycle.  As stewards we are responsible to care for things, something that requires intentional actions and decisions. Part of caring for what God gives us is also making sure you continue to have the resources available to care for, with what you are charged with.  Non-depletion of resources or taking care of our natural resources and making sure they are renewed becomes a focus.  For us personally, we make sure that in our garden, some plants are allowed to go to seed; creating a cycle that continues so that we will have a crop for next year.  God gives us stuff to take care of, not necessarily use it all up.

Being a good Steward is NOT becoming Self Reliant.

(Self-reliance is defined as the reliance on one's own efforts and abilities—Synonyms: independence, self-dependence, self-reliance, self-subsistence, and self-support)

One thing that comes up frequently in my conversations about Sustainable Living is the question of self-reliance or self-sufficiency.   This generally is questioned amongst our fellow church goers, where it seems there is a perceived conflict between the philosophy of total reliance on God in our life and sustainable living.  One thing I want to do is share my understanding of what the Bible tells us and how I believe it doesn’t contradict sustainable living, but actually supports it.  In short you cannot lead a sustainable life without relying on God to provide everything you need.  We had to set ourselves up to benefit from God’s work in our life.  We processed compost in our worm bins, amended the garden soil, planted seeds that we harvested, tended and watered the plants, but we cannot make the plants grow or produce fruit.  In short, without God; you get nothing.  Once you begin to rely on God, you have to rely on God because you can’t bail yourself out. This led us to a better understanding of God’s grace, something we are consciously relying on as we continue down the path toward sustainable living.

How we got started

Baby steps

 Necessity.  Learning about needs versus wants for us started with our first house.  We purchased a small run down house during the peak of the real estate boom in Seattle.  We were barely making ends meet and the needed house repairs compounded our problems and put great strain on our lives.  Not to be a victim, we decided to not only fix the house, but restore the house to a market value and get out of our unsustainable mortgage.  At first our goal was selfish- we wanted a nice house that people would judge our success on, but it quickly became apparent to us that we were perpetuating an unsustainable cycle.  To accomplish our goal I started collecting reclaimed and recycled materials.  I looked at salvage companies, befriended contractors and worked with King County to secure used and leftover building materials.  We removed all the original hand split cedar shakes on the house, trimmed the edges and reattached backwards, exposing the original old growth clear cedar.  We had our trees felled on the property, split the wood (while my wife was 9 months pregnant), and sold the firewood to pay for the cost of the trees dropped and the new materials we couldn’t source.  Sounds ambitious, but we worked on it gradually over 3 years- every night, day and weekend.  We solicited our parents, neighbors, friends, colleagues and even the passing Jehovah’s Witness or Mormon elder.  It worked and we were able to sell and start fresh, even though at that point we didn’t understand the destructive consumerism cycle that drove us to want more than what we had.

Breaking Point

I cannot pinpoint an exact point that can be defined as a breaking point, but I was working 12-14 hours a day, traveling out of town on business for at least a week per month (sometimes for 3-4 weeks at a time), and my 3 year old daughter didn’t acknowledge me as a parent (she finally did about 10 months ago).  I remember I was in San Jose for a weeklong business trip that was just extended an additional 3 weeks.  I called my wife and she agreed.  I quit my job 15 minutes after I hung up the phone with my wife.  For us, this was the beginning- us breaking the unsustainable cycle of our life.

Creating Pain

After uncontrollable fits of fear and feelings of regret, I accepted our decision and started a game plan of changing our behavior- a radical shift of thinking for our family.  We decided that we needed a shock and awe strategy to refocus us and force us to think, breathe and live a sustainable life.  Everyone needed to purge our stuff.  We started with our car.  We had two cars, one was mine that I no longer commuted in and the other was an expensive family car that we drove daily to the park and ride and back-  2 miles or so a day.  Ironically you had to pass the bus stop within walking distance of our house on the way to the park and ride.  Next we attacked pet projects.  If we hadn’t used or worked on it in 6 months, it had to go.  Everyone in the family had to contribute and it couldn’t be easy stuff.  Old clothes or damaged items didn’t count.  We looked at specialty books, collector’s books, autographed books, out of print, first editions- collector toys…stuff.  We sold everything we could and reduced our debit.  By creating pain, we were also working on becoming financially sustainable as well.

Deeper look at our definition of Sustainable living

In an earlier posting I wrote; “Sustainable living is a series of lifestyle decisions that attempts to alter our day to day activities to be better stewards of God's gifts – both natural resources and our own individual resources.”   We have attempted to go deeper into what it means to us to live a sustainable life.  Sustainable living is not buying into a consumerism cycle with marketing labels; it is breaking the cycle of wants instead of needs. Large corporations make money on people’s perceptions of sustainable living while driving the destructive consumer mentality of wants versus needs.  Our economy is based on supply and demand, but we look at ways to create a balance of supply and demand without creating unending demand.  Attempting to strike a balance and encourage a sustainable demand we use the following guidelines:

1.       We encourage a full return to quality.  What you buy needs to last longer or serve its purpose for the entire lifecycle of the product.  We cannot continue down a path that encourages or requires items to be purchased and viewed as temporary.

2.       Be happy with what God gives you.  Good stewardship of what you have is only half of the equation.  Satisfaction with the resources that God gives you and relying on Him to provide is the other half.

3.       It is only stuff.  When we look at our needs versus wants and focus on intentional purchasing, we stop collecting stuff. 

4.       Skunk Test.  Look at what you own now.  Look at what you are trying to achieve- financial sustainability and a sustainable lifestyle.  Now ask yourself this question about what you own- “If I had an opportunity to buy this item again, right now, would I do it?”  If you answer no, it stinks and must be dealt with.

5.       Beware of “Green marketing”.  We looked suspiciously at everything we purchased.  Was it truly sustainable? 

1.       Green

2.       Bio

3.       Eco-friendly

4.       Sustainable

5.       Environmentally friendly

6.       Organic

7.       Natural

8.       Free range

9.       Cage free

10.   Free trade

11.   Shade Grown

Sustainable living is a series of lifestyle decisions that attempts to alter our day to day activities to be stewards of God's gifts – both natural resources and our own individual resources.  We attempt to reduce our carbon footprint, energy consumption and simplifying our food choices to be as local as possible.  We aim to conduct our lives in manners that are consistent with our religious convictions and sustainability, in balance and respectful of humanity's symbiotic relationship with the Earth's natural ecology and cycles without assigning deity status along the way.  We attempt to reduce our financial obligations to enable us freedom from borrowed money, becoming financially sustainable as well.

Sustainable living is not a political statement, nor do we blindly make decisions that benefit the environment while disregarding human needs.  As Christians we are to be good stewards of God’s creation, not exploit or overindulge in what God provides- animals or vegetation.    With that said, we strive to utilize 100% of what we harvest in one way or another.  America holds a consumer mentality and as a result a thoughtless wasteful environment.  We are working to counter that mentality.

What advice would your Grandparents give you, if they could, about running a household and providing for your family?  Who is your inspiration or role model of ideal living?

Why did we decide to practice Sustainable Living in all aspects of our lives?

My wife and I have been sharing our views of Sustainable Living with a small group for the last three Sundays.  Looking back over our notes, we realized that we have not shared the reasons behind our decision to live in a more sustainable manner.  As we discussed how we personalized the path we took, we also realized that we never have written down on paper our personal reasons or train of thought behind living a sustainable life.   I want to share now some of the main ideas or drives we used to decide how we wanted to get started.

The first step in our journey was less of a step and more of an awakening.  I can’t pin point one time, but both of us realized that we were not living in a fashion that would allow us to continue down the path we were on.  We were not living in a sustainable manner and what we were doing would not allow us to focus on what was important to us.  Short term goals or milestones were always pushed into the long term plans; it was not sustainable.  We were waiting for something to happen to us to break the cycle; there was seemingly no end in sight.  We weren’t panicking; we just couldn’t see an end in sight.  We decided to make a conscious and intentional decision to stop the cycle.    We also came to the realization that there was no easy answer or magic pill to help get us on track of living in a sustainable manner; we had to figure it out. 

I supposed if my wife and I realized what we were committing ourselves to there may have been some apprehension.  Being as stubborn as I am, I convinced my whole family that is was time to start living sustainably.  Being as stubborn as my wife is, she held me to that responsibility.  If you want to lose weight, you don’t eat so much and you exercise more.  People ask us for a simple answer…the simple abbreviated answer is hard work. 

We first started by identifying what was important to us, as a family and as individuals- our core values.  Looking specifically at what our core values were helped us decide what deserved our time and attention.  Throwing aside what we were currently focusing on, we asked what we should be focusing on.  We took what was important to us and developed specific targeted areas in our life.  These areas became our targets for change.

This was how we started.

What was important to us?

Our core values:

·         Realizing where our food came from, how it was made and appreciating what God provides.

o   As a chef, the people I cooked food for, were offered better food than what I offered my family due to time constraints, money and resources.

·         Family Time with our kids without having negative affect on their health and wellness.

o   Refused to short change our kids sleep so we could spend time with them and fit them into our schedules.

·         Paying off debt- living in a financially sustainable manner.

o   Just wanted to be in the black all the time.

o   Didn’t want to be 1 gallon of milk away from overdraft at the end of the month.

·         Have our kids share in our fond memories of when food was in season and tasted good- was only available in season.  I wanted our kids to have that, not settle on mediocrity just so that all food can be available year around.

·         Appreciating God’s incredible creation

o   Appreciate animals and how they live, provide food for us, and survive.

o   Appreciate how things grow

·         Not Modifying God’s creation for our convenience was important to me.

o   Hydrogenation of fats

§  Margarine

o   Homogenization of milk

o   Genetically modified crops

o   Growth Hormones

o   Blanket antibiotics

o   Blanket pesticides and herbicides

o   HFCS

o   Artificial Sweeteners

§  Aspartame

§  Splenda

§  Saccharine

·         Diet Soda

o   Artificial Colors

§  “Blue” is official referred to as a flavor.

Identifying what was important to us was the easy part.  The hard part was how we were going to make a dramatic change and target areas in our life that will allow and force us into sustainable living.  We used these targets as global areas in our life in which we wanted to effect change.  We than listed individual ways under each target that we could alter into a sustainable cycle; keeping in mind that everyone and everything is intertwined together.

What are we going to focus on?

Our targets for change:

·          Stewardship

o   Responsibly taking care of what is given and entrusted to us.

·         Financial obligations and needs / Occupations

o   Needs versus Wants

o   Breaking the Demand cycle in Supply and Demand

o   Purchasing

§  Product Sourcing

o   Transportation         

·         Family Life / Marriage

o   Schedule

o   Meals

o   Extra-Curricular Activities

o   Shopping

o   Family Time

·         School and Education

o   Homework

o   Tutoring

o   Speech Therapy

·         Faith

o   Church Life

o   Pioneer Club

·         Health and Wellness

I hope to touch on all of our targets for change in the weeks to come; to help share how we got started, first by looking at the why and then focusing on the how.  Every decision we made, was made specific to our family.  What worked for us, may not work for others.  At times it may seem that we contradict ourselves in our decisions, but we try to make decisions not based on only one target for change or core value, but we look at how the decision may affect the entire sustainable living cycle we are working on.  I encourage you to ask yourself the same questions we did and see where it takes you.