Weve caught the swapping bug! Sustainable Bury launches its first Swap Shop

L-R: Pippa, Fiona & me: Some of the founding members of Sustainable Bury, at our very first Swap Shop. Photo credit: Sandy Jackson. 

Ive been to several Swap shops or Give & Take days organised by Transition Town groups around Suffolk. the last one being being held by Sustainable Bungay in September.  I must confess that when I left that event, I was both quite jealous that Bury St Edmunds didnt have such an occasion to get the good town-folk out swapping, but also very much inspired to do something about it.

After all, in Bungay, what I witnessed was not just a great way of motivating people to declutter their unwanted items and let someone else take them home for free, but there was also a fantastic vibrant community spirit.  

Now left to my own devices, that inspiration might have remained a pipe dream due to competing priorities.  However, my visit to Bungay coincided with the gathering of like-minded folk in Bury St Edmunds - mainly in a pub - to organise a new Transition Town community group called Sustainable Bury.  As we were planning our events, I mentioned how much Id love to bring the Swap Shop idea under our umbrella.  All it took was someone to suggest enthusiastically that we should run one just after Christmas and Bobs your uncle, the first community event for Sustainable Bury was born!  Such is the power of team-work.

The posters went up, leaflets were distributed and we received some great mentions on Radio Suffolk and excellent coverage in the Bury Free Press, but it was still quite nerve-wracking yesterday morning as we got ready for our big event.  Would the good folk of Bury St Edmunds turn up?

Setting out the tables at the St Johns Centre.

Thankfully, yes they did!

Including Kim, one of Bury St Edmunds entertainment organisers.  I never did find out whether she took those funky specs home, but I really hope she did!

The idea was that people could drop off items that they no longer wanted and take anything away that they wished, for free!  If they didnt have anything to bring, they could simply leave a donation at their discretion.  Any items that were left, we simply pledged to donate them to the charity shops, dotted along St Johns Street.

As with any Reuse event, the swap shop featured a real eclectic range of stuff.  I loved these little Saki cups.

And this unopened Body Shop gift pack was certainly a great find for its new owner.

As was this Past Times tea cosy. proclaiming "Where theres tea theres hope"!  That might become my new mantra.

Im really pleased that for our first event we had around 30 people, perhaps even more.  To be honest, we were so busy listening to all the great feedback from the visitors who dropped by that it was really tricky to keep count.   In fact, the feedback that we received was so encouraging, we have decided to bring forward plans for our next Swap Shop, which we will now run in April.

Im now looking forward to the Swap Shop becoming a regular event that supports the Reuse infrastructure in Suffolk, in a way that is truly fun and brings the community together.   For those who struggle to get stuff into town, it would also be wonderful for satellite events to be hosted by community centres and schools in the the surrounding estates and villages and I would certainly be happy to help get those rolling.

However, Sustainable Bury is not just about encouraging reuse and reducing waste, there are other great plans on the cards too.  There is a real wealth of ideas coming through, so if you have time, do check out this great piece by the Bury Free Press from yesterdays event, which also features a video of our members, sharing some thoughts about what theyd love the group to achieve.

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Sustainable Bury really is in its infancy, so while we wait for its website/blog to be created, more information can be found at the Facebook page or by following @SustainableBury on Twitter.   If you are local to Bury St Edmunds and would like to get involved,  please do get in touch via Facebook/Twitter, email me or alternatively leave a note below and I will be pleased to pass on your details to the team.  The next planning meeting is this Tuesday, 15 January, 7.30pm at the Fox Inn, in Eastgate Street.  All are welcome.

More information about Transition Towns can be found at www.transitionnetwork.org.

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My very first relationship with COMPOST!

As were slap bang in the middle of Compost Awareness Week (6-12 May), I thought Id delve into the archives of my memory cells and rustle up a few notes on my long standing relationship with compost.

For me, composting has been a normal part of life since my childhood in the Seventies. I have early memories of accompanying my grandmother on the trek from her kitchen to the compost heap, which was located in the chicken run.

Well it felt like a trek.  I was just five years old, and it was a large garden.

My sister and I spent a lot of time at my grandparents home and as we grew up, one of our little jobs was to take the kitchen waste to the compost heap, dodging the fearsome cockerel when we got there.

We soon realised the value of composting, not least because it was the perfect place to hide the evidence of our sneaky pea snaffling, as we entertained ourselves with many rounds of pea-pod Top Trumps.

And every so often, we would see our uncle standing in the middle of the heap, turning it and shovelling heaps of earth from the bottom, into a wheelbarrow, which hed then dig into the kitchen garden.

Soil from all those peelings! It seemed like magic.

It is clear that my early introduction to composting as an everyday part of life stayed with me.  I may have left the Welsh village where I grew up and spent the next decade hopping from student digs and shared houses, before settling down with my husband, but the minute we bought our first house in 1998, one of the first changes I made to the garden was to install a compost bin - one of those black plastic ones, which we bought through our local council.

When we relocated to our new home in Bury St Edmunds five years later, I discovered that St Edmundsbury Borough Council collected vegetable peelings & garden waste as part of its recycling service. This was 2003 and when registering for our brand spanking new wheelie bins, I suddenly got all defiant.  As I rejected the opportunity of adding a brown wheelie bin to our collection I recall making my stance clear...

"Theres no way the councils getting their hands on my compost!" were the words that fell from my mouth.

I cant help laughing at my over-protection position on my grass clippings and apple cores.  It wasnt as though I was even being particularly frugal.  We simply had an average sized garden that could easily accommodate a compost bin, and it just made more sense to compost at home and bung the finished contents under the odd shrub, instead of a bin lorry carting our peelings around the county to be managed elsewhere.

Nine years on and we now have a collection of three compost bins dotted discreetly around the garden, as well as a wormery, which is great for the odd scraps of cooked waste.  Well, I say discreet.  The plastic ones are tucked away, but the wooden beehive compost bin (pictured above) has become a very attractive feature of the garden and is located just outside the kitchen.

Many people feel discouraged from home composting because of the risk of vermin such as rats. Although this is a possibility in some areas, weve never had a problem.  The worst weve ever experienced was a mouse that decided to take residence, but was solved with a humane mousetrap.  I also had a squeamy squirmish scare with maggots on one occasion, as a result of something going in that shouldnt have, but some boiled water, covering the contents with newspaper and avoiding that compost bin for a week soon resolved the issue and it has never happened again.

As far as creating the right mix is concerned, Im no particular expert.  I just bung in all our scraps and remember to add odd pieces of cardboard, paper and garden clippings now and again.  If the results are sloppier than our efforts, I dont see it as a problem as the compost just gets buried into the existing earth anyway, enhancing it with all its extra nutrients.

Even though our garden is not very large, I still prefer our self-sufficient approach to managing our kitchen scraps. From a sustainability perspective, it seems far more sensible.  However, we have since compromised and added the councils composting service for our garden waste, which is plentiful in the Spring and throughout the Summer.

Although not quite as exciting as my own early memories of composting, I hope my children - currently aged 7 and 10 - will develop the same responsibility and awareness when they are older.  At least they already understand the process and a quick test this evening demonstrated that they know the kind of stuff that goes in the compost bin, even if they dont have that duty very often.

But theyd better look out because Compost Awareness Week has just inspired me to add compost duties to their list of jobs.

Cue evil laughter.

Mwahahahahahahahaha.

Mwahahahahahahahahaha!

Well its about time they made more of an effort.

And I know it wont just be rotten veg well be discussing. Im quite sure they will soon tell me that Im a Rotten Mother for making them do it.

I just hope that when they are my age they will come to thank me, and are just as grateful as I am to my late grandmother.

If youve never composted before and would like to find out more, visit www.homecomposting.org.uk and www.recyclenow.com/home_composting.

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Shhhh you heard it here first

Well, bang goes my life as a random and loose cannon housewife in Suffolk.

I suppose it was a matter of time really.

Yes, I bring you the news that having wandered off the streets of London into yesterdays AGM for the Zero Waste Alliance UK, I found myself wandering back out again as a newly appointed member of the charitys board of directors.

Yes I know.  Im still in a position of shock too.  Theres one thing being random, but give the woman a strategy and goodness knows whatll happen.

However, Im proud to be joining a board that has such a strong pedigree in the zero waste sector, whose membership includes individuals for whom Ive had great respect and admiration since I first discovered their work and achievements several years ago.  My sincere thanks go to the members who invited me to join as well as to the rest of the board who supported the motion.

For those who arent aware of the Zero Waste Alliance UK (ZWAUK), the organisation is an educational charity that actively promotes innovative resource management to help UK industries, societies and governments achieve realistic objectives for zero waste.   Established in 2002, it has a history of successes as well as key challenges under its belt and it is really exciting to have the chance to contribute towards new opportunities for the alliance to make its mark in drastically reducing the UKs waste output and how residual resources are managed.

I will of course keep you up-to-date with the work of the alliance during the months that follow, but for the moment I am just coming to terms with how I can contain my levels of randomness in light of such new responsibilities.

How exciting is that!

I look forward to sharing further news with you soon.  However, in the meantime, for more information about the work of the charity, please visit www.zwallianceuk.org.

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First in the Ring Atkins Induction

Today the diet-trials began. I woke up this morning in my usual state : cold, grumpy and more than a bit hungry. Normally, Id drown my morning woes in whole grain cereal with milk and a giant cup of coffee. Any conversation Id engage in would consist largely of grunts. But not this morning. Atkins Induction allows neither cereal nor milk, and only a limited amount of coffee. (jury is still out about the grunting) To make matters worse, this means I have to cook breakfast.

Ten minutes later, Ive fried up a three-egg, spinach and feta scramble which proceeds to get cold as I wash my fry-pan. It looked pitifully small on my plate. (pictured above) Humph. So far, this diet thing is turning out to be just as irritating as Id imagined.

After eating, Im less grumpy, although the food feels awfully leaden in my stomach. I sit down to count out how many carbohydrates Ive consumed thus far. According to Atkins and my food labels, Ive consumed a 1.75 grams of carbohydrate and no fiber. My normal cereal and milk would have me at approximately 35 grams of carbohydrate and 3.5 grams of dietary fiber.

Most traditional diets recommend the individual obtain approximately 45% to 60% of their calories from the carbohydrates in their diet. The majority of these carbohydrates are broken down in the body into glucose, which travels through the bloodstream to provide fuel for almost all of the important functions in the body. For a person who consumes 1,800 Calories (kcal) each day, this breaks down to approximately 225 grams of carbohydrates each day. Atkins Induction pushes an ultra-low carbohydrate approach which demands the individual consume less than 20 grams of carbohydrate in a day.

This ultra-low carbohydrate consumption pushes the body into a state known as ketosis, in which the liver converts the fat in the diet into fatty acids and ketone bodies. The ketone bodies serve to replace glucose as the main fuel source in the body. This, in turn, reduces the insulin production, as insulins main function is to carry glucose to various locations in the body.

Theoretically, the ketogenic nature of Atkins Induction reduces body mass by reducing blood glucose and insulin production, which they purport to be the main cause of obesity. The body has to work harder to make the fats and proteins pushed by Atkins into fuel, and thus, despite consuming higher numbers of calories, the individual loses weight.*

In order to continue to obtain all of the necessary vitamins and minerals to be healthy, most all of the carbohydrates allowed in Atkins induction are non-fibrous vegetables. Due to their low calorie and high micronutrient profiles, these vegetables make the ideal low-carb, high-nutrient source of carbohydrates. It is recommended that of the 20 grams of carbs allowed, 12-15 of them come from such vegetables.

As for the rest of what Im allowed to eat on Atkins Induction, it is pretty simple. The list consists mostly of meats, fish, seafood, hard cheeses, oils and fats, spices, broths, the foundation vegetables, and lots of water. Im not allowed any fruit, grains, milk or desserts (except sugar free gelatin) and I have to track the carbohydrates of any food I consume. Its going to be a strange few weeks, but well see how it goes. I doubt I will ever stop being grumpy at breakfast, but maybe ketosis can change me.

* Once again, Id like to state that it is not my goal to lose weight on these diets. I will certainly record it if I do, but I am more interested in what it is like to live on these diets, and how doing so changes my view of how I eat.


For a complete list of allowed foods, click here.

For guidelines about Atkins Induction, click here.


Sources :

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atkins_diet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketogenic_diet

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First Month Experience and reflections

MONTH 1

I started on the heels of a bit of a sinus cold, so I cant say that I had a ravenous appetite to begin with. The strict diet wasnt difficult for me to start. I took an evening (without the kids) and trawled the aisles of my local Loblaws to find foods and brands from the prescribed list. Not too difficult, and I came home well equipped. It took me a couple of days to realize that I needed to pre-portion everything and pre-measure to be sure I had my meals ready to go. I was trapped a few times feeling ravenous when I wasnt prepared and had to rush to pull something together.

In the first week, I learned you need to have your meals ready. The ketosis/fat burn goes into high gear, so when you need to eat - eat.

By the third day, I had lost 5 lbs. Mainly water, sure, but I was stoked!

I experimented with different recipes from the book, making sure I wasnt going to lament the food and think it was boring and dull. Quite the opposite. Once I found out I could use most of the spices, herbs and my favourite sauce (Patak Tandoori paste) quite liberally, I was in heaven!

By the end of the first month (4 weeks on the program) I have lost 20 lbs.

True to their motto, I have lost 20 lbs in the first month - and look and feel fab-u-lous!

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