About Me
An American food and travel writer, a reformed shopper, now living a rural, "slow" non-consumerism life in the south of France with her French husband and daughter. Poorer than dirt, but living like kings from the riches of the earth.

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What is A Slow Year?
August 2007-August 2008 we did not purchase anything. Only food and that was severely limited to the farmers markets and the organic co-op store. This year, we are doing an all-out No Shopping School Year: September 1st thru June 15th, we will not buy anything, not even food. We will use what abundance we have: what we preserved this summer, our garden, foraging, bartering, trading, living off what mother nature gives us.

Why am I doing this?
I embarked on this slow life after seeing the waste from two peoples lives cut short. My husband's family halved in one month and we were left to sort through their closets, sell the car, and shake our heads at the material “stuff” that lived on longer than his grandmother’s precious words and his father's new lease on life as a first time grandfather.

I realized further that we needed to do some soul searching and rid ourselves of material obligations. In fact, now after a successful year of not shopping, we will probably make it part of our lives instead of just a stunt year. This year we will cut out food shopping as well and rely on foraging, what organic food we have in the freezer, fishing, our CSA basket and what we can grow in containers on our small patio.

I am having fun with it, discovering so much about myself and our planet along the way and hopefully inspiring my close circle of friends and readers to do the same. We are happier, more content with what we have and cherish each other and what nature give us without the constraints of money in our lives.

Also, I feel more grounded and in touch with "mamie" who lived through some tough times and I am discovering her world and past generations traditions along the way. I feel very blessed to have stumbled upon this through the slow year.


Photos
www.flickr.com
These Days in French Life's photos More of These Days in French Life's photos

A Slow Year Posts
40 ways to start a Slow Life
A Slow Year Flickr
My Non-Consummation Proclamation
Cat Food
Grocery List
What I Can Do
Re-Valuation sans Money
Saturday Links
Wind Power
On The Road
Time of the Month
No Toilet Paper!
Tute: Baby Legwarmers
Tute: Baby Slippers
Tute: Baby Cloth Diapers
Where to Start a Slow Year
Is that really Organic?
Laundry Soap
Homemade Toothpaste
No Poo (hair washing)
Why Am I Doing A Slow Year?
Why does everything break?
For our Health
We dont use toilet paper

Kiva - loans that change lives

Saturday, March 04, 2006
Weekend Cat Blogging (WCB)
It's weekend cat blogging--Lucky is out of town at MIL's house having a great time getting yummy cat sticks all the time, lounging on the couch and chasing her neighbor cats while I unpack and download photos of our trip.

Millie and Mégot were my substitute cats this week from A Pretty How Town. My flash didnt go off so its a bit blurry, but you get the idea. Mégot (french word for Cigarette butt--because she has a stubbed tail) cuddled with me in bed and Benji fed them in the morning. At one point I thought that I had a cat on each side of me, but it was just the Lesbian stuffed sock Monkey (another story for another day)

The cats patiently wait to be fed on the table up high away from a grabbing 18 month old who says "chat" kind of--he called Benji "Ze"; I tried to get him to call him Monkey instead! Baby S was adorable and our hostess was so nice and welcomed us into her house by the lake. It felt like we were friends that hadn't seen each other in a long time instead of friends that were meeting for the first time. I almost cried twice.

  posted at Saturday, March 04, 2006
  4 comments



4 Comments:
At 3/05/2006 3:00 AM, Blogger b'gina said...

Smart cats, they've got their tails out of harm's way. It's lovely that you two hit it off so well.

 
At 3/05/2006 9:10 AM, Blogger misschrisc said...

Yeah my sister left after two short days...*sigh* :(

Hey they look like ghost cats in the first picture. Kinda scary. woooooOOOOO-ooo!

 
At 3/05/2006 1:56 PM, Blogger Clare Eats said...

I wish I could meet my internet buddies just like that....

So sorry that wcb was up so late...

 
At 3/06/2006 6:51 PM, Blogger Cree A. said...

Awwwwww! I can't wait to meet your host, myself. (((sniff)))

 

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