Habitat for Humanity

In Awe of Him said:
Hi Lanolin... Where I am living has NOT been a garage for at least the last 20 years... because it's been an apartment for over 10 years and before that... it was the family bar area... so they closed off the garage a very long time ago. so I don't have to worry about residual gas fumes. the lighting is a bit of hassle... but I make sure I get outside on a daily basis. Happy New Year to you. I am sorry to hear about your vegetables.
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Aw ...I was mad at first..no pumpkins this year, I was hoping to grow giant ones. I will get over it.

my cousins now have bought houses and one has a duplex next door to her parents the other cousins have bought a bigger house a few blocks away that could house the entire family and cars, and is on a bit of a rise, so, it won't be damp..

They aren't brand new houses...in Aucks you have to either bid on them or talk to the owners but it would be well over a million dollars by now for a house and section, because that's the market value. It doesn't even matter if the house is a complete dump because it goes by the land value. Even if the land is underwater and floods. ?!

Mostly developers are buying them, completely bulldozing the houses and building cheap high rises. Though some might be historic and have good bones, they don't particularly care. More money is now to be made in squeezing as many people as possible in tall towers. I guess that's city life for you. The other is infill housing where large sections plonk another house or 6 on a bare backyard. But also so many gardens with mature trees ...destroyed.

My neighbours levelled their garage and put a sleep out in its place, for my neighbours 3 grand daughters to hang out in. She's been invaded by her daughters family after her husband died and now can't get a moments peace lol.
 
The family bar??
Did it have a licence...?

My cat came with a house when we adopted her but hasn't been back in it since. It's made of cloth covered sponge and the roof zips off. I think she's much happier in our brick house. So I've put the sponge house in the garage, where everything else goes that we dont use/can't fit in the house.
 
My sis is coming back and its hoped she'll go stay with my brothers because I don't think she will fit in our house with all mum's things in the spare two bedrooms. She was fine when she just had a suitcase and was here temporary (though she worked at night and I had to be super quiet in the mornings) but I don't know how she'll fit everything in if she does come back to stay with us.

Plus, she will drive me crazy. I can't live with my brothers though, I been there, done that.
 
Does anyone here like to watch that tv show Full House. I noticed it came back as Fuller House on Netflix. It was hilarious, and was interesting to see DJ, Stephanie and Kimmy again. DJ now has children. But Michelle (olsen twins) has left home.

I'm sure a sitcom in my house would be as entertaining.
 
Lanolin said:
The family bar??
Did it have a licence...?
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Good morning Lanolin... I think if I remember correctly.... Canada has about an 18 hour time difference from where you are. I could be wrong about that but I know it's quite a lot.

I don't think the family bar had a license as it was in the home.. Back in the day... they were all the rage and some even had little sink units in them like the campers do. HA.

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Growing pumpkins is fun... but they do require a lot of space... Next year... I decided I am going to try growing stuff at the side of the house. It doesn't get much sun but I can probably get away with using pots and moving them.
 
A family bar....back in the days of...prohibition?

In the olden days here fancy villas had a 'parlour room' or 'sitting room' which was a room that had the best furniture for guests. The rest of the house could be an absolute tip, but the parlour room was always kept immaculately clean.
 
I'm having problems ...sorry to be a drag. I stupidly said I would help a widow with her garden as she moved into a new house all by herself and there's a large shrub border on her retaining wall at the back but she can't actually climb up to garden it.

So I offered to weed it, and now I've weeded it but found out it was one of those silly landscape jobs that out weedmat and bark on everything. She wanted the trees cut down because no light was getting in her kitchen. She got someone in to do that. But that meant as the trees were removed more light got in and the weeds just grew on top of the weedmat. I can't plant anything else on there as soil is now rock hard being starved of nutrients because of this stupid weedmat. And it will be a HUGE job now to cover it all over again with what she wants (bark) and I can't imagine how long it will take to shovel that one top, and it will just roll down, because its on a bit of a slope.

Anyway. She's not a gardener and doesn't know what to do, and I tried to clear some of it so I can actually weed it, but its now getting impossible because she doesn't really want a garden anyway, (or what's there) but more like a stone landscape with succulents.

A lot of new houses come already landscaped and the thought is from a lot of homeowners that once its done, they don't have to do any gardening. WRONG. You chop one tree down, there's consequences for everything else in that garden cos the plants relying on that shade, are now exposed.
 
I can't imagine how hard it is for her since she lived in a big house with her husband, but he died (suddenly) though her family moved in to help her but they got their own house for themselves now and she moved into a smaller one by herself.

Someone comes and does lawns, but she's said she's no green thumb and her house came with a garden that requires a lot of grooming and she doesn't know the first thing about it. There are prickly roses and roses are not easy care either.

Anyway. She thought to just spray it all with poison but I said that's not a good idea. I've already had other elders die of cancer because they used roundup without any protection and I am not going to use a lethal chemical.
 
Note to developers and house builders...women like a sunny kitchen. Put it on the north side of the house to get the morning sun for breakfast.
Her old house had a sunny corner kitchen.
Elderly people appreciate flat sections and bathroom access and not too many flights of rickety stairs. Children need space to explore and run around in. They don't want to get run over by fast cars or SUVs that can't see them.
Curtains are good - and windows that can open and close and let fresh air in and keep rain out.
Wooden houses need painting every few years. Its a job in itself and you can only do that in summer months.

Unfotunately we often have no choice on where we live as there is limited housing supply....and if you want a brand new house, be prepared to wait a while it gets built and go through tonnes of paperwork and regulations while infrastructure is put in.
 
Lanolin said:
I'm having problems ...sorry to be a drag. I stupidly said I would help a widow with her garden as she moved into a new house all by herself and there's a large shrub border on her retaining wall at the back but she can't actually climb up to garden it. So I offered to weed it, and now I've weeded it but found out it was one of those silly landscape jobs that out weedmat and bark on everything. She wanted the trees cut down because no light was getting in her kitchen. She got someone in to do that. But that meant as the trees were removed more light got in and the weeds just grew on top of the weedmat. I can't plant anything else on there as soil is now rock hard being starved of nutrients because of this stupid weedmat. And it will be a HUGE job now to cover it all over again with what she wants (bark) and I can't imagine how long it will take to shovel that one top, and it will just roll down, because its on a bit of a slope. Anyway. She's not a gardener and doesn't know what to do, and I tried to clear some of it so I can actually weed it, but its now getting impossible because she doesn't really want a garden anyway, (or what's there) but more like a stone landscape with succulents. A lot of new houses come already landscaped and the thought is from a lot of homeowners that once its done, they don't have to do any gardening. WRONG. You chop one tree down, there's consequences for everything else in that garden cos the plants relying on that shade, are now exposed.
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Hi Lanolin;

I feel you did as much as you could to help the widow. But the project may require the widow to take the next step and invest in a landscaper that can complete the areas you mentioned.

It may cost her but she can always do one piece at a time.

I'm praying for this sister.
 
Lanolin ... I'm with Bob on this... It was awfully kind of you to help this lady but you had NO idea at the time what the issue was. This is a job that is way too big for you... and I'm sure the lady will understand.
 
In Awe of Him said:
Lanolin ... I'm with Bob on this... It was awfully kind of you to help this lady but you had NO idea at the time what the issue was. This is a job that is way too big for you... and I'm sure the lady will understand.
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That's ok we came to an understanding and I gave her some landscapers business contacts so she can get quotes, she was upset that I'd removed some of the leggy daisies and now the back is bare and looks...worse. We prayed about it too.

She's been in a bit of physical pain if you could pray for her, apart from grieving her husband but we able to talk about that she's not quite settled in her new house, with cupboards not closing and a toilet there's something wrong with and things still in boxes...but she's carrying on as best she can and relying on God.

I also lent her a book called 'care-free plants' as she needs something very easy care.
 
In Awe of Him said:
You must be really young Lanolin.... family bars ( usually in the basement) were a big deal. They were snazzy... as in COOL.
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I don't think I've ever been in one. A lot of houses round here don't actually have basements, like they would in the colder parts of North America, if the house is raised the bottom part would house the garage and steps leading up to the house. Also a lot of homes are built on hillsides so, they can be a bit split-level, and have a raised wooden deck or what we call a verandah.

Maybe the richer homes have one, but my family don't drink that much. We consider mum's kitchen and dining table the family restaurant though!
 
I gave the sponge house away to my friend who has a new dog, a tiny pit bull.
I was going to give it back to the SPCA op shop but when went there it was closed.

Instead of giving away a pet to a good home, I gave a good home to a pet!

There are a lot of new housing being built often two, three stories high, stuck together like on coronation street now. One section having 6 units is not unusual. Not quite apartments more like flats. I don't know how our roads and infrastructure can cope but the population can't seem to go live in the smaller towns that need people. It is going to look like Hong Kong 2 in a few years time! And most people immigrated to NZ to get away from living in an overcrowded city.

I don't know why planners want to keep urban areas people living like sardines and rural areas isolated and NO people. It just seems a bit crazy. Surburbia isn't the solution. Why can't we just keep living in small villages and have a proper common I meant that seems to work, rather than living in a labyrinth of motorways? But then what do I know.

I want to just live in a garden.
 
My permaculture design course taught me that only rich people who already have loads of land have the power to redesign their land to make it a thriving community, which does require lots of labour or just sell it off to developers for cash.
Retrofitting takes a lot of time and effort, but it seemed its actually better to start from scratch.

If you have rich soil already, or arable land, then you don't have to do so much remedial work on it. All this takes time. Homesteading isn't always the solution either. You may have to listen to what the land really wants. It isn't a case of, just divide the land into plot and each plot will have an equal share. We don't all live on a maths grid. Our land has different features geographically.

I think of whats happening in Israel. God had that land of milk and honey and was going to bless his chosen people if they kept His commandments. But they didn't and now it's cursed.
 
Good news the landscaper called in and thinks putting in steps with a handrail and a path would be a good idea for her raised reclining wall garden, so she can actually get up there (or her family).
She's getting her loo fixed too.
With the sale of her old house it will probably pay for renovations/redesign on the new one.

I think it's a big thing to move house/home and always unsettling. It's actually a major stress especially to have no fixed address. People can't live that way forever, nor can they live in a war zone (which a lot of people round the world do, on a daily basis) and even people who are prepiatic and jet setting/living in 5 star luxury eventually tire of living out of a suitcase.

I've sometimes wondered what the ideal habitat for humanity is. You read of some places that seem ideal, like co-housing, retirement villages, planned suburbia developments, condos, castles and feudalism, lifestyle blocks, retreats, resrorts, communes...but they call come with their own problems. When we humans live anywhere it can cause problems for everyone else. How do we fit in this planet?

I think of this when I'm gardening. Plants generally are rooted in one place though they can multiply and spread and get too big. To have a flourishing garden you need diversity its not always a perfect grid of monocultures. I think some people just like to put people into neat boxes but reality is that only works if you have clones and robots. People aren't like that.
 
I've been reading this book about communes in Aotearoa (NZ). Its utopia for the first couple of years but then reality sets in.

The narrator lived in one since the time she was 17 till about 30 milking cows, making cheese and cooking, at first having no private space and many just walked round in the nude. The women did all the cooking and cleaning and childcare, and the men, not marrying but sharing the women around (this 'free love' thing didn't really work well for the women). They rode horses and they chopped wood in winter.

I am not sure how they paid for things they couldn't make on the commune, like flour or gas to get to town but they built a lot of things out of demolition scraps. They didn't want to be called hippies, but really, they were kinda!

They might call this 'intentional community' now and have a lot of rules and regulations of who can have what or share whatever. But once the original pioneers or founders leave, it's hard to sustain these things.

I often think this is kind of like church or even church cults. You need to have one benevolent dictator (or shepherd?) telling people what to do otherwise its everyone for themselves right, anarchy.

There's also a kind of end of the world paranoia about it too, that leads people to become extreme preppers and abandon everything or run to the hills. What happened to the commune was that drunks and mentallly ill started going there and seeing it as a haven, and they were on the dole and freeloading, disrespecting the place till it all fell into rack and ruin. They couldn't or didn't have the power to evict anyone because the land was held in common. Rubbish started piling up, and people weren't interested in organic farming and bought all their food from supermarkets, which had all this plastic packaging that they had no way of getting rid of or using, so it ended up being a tip and resting place for cheap Japanese cars.

Some people have this ideal of a rural idyll, but actually many places in the countryside are poor and marginal and hard to keep going. I don't know what the answer is, but suburbia seems relatively peaceful compared to the squabbling in a commune when people are divided. Though houses divided against themselves cannot stand, and thats true of broken homes even with just two people living in it.
 
Lanolin said:
I've been reading this book about communes in Aotearoa (NZ). Its utopia for the first couple of years but then reality sets in. The narrator lived in one since the time she was 17 till about 30 milking cows, making cheese and cooking, at first having no private space and many just walked round in the nude. The women did all the cooking and cleaning and childcare, and the men, not marrying but sharing the women around (this 'free love' thing didn't really work well for the women). They rode horses and they chopped wood in winter. They might call this 'intentional community' now and have a lot of rules and regulations of who can have what or share whatever. But once the original pioneers or founders leave, it's hard to sustain these things. I often think this is kind of like church or even church cults. You need to have one benevolent dictator (or shepherd?) telling people what to do otherwise its everyone for themselves right, anarchy.
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Hello Lanolin;

I would assume this book is fiction.

I'm sorry, Lanolin, I don't mean to rain on your thread but I'm not in favor of communes. It reminds me of the history such as the Waco Siege, a Christian sect called the Branch Davidians in 1993 and the People's Temple, another Christian sect led by Jimmy Jones in 1978. Both ended tragically.

My thoughts on what you shared; In "real life" communes are most people who have resigned from co-existing with society. Some justify the woes of the world so they drop out in search for communal life. Problem is most of the commune or tribal leaders don't put together a proper plan for the people who will join.

Biblically speaking, men have a role to honor God's creation of marriage, not to share women and have babies as they please, making it a communal law or rule. Other men love the utopia feel of perfect living within the confines of nature. But when they realize it's tough to kill for food or defend the tribe from beastly animals, they soon lose that nirvana, pack up and surrender back into human society.

Women end up doing the cooking which may include chopping wood, cleaning and childcare. They become sexual objects to the men or the leaders with the attitude that this is ok for communal living.

People in communes still have to deal with communal health such as care of their bodies, care for their teeth, sanitation and prevention from diseases, viruses, etc...

Over time, communal living becomes unbalanced. The communal leaders don't have a proper structure proven and end up becoming a sect. This is why most communes don't succeed. Most communes don't succeed because God's hand isn't in it.

I can read a book on communal living or watch a documentary. But in the end they just don't work.

God bless you, Lanolin.

Bob
 
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