Meli Mot

Just to update, I am no longer seeking anyone.

I am interested in pursuing clothing self-sufficiency in my totally perennial vegan food forest vision. My first thought was using nettles, as i have a nice patch of them. However i noticed yesterday that deer eat them (i do too), stems and all. So i don't want to take away their food. I was looking into making clothes from bark. Apparently many cultures including the Ainu in Japan, traditional Hawaiians and Ugandans also have used bark to make clothes. For some trees, the bark even grows back, so it is a renewable resource!

Has anyone ever done this? I wonder if any trees could work in my mesic hardwood forest, which has tuliptree, maple, oak, sassafras, hickory, beech, mainly?

I have been using a Samsung Galaxy Tab A 8.4", SM-T307U, for 3.5 years since i have been offgrid. I got it used on eBay for $90. It works offline and has a slot for a SIM card. I use an Amish vendor with a basic data plan for just $20 a month. I make calls using Google Voice. I use it for all my needs, i do not have a computer or phone. The only issue i have had lately is humidity, and so i bought some desiccant packs and keep it and its charging cables in a bag with dessicant packs when not in use.

Thank you for the quick reply! So fascinating how age-old traditions quickly got changed by modernity!

I do "intermittent fasting" daily, eating only between 4am and 8am, nothing else all day but water. It makes life a lot easier to not have to make a fire to cook and wash dishes multiple times a day, as r ranson mentioned above. I don't get hungry because i am eating to satiety.

"That corner of England had 4 extra letters in the alphabet when my dad went to school,"

Wow, what were the letters?

I do not take showers or baths.

I have long hair (to my waist), i never shampoo or wet it at all, except around once a month when I henna/indigo it. I just 2x daily, "scritch" and "scratch" (fingernail and fingertip scalp massage),  and comb with sandalwood comb and real horn comb. I never use soaps, shampoo, or water at all on my hair, except the henna/indigo paste and rinsing it out, around every 4 weeks. I agree with above mention, of cleaning one's combs every so often of sebum. I use a strip of dental floss to clean between the tines of the combs. I only do this when i notice that combing doesn't seem to be effective on removing grease. Then i know it is time to clean the combs.

For my body, i do a "Tudor" style dry bath (from the book "How to Live Like a Tudor"), with real linen rags and a spritzer bottle of distilled rainwater. The only body part for which i use soap are my feet.

This keeps me smelling sweet all day. I noticed when i went to town and used city water, that i started to smell during the morning. So i re-washed with some of my distilled rainwater which i had packed, and that corrected it!

I have been washing this way for years now. It is nice to be free of the toiletries and also to use so much less water. I have also previously tried soapwort, soapnuts, vinegar, baking soda, and shampoo bars, and this current has worked best for me.

I also just brush my teeth with baking soda, with the blessing of my dentist for over 10 years. Followed with flossing and occasional diluted peroxide swishing for brightening.

My aha moment was when I realized the drip from the stainless steel water tank attached to my woodstove could be utilized for distilled water! Previously i thought the drip was just annoying, and would put things under it to catch the drip. Then it occurred to me, this is distilled water! Wow! Now i have distilled water when I need it!

Sibyl Buck wrote:Dead leaves all day long in this one if you don’t want to buy cover material. If you don’t mind buying it, coco coir is the bomb.com. If you have pee in there and use a less dense cover material I bet it will heat up more. I agree deeper than 2 feet helps to get the heat. I have used 4x4x4 piles for loooong periods of time because it breaks down so much so fast it’s almost an endless situation. I do large scale food compost for 1600 women over two weeks and have humanure at home for 10 years

Should the coco coir be used in the potty, or as the cover in the pile?

I suffered with this all through my teen years! It was terrible. I do not reccomend antibiotics as they killed my gut microbiome and it suffered permanent damage. I do recommend avoiding dairy, sugar, nightshades, onions, garlic, anything non-organic, preservatives, and also to ferment all grains. I do not recommend topicals, creams, or soaps, just pure water (distilled, or clean rainwater, also for drinking too). Salt exfoliation works to help clear up old scars.

Jocelyn Campbell wrote:I posted about this in another group and someone commented there that alcohol sprays like this have been used a lot for ballet costumes to freshen and deodorize between performances without a full cleaning.

Thank you for this tip! I tried it due to a current drought and it works!