Tammy Rehbein

""Never attribute to malice that which can be explained by incompetence."

So, people never intentionally do anything bad? It's always due to incompetence? I think not."

I think this one is meant to be more along the lines of "don't assume someone did something malicious on purpose when it could have just been stupidity' or something along those lines.  Like, if you asked your partner to do the dishes and you came home and they still weren't done, you might be prone to thinking they just don't care/doesn't like you enough to bother or purposefully wasted their time doing something else instead, when really they probably just got distracted and totally forgot, but their intention wasn't to do that.  Stuff like that.  So it's more like.. don't jump to the conclusion that someone's out to get you right off the bat ... it might have just been a mistake.  Communication breakdown or innocent mistake instead of malicious intent, type thing.

I totally hear ya, though, it does sound pretty wrong if you go with the 'everything is incompetence and nothing is purposely done maliciously' angle!

I feel for ya!  It sounds like quite a stressful situation.

Honestly, if things were rough enough to cause such a divide, you're going to be better off going forward.  Yes, it's a big change, and you're probably not used to being your own person after being attached as a couple doing things for the family for so long -- but it'll come to you, and you'll be better off!

One thing I find really helpful in a situation like this is to consider yourself as your own best friend and caretaker.  I know that sounds a little odd, but YOU are the one who's always there to pick you up after every life event, and YOU are the one that's in charge of your life going forward.  It can be super weird after being with a partner so long, and you get that sort of 'weird dependence' around being a couple and constantly thinking about the fallout of every choice and how it affects your shared lives and the other person's feelings -- but in the end, your choices need to be the best ones that you can make for you.  The kids will make it the way that they do, regardless of what happens, and if mom is doing well and able to keep herself taken care of, especially in this stressful and tumultuous time when you NEED to be focusing on your health and your self-care, the kids will be better off for a happier, more stable mother.

Big hugs!  I know one person can't like, give you all the right words you might need, but you got this.  It sounds like you being able to be in charge of your own permaculture situation will be good for you, especially if your projects won't be interfered with or hampered by someone else's actions or inactions.

One other thing to note, which you probably already know -- is that this is a big stressful time of change, and sometimes we like to compensate by trying to throw ourselves into big projects -- but really reeling it in and taking it slow and easy is the best way to go forward.  IE -- if you want to maybe work on a small project, like growing a bigger garden, or getting some chickens, or something (whatever your situation is); that's fine to do, but taking it slow while you adjust to this new reality is going to benefit a lot more than going overboard and, for example, starting a whole new herd of animals when you really haven't settled into your new 'normal' state yet.

I hope that helps!

Also, if you're feeling like you can't get enough clients as a self-employed person, you might have to re-think things.  I did the same thing recently -- I'm also self-employed, and there are times where I feel the stress and pressure of trying to do EVERYTHING just falls short, and my income suffers.  It's always going to be personalized to your own situation, but sometimes the best thing you can do is analyze what's working and what isn't.  Are you charging enough?  If you can raise your prices feasibly, and you lose a few clients, it may seem scary, but the clients you keep will be paying the bills with LESS work because your prices are up where they should be, AND you don't burn yourself out trying to chase dollars and putting out subpar work.  (I don't know what you do, exactly, but the principle still applies.)  

And if it turns out that it's just NOT working after you set some goals, and a timeline, you can have other alternatives planned out.  For example... if you say 'OK, A is working, and B isn't, so I'm going to focus on doing A for this many hours a day, every day, because I know I can do that workload.  And if I can't make of money consistently by this specific date, my alternative is to go get a full-time job in town for a while until I can pay down my debt (or whatever your situation is.)  Self employment can be awesome if you can make it work, but there are benefits to a steady job for a while to achieve a goal, too.  Especially during a stressful time -- it's good to analyze whether you need to adjust your tactics and make changes to stay viable and work within your ability (and stress level), and find strategies to do that -- but it's also good to analyze what your alternative options are, and whether it might be a better fit.  That's why goal-setting on paper helps -- if you can't achieve the reasonable goals that will keep you afloat, it's time to change tactics.    Sometimes going to work at something relatively 'easy' and making a steady paycheck is just mentally healthier while you're trying to go through some stressful stuff!  But at the same time, if you feel you can handle your self-employment in your own way and find ways to make it work during this stressful time, you can do it!  Just sometimes takes some adjustments and planning.

Sorry for the ramble!  Just feeling for your situation and I understand the stress!

Looks like a good way to start something.   I'm in a different situation out in Canada and so I don't think we'd be super compatible, but in another life it might have been something I'd look into.    I admit, the fishing photos and the dog in a bucket is a good selling point for striking up a conversation with like-minded people.  Best of luck!

"We're working to regenerate some depleted land in Niigata Prefecture. In our experience, the best way to get loads of great compost is to grow rabbits and feed them stuff you forage from unused land. You can load up with reeds, kudzu vines (high protein!), veg leftovers, tree branches, and whatever else you can find on unpolluted ground that the rabbits will eat"

That's what I was thinking, but with a different method!  To follow up with that, are you able to potentially do a few rabbit tractors to put over the area?  

Rabbits are excellent at digging out and escaping, but if they're contained in a tractor (or even in a secure metal dog kennel if you're able to attach it to something they can safely use for an overnight house so nothing can get in with them), they can just eat the weeds in place for you, and poop right on the ground.  Normally you'd want specific factors for a rabbit tractor if you were rotating them - but because your goal is to get rid of the weeds, you can literally just leave them in place (monitored) until they eat most of what they want right to the ground.

You'd just want to take care that they 1 -- can't dig or chew their way out of any wide space in the kennel (or tractor if you go that route), and 2 - aren't getting hungry eating everything down and then turning to toxic plants.  (Good to know what toxic ones might be in there first, so you can pull them before they get hungry enough to try and eat them).
You also want to make sure they're kept shaded if it's hot (rabbits do better in cold, but not heat and they definitely don't do well in hot direct sun!) and always have water, of course.

Alternatively, closing in some goats with electric fence will make short work of the area as well.    Same thoughts with making sure they're well-contained (maybe double fencing in case of escapes if you don't have a perimiter fence), and making sure they have the ability to avoid toxic plants.

Just saves you a LOT of work trying to pull and manage a large area of high weeds on your own when there are animals that will happily do it for you AND give you free fertilizer!  Once they chop it down to almost nothing, and poop everywhere, you're well-situated to try and cover the rest of the weeds with cardboard or a no-dig or whatever else you'd like to do.  

Love to see how you go forward with this project!  

Alana -- I have not personally heard of that, but I can definitely see how it could easily happen with the handheld re-useable bidet like that -- if any bacteria (from well or from splashing) got in the bottle, I would think it could certainly be the cause of a UTI.

We are on some pretty horrible well water that we don't drink at our current place, and it has killed some insects, snails and even mice that we were raising ... so we don't give it to anything anymore.   But we use it with the bidet and haven't had any problems at all.  Ours is attached right to the toilet, and is this one here:  https://www.amazon.com/Luxe-Bidet-Neo-120-Non-Electric/dp/B00A0RHSJO/ref=sr_1_5?crid=320WCVAH4YOYA&keywords=bidet&qid=1649177926&sprefix=bidet%2Caps%2C132&sr=8-5

With these it's a constant supply of fresh water and it's not sitting in the container.

Hopefully it's not your well water itself but maybe the handheld bottles need to be sterilized every few days or so to keep bacteria from establishing?  I'm not quite sure.  I know my daughter's drinking water bottle for school (and the dog water bowls) get pretty nasty after even 2 days in warm weather if we don't completely clean them out so I imagine the bidet bottles would be similar.

We have a lot of weeds that come back every year like perennials without being planted, and so I allow them space in our yard.  We haven't actually gotten around to trying to cultivate them yet, but it's on the list.  My two favorites are shepherd's purse (delicious, like mild broccoli, but fairly small as a food source as it doesn't seem to grow thickly -- still, a nice treat) and more substantially, purslane, which is lemony and delicious and supposedly quite full of nutrients, and it grows for a long period of the year and is easily harvestable in small amounts as it keeps growing back.

Rosehips are nice to nibble on and make tea, and of course they come back every year -- but we try to find individual plants with better tasting fruits; they really vary a lot.  Some are downright bitter and dry, while others are more sweet and soft, and everything in between.

We have huge patches of chickweed and violets that are edible and come back in force every year for long periods of time at once, too, but we like to keep them around for the animals and the novelty of eating neat weeds/showing people, rather than the taste... I think chickweed tastes like hay smells and violets aren't really my favorite flavor either.

Oh no!  That makes sense.  ^_^

I already imported my legal limit of one American life partner so I think I'm supposed to stop there.  

Just a question -- would this be open to people from Canada?  (for the legal limit of time, which would be, I think, 6 months of the year for visiting?)
If so, I would imagine it would be a bit harder to stay past that limit unless there was some other arrangement, like immigration.

I attempted to find this out on the site or elsewhere but after about 20 minutes of searching I thought maybe I should just ask, in case I missed it somewhere obvious.  

Just seems like a very neat opportunity to do some wide-scope learning with a whole group of like minded people.

Thanks!

I've used scrap styrofoam to make homemade egg incubators for poultry -- if you were able to do something like that, even if you weren't wanting to use it yourself, would it be possible to sell it to other like-minded people looking for a nicely built incubator at a profit to yourself?  Professional incubators are PRICEY and can be built much cheaper, but well-done DIY incubators are rarely for sale.    Just one idea!  

Hi Sandra!  I'm a female from BC, but can I ask.. what is SWF?  (I assume the F and M is male and female but otherwise I'm new at this!)  

Cheers, and best of luck!