Well here we are, just a few short weeks away from the federal election, being bombarded with ads, soundbites and lots of promises.

No matter where your vote will be going on August 21, we suggest checking out politicalanimal.org.au first. A site made by the RSPCA, it’s been designed to highlight the key animal welfare issues Australians want the government to get in order.

How it works

For example, say you’re interested in the topic of the humane slaughter of animals. You click that link on the Political Animal home page, then vote on what concerns you most about animal slaughter: low stress handling in abattoirs, slaughter without stunning, transport and trucking conditions, or the transport of young dairy calves.

After you vote, you’ll see a breakdown of how other people voted – but, more importantly, the information will be used in the RSPCA’s battle for the fairer treatment of animals in our country. As the site itself says, “Community standards and expectations influence our decision makers more than the average voter realises.”

You can vote on the topics of food labelling, animal slaughter, puppy factories and live exports. You can also sign a petition to show your support of the program, join the forum to comment on the topics, and learn how to contact your local pollies to ask them what their opinions are on these important subjects.

Go on, become a political animal and vote now. You’ll be casting a vote for the creatures that have no voice – before we cast a vote for the creatures that sometimes seem to be all voice!

As always, remember to check out our store for lots of eco-friendly goodies for you and your home. Have a gander at our fab pet products – the Onya Biodegradable Dog Poo Bags, Organic Pet Liver Treats, and Organipet Pet Shampoo!

Did you know that the chickens can grow to be 11 years old? Keep that in mind as you learn that after two years of age, most battery hens stop laying as many eggs as their owners want them to produce. What comes next for these poor chickens? According to henrescue.org, they’re classified as “spent hens” and are sent to slaughter.

But good news for our fowl friends – NSW Hen Rescue has started a program to give them a new life. This organisation works with farmers to re-home their “spent” hens, saving them from a tragic end by giving them to people who want some chickens of their own. Then the hens then get to finally act the way they should, spreading their wings in their spacious new henhouses!

NSW Hen Rescue needs your help – whether you can adopt some chickens, donate to help keep the organisation running or just join the group on facebook to spread the word, you can give the poor old hardworking hens a hand!

Solution Living supports animal-friendly initiatives and eco-responsible living – check out our earth-friendly household products in our store to support us!

For years we had a pet possum living with our family (Possie). We raised her from a pinky – her mum had died so my mum carried her around in her pocket for months until she was old enough to scamper about the house, causing havoc by running up our aunties’ legs and teasing the dog.

This wonderful creature taught us kids lots about marsupials and the magic of these unique and beautiful creatures. Her favourite meal was rose petals and bananas. Although gorgeous, they are wild animals and are not really supposed to be household pets, so we hastened her return to the wild when she reached mating age, when anything that was left uncovered by a doona at 5am received a sharp little possum nip! She finally went to live outside and for years she returned for a treat with her babies on her back, which she allowed us to touch.

So when my husband pointed out that we had a possum living in our roof – one he was none to happy about! – we looked to devise a possum-happy plan. It was never going to be an option to poison it, or to trap and remove it – there is always a better way.

Possums are very territorial and if you take one and put it in another possum’s territory it can lead to misery for the poor little beast. They are also quite likely to try and turn up again. So what is the solution?

Well, we bought a possum box from WIRES and put it up in a big tree at the back of the garden, where it was safe from cats and dogs. We then surrounded it with fruit to attract the possum. We locked him out of the roof when we saw him leave in the evening, and blocked up his hole. The next morning when he tried to get in he did spend a fairly miserable day scrunched up against the roof hole with the birds harrassing him, but the next day we went to check and he was happily snoozing in his new possum box – and has been there ever since.

If you think about the animal and truly aim to respect its rights to a nice life too there is always a way to solve our co-existance problems. WIRES are a fabulous organisation and have all sorts of good advice and information if you have a concern with our native animals. In the meantime we should all celebrate our unique Australian animals and feel happy when we hear the scamper of feet in the night – it’s a sign that you live in a relatively healthy ecosystem, of which you are just a small part.

Here at Solution Living we are always looking for ways to make conscious consumerism easier so here is our latest favourite thing!

“Your dollar is your vote – make it count.” That’s the idea behind the Shop Ethical! app, a collaboration between the Ethical Consumer Group and Outware Mobile, and I love it!

It can be hard (well, nearly impossible) to keep up to date with which companies dabble in genetic engineering, which ones are fairtrade, which ones have bad packaging or environmental records, which ones have a poor history of testing on animals… the list of corporate crimes goes on! But once you download this app, you can search for each product on your shopping list and find out its history: with marks ranging from a green tick (praises with no criticisms) to a red cross (criticisms) and even a boycott call for the worst offenders, you’ll know what the company behind each product has been up to. 

Based on the Ethical Shopping Guide 2010, the app has info from 25 advisory boards, including Greenpeace, Choose Cruelty Free, Responsible Shopper and Friends of the Earth. There are heaps of items listed – alcohol, dairy, pet care, heath foods, office supplies and lots, lots more – so you’ll never need to worry about your supermarket choices again! 

The Shop Ethical! app costs $3.99, and you can buy it here.

My friend Cherise of Garden Diva fame in her seasonal newsletter alterted me to a great new site! www.Woblmarket.com is a new fatastic free site to help growers and local people together. Tim Lawrence of Mulchnet.com has come up with a fantastic idea aimed at reducing waste and connecting food and people together. I am always horrified when I see Californian Oranges for sale in our local supermarkets (yes make sure you look at the sign before you buy!) while local fruit rots on the ground.
Woblmarket is designed mainly for the suburban grower who has a laden fruit tree, excess eggs or simply an over-productive vegetable patch. Could this be you? Why let fruit rot on the tree when someone down the road may be happy to take it? Or maybe you fancy some excess produce yourself. Hobby farmers & fully commercial growers may also use the system. The site is still quite new and waiting for more growers to register, so please be patient if you can’t find something at first click and simply bookmark the site so you can come back later. I know myself I have watched as bags of my lovely oranges and lemons have gone mouldy – it’s such a pity and I’d rather give it away to people to enjoy than to see it rot. So next time I will log on to woblmarket and see if there are any locals wanting a lemon or two! Imagine if everyone did it there would be no basil going to seed, no rotting oranges on the ground and the rip off supermarkets will make less money!! Log on it’s new but worth visiting and re-visiting in the near future to see new community members loggin on and giving it a go.

Solution Living is very excited to launch our new bubble bath! It is made from organic ingredients and essential oils, and contains no animal products, SLS or any other nasties. With lavender and ylang ylang fragrances and properties, it is a little bit of luxury you can enjoy every day. Made in Australia, this product is a great example of how you can make an ethical, environmental choice without sacrificing your little bit of joy at the end of the day. It foams really well too so the kids will love it!

Buy it now at www.solutionliving.com.au.

Solution Living Lavender Bubble Bath

I have written before about Yeranda, located at Main Creek NSW, just outside the beautiful country town of Dungog. Ros and Kevin Runciman, after 20 years of running thier 3 cottage eco- tourism business have thier 70 acres of pristine wilderness and a lifestyle to be envied up for sale.

So wether you are a young family wanting to give your kids a healthier upbringing or a professional couple sick of the city grind Yeranda offers the unique opportunity to choose a different life! If you fancy being your own boss, love the bush, nature and serenity this is the buy for you – a home, a business and a lifestyle.

So where are Ros and Kev off to? Well not far – when you live in paradise why move – they are moving to another beautiful property just down the road to slow down a bit.

Dungog is a mere 20 mins from Yeranda and has take away coffee, gourmet restaurants, a movie theater and very good local schools.  if you fancy a one in a lifetime opportunity for well under a million dollars visit www.yeranda.com.au to find out more.

With so much bad news surrounding the water crisis for the Murray River it is really nice to have something positive to write about the region. Regional Development Australia (RDA) is a joint Federal and State Government initiative that has been set up to drive change and encourage the development of sustainable enterprises in Regional Australia. The Ecostore in Lavingtion NSW is an example of a business that has had its start as a result of the scheme. What is encouraging about the scheme is that it works with the local community on projects, keeping jobs in the area and encouraging sustainable businesses. It is a conduit between government and local communities, a provider of information and is, a non profit community-based organisation.

Solution Living is proud to have our fabulous range of Eco friendly household products stocked by the Lavington Ecostore and encourage any locals who have not yet ventured in to go and visit and try some of the fantastic products that they stock. The products supply everything for making eco changes to your home, from energy saving light bulbs, Solution Living cleaning products, composting Bokashi Bins, water saving products (how relevant for thier area!), organic and sustainable homewares, children’s toys, and a delicious range of soaps and smelly things from Byron Bay and WA. The store prides itself on  finding safe, Australian-made eco friendly, recycled, energy and water-saving products for customers – and Solution Living is proud to be a part of it!

The shop is located at Shop 86 Centro Lavington PH. 02 6040 5450, 351 Griffiths Rd E. Lavington NSW 2461 W. You can email them at ecostore@murraynow.com.au. If you want to know more about RDA thier website is www.rdamurray.org.au/home/index.htm.  Of course if you can’t make it to Lavington we’d love for you to try our great Solution Living products – you can order them at www.solutionliving.com.au!

Solution Living has a rave that has nothing at all to do with saving the world today, just my thoughts on dog owners.

I am a dog lover and owner – in fact, an animal lover – and time and time again it distresses me to see ignorant people in charge of dogs. I’m not talking about the lunatic fringe with pit bulls who they turn into aggressive non family freindly beasts (it’s always bad people, not bad dogs). I’m taking about everyday people who tug and wrench at thier dogs’ leads, smack them and push them on the bums  to make them sit – generally mistreating the poor doggy soul who desperately would like to please their person but don’t understand human-talk!

There are some great new dog training programs out there, such as the SMART program, and I highly recommend them. Even if you think you know all there is to know about dogs and training them, go and do a cours – yes, even if you have a dog and not a puppy, as you CAN teach an old human new tricks, and your dog with thank you for it. I won’t go into the method but the training philosophy is all about rewarding natural behaviours that are good rather then punishing the bad (works for kids too!). In fact, they use signals similar to the ones they use when training dolphins and whales. So go on, learn something new and I won’t be the one giving you skinny eyes at the park!

At Solution Living we have some lovely treats for our doggy friends .. organic liver treats (Astro, pictured, and Trix love them) and some great biodegradable dog poo bags on a handy lead clip so you never have to be the one that runs out at the park.

Also we have Organipet shampoo and eco friendly flea deterring shampoo – visit www.solutionliving.com.au to buy!

Solution Living goes budget grocery shopping!

So I have been going over the household budget – we have a renovation coming up and the money has to come from somewhere! Given that I refuse to give up on buying organic, free range and eco-conscious household products, I’ve decided to cut back on the things that we really shouldn’t be buying anyway: things like prepackaged snacks, cheeses that come in little packs, biscuits… mostly the on-the-go convenience stuff.

I also need to look at the meat we eat – as we choose only organic and free range we will be taking a step towards going more vego! Much to the horror of my 3 meat-loving boys, we’ll be having 4 out of 7 days meat-free (we were managing about 2-3 before). I’m planning meals and setting a… shock horror… budget!!!!

I’m rising to the challenge and am quite excited about not wasting anything in the fridge, and the kids not eating stuff they shouldn’t (even though it’s easy for me) . Now just got to find time between my day job, Solution Living, kids, husband, pets and homework to do the budget, start menu planning, baking and freezing!

Wish me luck. I’d love to hear any ideas on budget recipes for lunch boxes, too…