After a very peaceful and somewhat Make Do & Mend the Earth Christmas (full of shopping locally and earth-consciously…not so much handmade, after all) I’ve been spending quiet moments in January finding a way forward here. My passion and belief in the worthiness of this movement hasn’t waned, but understanding the realities of my time and energies has waxed. So I’d like to begin again with the sharing of the clarity that has come to me, and we can go on from there…

~After attempting the film club last year, I can see that more than anything else this site needs to be a storehouse, a resource to turn to-whether you are new to making do or just need some support and inspiration. My other earth-thoughtful website needs much of my attention and energies and is where we read books and watch things and do projects together and it was too much of a strain to me to try to do that here, as well. So in the weeks to come I will do some rearranging here and create pages with books and films and other helpful things that you may use in your own time and at your own pace.

~Beyond the usual resources like books and films and websites, I will be creating printable resources (eye-catching cards to share with shops, friends and others) and shareable ones (graphics for Instagram and blogs, etc.) with messages to spread the word and make more visible what we are doing in our home fronts. For instance, I get so frustrated that printed receipts are still ubiquitous! Such a toxic and wasteful practice when there are other options now. I’m picturing a letter-size printable of six to eight cards to cut out with a request to change this system along with a few whys. Brief and heartfelt. Something we can carry in our wallets and hand out when we are in the checkout being handed yet another length of tree-killing paper that most likely goes straight into the recycling bin (to be recycled or not.) And likewise, a graphic housed here that you can drag off and use where you want to, say, proclaim that you have given up amazon.com. An ever-growing collection.

~Which leads me to another strand in the going-forward. I would so like not to be tending and creating all of this myself…both because it’s lonely and because we can do more together. If you feel deeply about this movement, too, and would like to offer your artistic abilities with designing resources or just chat about possibilities and ideas via email (or snail mail or chat or phone or…) please be in touch.

~And the last bit of clarity for today is that beyond the home front/making do during the world wars that is so much our light to follow, I’d like Craftivism to become another light. I received Sarah Corbett’s book two Christmases ago, but it’s taken time for the approach to sink in. Now, I am thoroughly behind it, yet still figuring out my path with it. I do know that the next post here will focus on a small project we can do together, for a first step. So please stay tuned.

I look forward to conversation here and will be taking up posting at our Instagram again, too. Pleased to see our hashtag being used here and there (#makedoandmendtheearth) which you can see, too, if you follow the hashtag itself, just as you can follow profiles. I’ve been pulling up my bootstraps (second-hand, of course : ) recently, being gifted a second-hand iPhone to more easily take and post good photos, making lists of helpful hashtags and visiting kindred folk, generally simplifying and planning for less distracting online sharing and am feeling more hopeful about it all flowing and making more of a difference. Refining. Not in the least giving up.

I’ll leave you with a quote I came across recently that might clear away the sometime fog and indecision of how to Make Do & Mend the Earth, from Sir David Attenborough…

“You can do more and more and more the longer you live, but the best motto to think about is not waste things,” Attenborough replied. “Don’t waste electricity, don’t waste paper, don’t waste food. Live the way you want to live but just don’t waste. Look after the natural world, and the animals in it, and the plants in it too. This is their planet as well as ours. Don’t waste them.”

P.S. The photos are of the berries and ivy and the crown I made of them for a blessingway ceremonial I was privileged to attend last Sunday. When I was asked to make the crown, I visited some blessingway links and saw the super-flowery crowns shown in most all of the photos. I knew the crown I made wouldn’t be flowery as it is winter and I don’t buy flowers from shops and I did wonder what mine would look like. As is so often is the way with making do, I found just enough beauty amongst our tangled wintery woods to make a lovely and simple crown for the lovely mother-to-be.