200 Things: Summer

By Sharon Astyk. Reprinted with permission.

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If you don’t can or dehydrate, now is the time to learn. In most climates, you can waterbath can or dehydrate with a minimum of purchased materials, and produce is abundant and cheap. If you don’t garden, check out your local farmstand for day-old produce or your farmer’s market at the end of the day - they are likely to have large quantities they are anxious to get rid of. Wild fruits are also in abundance, or will be.

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Consider dehydrating outer leaves of broccoli, cabbage, etc…, and grinding the dried mixture. It can be added to flours to increase the nutritional value of your bread.

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Buy hay in the summer, rather than gradually over the winter. Now is an excellent time to put up simple shelters for hay storage, to avoid high early spring and winter prices.

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Firewood, woodstoves and heating materials are at their cheapest right now. Invest now for winter. The same is true of insulating materials.

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Back to school planning is a great time to reconsider transportation in light of peak oil. Can your children walk? Bike? If they cannot do either for reasons of safety (rather than distance) could an adult do so with them? Could you hire a local teenager to take them to school on foot or by wheel? Can you find ways to carpool, if you must drive? Grownups can do this too.

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Also when getting ready to go back to school, consider the environmental impact of your scheduling and activities - are there ways to minimize driving/eating out/equipment costs/fuel consumption? Could your family do less in formal “activities” and more in family work?

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Consider either home schooling or engaging in supplemental home Education. Your kids may need a large number of skills not provided by local public schools, and a critical perspective that they certainly won‘t learn in an institutional setting. Teach them.

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Try and minimize air conditioning and electrical use during high Summer. Take cool showers or baths, use ice packs, reserve activity when possible for early am or evening. Rise at 4 am and get much of your work done then.

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Consider adding a solar powered attic fan, available from Real Goods.

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Don’t go on vacation. Spend your energy and money making your home a paradise instead. Throw a barbecue, a party or an open house, and invite the neighbors in. Get to know them.

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Be prepared for summer blackouts, some quite extensive. Have emergency supplies and lighting at hand.

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Practice living, cooking and camping outside, so that you will be comfortable doing so if necessary. Everyone in the family can learn basic outdoors person skills.

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Make your own summer camp. Instead of sending kids to soccer camp, create an at-home skills camp that helps prepare people for peak oil. Invite the neighbor kids to join you. Have a blast!

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Begin adapting herbs and other potted plants to indoor culture. Consider adding small tropicals - figs, lemons, oranges, even bananas can often be grown in cold climate homes. Obviously, if you live in a warm climate well, be prepared for some jealousy from the rest of us come February ;-).

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Plant a fall garden in high summer - peas, broccoli, kale, lettuces, beets, carrots, turnips, etc… All of the above will last well into early winter in even the harshest climates, and with proper techniques or in milder areas, will provide you with fresh food all year long

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Put up a new clothesline! Consider hand washing clothes outside, since everyone will probably enjoy getting wet (and cool) anyhow.

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If you have access to safe waters, go fishing. Get some practice, and learn a new skill.

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Encourage pick-up games at your house. Post-peak, children will need to know how to entertain themselves.

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For teens, encourage them to develop their own home businesses over the summers. Whether doing labor or creating a product, you may rely on them eventually to help support the family. Or have them clean out your closets and attic and help you reorganize. Let them sell the stuff.

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Buy a hand pushed lawn mower if you have less than 1 acre of grass. New ones are easy to push and pleasant, and will save you energy and that unpleasant gas smell.

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Keep an eye out for unharvested fruits and nuts - many suburban and rural areas have berry and fruit bushes that no one harvests. Take advantage and put up the fruit.

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Practice extreme water conservation during the summer. Mulch to reduce the need for irrigation. Bathe less often and with less water. Reduce clothes washing when possible.

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This is an excellent time to toilet train children - they can run around naked if necessary and accidents will do no harm. Try and get them out of diapers now, before winter.

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Consider replacing lawns with something that doesn’t have to be mown - ground covers like vetch, moss, even edibles like wintergreen or lingonberry, chamomile or mint.

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If it is summer time, then the living is probably easy. Take some time to enjoy it - to picnic, to celebrate democracy (and try and bring one about ;-), To explore your own area, walk in the nearby woods.

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