Assigning Value

Eug and I live in a little house, and our lives are affordable enough that we can each spend just a few hours on paid work each day. We spend a lot of time with our children and, rather remarkably, recently found that we have time to clean the house. There is no real reason not to invest time and energy into being brave with our vocations. We live pretty modestly for this very reason. We are in this lucky place where our lives need not center on money.

One of the first things in our house that is just there for beauty (that top shelf). The crates are how much fruit and vegetables we consume every week. 

But I still constantly turn to money as a way of measuring value, and it's hard to get away from the fear that there may not be enough, or that we won't get our "fair share"- fair pay, fair recognition, a fair assessment of my dissertation so that I can move forward somehow.  

As I try to follow Jesus, I want to learn what it means to hold money loosely, but also how to assign value without thinking of money first. On the frugal-minimalist-sustainable spectrum, I tend to be frugal first. My first gut question when Eug started making beer was "is it cheaper than buying it?", even though we've never bought beer in our lives, so the question is largely irrelevant.

We keep on adding shelves, and I seem to have begun a love affair with glass jars. Who knows how it will end.

I have a similar reaction to a lot of things, and struggle to separate my worth from my earning power.  After all, it's our cheapness that allows us this kind of life in the first place, right? Well, yes and no. One of the most influential books when Eug and I were paying off debt was "Your Money or Your Life", which equates money spent with the real number of hours required to earn that money. But thinking about spending in these terms, particularly after getting free from debt, can be a dangerous source of pride or inadequacy if it's used too simplistically. Money is a blunt tool that fails to take into account the nuances of our real needs in community and in family. It is a fickle source of security.

I'm keen for my goals to be about adding value without necessarily having that value translate to money. This means that my to-do list is re-oriented towards how I can bless myself and other people the most. It's not centered on what people who influence my pay/earning power or Eug's pay want from us, but on less tangible value, both in the short term and the long term. Still pretty vague, but I'd love to hear from you on how better to make this leap. 

How to Make Non-toxic Sunscreen

In recent years people have started writing about the toxicity of commercial sunscreens, and it also seemed like one way to reduce plastic consumption, so I decided to try to make our own as it starts getting hot here in Cape Town. 

In contrast to our pediatrician in Boston, our pediatrician here in Cape Town didn't recommend sunscreen for babies.  From what I've read, I finally feel persuaded to find a hat I actually like wearing for the summer, and to do the same for the kids. Barrier protection against the sun- when you're in the sun for more than the usual out-and-about- seems to be the best line of defense. The sun is also a good thing so a little exposure is ok. This sunscreen will allow us to hang out on the beach a little longer. We'll be using this sunscreen when we're at the beach and pool, and if we go for long hikes. Zinc oxide is not totally innocuous, but it basically provides barrier- rather than chemical- protection against the sun at a micro level. I was careful not to buy nano zinc, which is apparently sometimes absorbed into the skin. 

This sunscreen takes about 10 minutes to make, has just three ingredients, and rubs on easily. 

The three ingredients are as follows:

2.5 tbsp of zinc oxide (this apparently makes about 20 spf- you can find more accurate measurements online)

Beeswax- about half a cup, melted.

Apricot kernel oil or some other oil- 1/2 cup-3/4 cup*

*South Africans, apricot oil is available at the pick n pay in Tokai and I'm sure many other places. I have a lot of beeswax and zinc oxide thanks to a visitor from the U.S., but if you know where to get these ingredients in SA, I know people would love to know in the comments.

I melted the beeswax in a makeshift double-boiler. It's quick and easy, but I'd suggest just using the jar you're going to store the sunscreen in, or using an old tin can if you have it as the pot was quite difficult to clean. While the water is still cool, place the oil and wax in the jar until it melts.  Then remove the jar before it gets too hot, then mix in the zinc oxide. Be careful to get the zinc oxide straight from the bag into the mixture- don't inhale!

Done! It rubs in nicely and smells pleasantly like honey.

Food Evolutions

As some readers know, I made a big push to plan meals earlier in the year. Then I scrapped the meal plan and I'm slowly coming to a happy medium. The meal plan didn't always work because it didn't give me the flexibility I needed to buy the food that's in season and cheap. Plus it brought out my crazy side, which my family shouldn't have to see every single day.

I've adopted a new way of shopping. I just estimate how much we eat during the week, and buy that much. We buy a lot of fruit. My general goal with shopping is to avoid all packaging, and not to waste any food at the end of the week. So as we come near to shopping day, I try to finish all produce except root vegetables before getting anything more. I buy carbs- flour, pasta, rice in bulk from Macro and the nearby Korean store.

I've been on a food journey with you these last few years, and some things have stuck, others not. While theoretically I want to eat only unprocessed oats, the reality is I need both whole oats and rolled oats, both brown rice and white rice, because I don't always remember to soak foods. 

So for this stage in our lives, where I'm trying to be part of a home that's pretty peaceful, a few things are working well: The food I buy from the grocery should have just one, preferably unprocessed ingredient, and I should know that ingredient. This idea is from Michael Pollan. My exceptions are cheese, which I don't yet make myself, chocolate (sometimes), and occasionally bakery bread.

I no longer have a grocery budget. I used to try to keep my grocery spending low, but I'm beginning to think abundance in food- good, healthy, plentiful food- is surely as important as anything imaginable. Maybe even as important as giving or showing our kids the world! So as we gradually find better sources of foods I try to extricate myself from all guilt associated with buying better, more expensive food- often in smaller quantities- so we're not buying much meat or cheese. I acknowledge this is a luxury, and my goal here in Cape Town is, over the course of five years or so, to get to know the producers of all of our family's food. Join me in the journey if you can!