Greetings from Fife,Scotland

[hay331]

Hi Greenbean

Stirling just up the road! My oldest daughter was at Stirling Uni for a year (dropped out!) so we had a few trips up there. It always had a "nice" feeling about the place, if you know what I mean.

The earthship is at Craigencalt Ecology Centre in Kinghorn. http://www.cfec.org.uk/
You can have a nice day out and take your dog too!

Did you get that frost in Stirling last night? Good for the garlic so I believe!
I thought my pea seeds (on windowsill) weren't going to germinate but excitment this morning when I checked them and saw all these wee green shoots poking up!

Muddypause, Did you ever see that programme "Grand Designs" where the house was built with bales? I think you can still see it on the Channel 4 website. I don't know much about "Natural House" methods so all this info is really good for my education!

[greenbean]

Hi Hay,
Stirling is a lovely place to live, you're right, there's a nice feel to the town. I stay quite near the Uni and from my garden watch the bats fly out of the Wallace Monument at dusk - very gothic.
I did have a frost last night, I've only got broad beans, onions and perenial herbs outside just now. If frost is good for garlic then I'll bet it's good for my onions too.
I shall certainly plan a day out to Kinghorn with husband, dog and picnic in tow. Thank you for the internet link - it looks very interesting, I am surprised I haven't heard of this place before.
Very glad to hear your germination news, I am impatiently waiting for sweetcorn to germinate just now, it's taking a very long time indeed.
Have a lovely day in Fife.

[Guest]

Muddypause, Did you ever see that programme "Grand Designs" where the house was built with bales?

I don't always watch GDs. Generally it seems to feature fabulous houses, and people who manage to go £100k over budget without breaking sweat.

But I've seen a couple of editions using bales. One was abroad (Italy? France? I forget) where the locals started off thinking they were mad foreigners, but ended up getting on very well with them. The house was big and flouted the local rules when they painted it colours other than white.

And there was the house in the woods, built by Ben Law from local materials. This was particularly appealing, because he went over budget, but still built a house for less than £30k.
http://www.permaculture.co.uk/mag/Artic ... Place.html

He's meant to be writing a book about it, but no sign of it yet.