200 Tips, Techniques, and Recipes for Natural Beauty


Shannon Buck - 2014
    With 200 Tips, Techniques, and Recipes for Natural Beauty you'll learn all that you need to know to make your own organic beauty products. Create delightful lotions and potions in your own kitchen, using all-natural, holistic ingredients like herbs and flowers. Discover conditioning carrier oils, sumptuous butters, and aromatic floral extracts that will nourish you head to toe. Also, use some of the recipes for your overall health, including curative herbal extracts and therapeutically effective essential oils. With step-by-step photographs, clear instructions, and expert tips, each recipe is easy to follow. Give them as gifts or keep them for yourself. Regardless, you'll never want to buy beauty products from the drug store again!

Dirt-Cheap Survival Retreat: One Man's Solution


M.D. Creekmore - 2011
    But how many of us can afford such a spread without a crippling mortgage? If you can't make the hefty payments on your survival retreat, the bankers will evict you, leaving you worse off than those who failed to prepare in the first place. M.D. Creekmore's motivation for finding a low-cost retreat was the need to live on a lot less money after he lost his job and got divorced. He started living in a travel trailer, parked on two acres he'd bought a few years back to use as a campsite and bug-out location, never dreaming he'd be living there full time. But he has called his trailer home for the past four years and says that "for the first time in my life, I'm actually content." Living off the grid in a travel trailer isn't for everyone. But if you are looking for a way to own a debt-free home--and enjoy the security that comes with it--here's the author's dirt-cheap plan for finding suitable land; buying a used trailer; securing it against the elements and intruders; providing alternative power sources; dealing with water and waste issues; maximizing your space; and establishing a workable storage system for food, water, medicine, tools, and other equipment. The good news is that the author has done the hard part for you.

The Climate Cure: Solving the Climate Emergency in the Era of COVID-19


Tim Flannery - 2020
    Although Australia’s prompt, science-led response to COVID-19 has not been perfect, it has saved tens of thousands of lives. But for decades, governments have ignored, ridiculed or understated the advice of scientists on the climate emergency.Now, in the wake of the megafires of 2020, a time of reckoning has arrived. In The Climate Cure renowned climate scientist Tim Flannery takes aim at those responsible for the campaign of obfuscation and denial that has already cost so many Australian lives and held back action on climate change.Flannery demands a new approach, based on the nation’s response to COVID-19, that will lead to effective government policies. The Climate Cure is an action plan for our future. We face a fork in the road, and must decide now between catastrophe and survival.

Solar Power Your Home for Dummies


Rik DeGunther - 2007
    You'll see how to survey your home to determine your current household energy efficiency and use, and evaluate where solar power would best benefit you. You'll also calculate what the return on your investment will be before you make any decisions. Once you've decided on a project, you'll see whether it's best to hire a contractor or do it yourself. We leave no stone unturned--you'll also discover how to:Choose and install your best solar system Handle small to large solar projects Heat and cool your house with solar energy Install exterior solar lighting Handle swimming pool, water heater, or ventilation solar projects Create greenhouses or solar rooms Build, buy, or sell a solar home Finance your solar investments Take advantage of tax rebates and incentives associated with solar power Avoid the worst solar mistakes Featuring ten of the easiest and cheapest do-it-yourself solar projects, Solar Power For Dummies is the fun and easy way to meet your energy needs with this clean power source!

Microshelters: 59 Creative Cabins, Tiny Houses, Tree Houses, and Other Small Structures


Derek "Deek" Diedricksen - 2015
    Created by a wide array of builders and designers around the United States and beyond, these 59 unique and innovative structures show you the limits of what is possible. Each is displayed in full-color photographs accompanied by commentary by the author. In addition, Diedricksen includes six sets of building plans by leading designers to help you get started on a microshelter of your own. You’ll also find guidelines on building with recycled and salvaged materials, plus techniques for making your small space comfortable and easy to inhabit.

DIY Projects for the Self-Sufficient Homeowner: 25 Ways to Build a Self-Reliant Lifestyle


Betsy Matheson - 2011
    Many of the projects require basic materials available at your everyday home center, but this book also provides valuable DIY resources for solar, hydro, greenhouse, and gardening needs. This book will help you build security with utility backup systems and become more sustainable, resulting in less dependence on city systems for basic needs. Whether you have a city plot or simply pots, this book includes all of the information needed to plan, build, and succeed with greater self-sufficiency.

The Tumbleweed DIY Book of Backyard Sheds and Tiny Houses: Build your own guest cottage, writing studio, home office, craft workshop, or personal retreat


Jay Shafer - 2011
    For the DIY enthusiast, here are photos, elevation drawings, and door/window schedules for six Tumbleweed box bungalows, plus an extensive how-to set of instructions that can be applied to any backyard building project. What they are not is home-center garden sheds. Though conventionally built, these handsome little buildings have real doors, windows, and skylights with interesting and practical details throughout. Paint them and finish them to suit your tastes and needs.The term "Box Bungalow" is a trademark of Tumbleweek Tiny House Corp. It refers to their idea of packaging these backyard buildings on a flat skid, for weekend DIY assembly. They'll also sell a prefab building for delivery to your prepared site. They'll also sell complete sets of plans for any of the houses shown in this book.

A Doctor's Occupation, The dramatic true story of life in Nazi-occupied Jersey


John Lewis - 1982
    Possessed of great warmth, wit and, above all a humanity which informs every word in this extraordinary account of Jersey life during the German Occupation, he served the island community with unfailing resourcefulness and not a little courage for five long and stressful years. However, despite the awfulness of the time, Dr Lewis infuses his account of it with an irrepressible joie de vivre which is utterly delightful. It is an uplifting story of winning against the odds, by turns hysterically funny and then unbearably sad. Above all it has an immediacy which takes the reader right into the heart of the Occupation, you can smell the fear, feel the pain, suffer the loss, sense the victory as do the characters in this history and they are many and varied. You will meet the good Jersey folk like the brave and tragic Mrs Gould from St Ouens and the not so good Jersey folk in the shape of the collaborators and informers or the “Jerry bags” like the exotic Ginger Lou. Here too you will meet some of the most wretched victims of the war, the Russian Todt workers who were hidden and helped by the locals and of course the many sorts of Germans who made up the occupying force. It is a story of compelling interest.I had the good fortune to meet John Lewis and his wife in 1991 at his lovely Jersey home. He talked for hours that seemed like minutes of his life during the war years. He was just as I’d hoped he would be - endlessly kind, witty and understanding. I came away from that meeting feeling happy, elated and much wiser, as you will surely do after reading of the Doctor’s Occupation. John Nettles

Greenhouse Gardener's Companion: Growing Food Flowers in Your Greenhouse or Sunspace


Shane Smith - 1993
    Today, greenhouses and sunrooms are real living spaces where gardeners spend as much time with a book and a cup of coffee as they do with a watering can and a pair of pruning shears. In this fully revised edition of a best-selling classic, veteran gardener Shane Smith embraces this new "lifestyle" approach to greenhouse gardening. Through lively writing that balances wit with commonsense advice, Smith draws on his more than 20 years' experience to cover everything you need to know to establish a charming and productive greenhouse.“Exceptionally comprehensive . . . a joy to read.”—Hobby Greenhouse Association

The Little Book of Living Small


Laura Fenton - 2020
    It features twelve case study homes in which style-savvy, small-space dwellers (from singles to families of four) open their doors and share their design secrets. Stylistically these homes range from urban to rural, minimalist to bohemian, with the unifying thread that they are all real homes of 1,200 square feet or less and offer clever solutions for you to use in your own home.Highly engaging with lists, tips, and actionable advice, The Little Book of Living Small shows readers how to make the most of limited square footage—with grace and style—and serves as the cheerleader readers need to help themselves feel satisfied and proud of their choice to live with less.Laura Fenton is the author of The Little Book of Living Small and the former lifestyle director at Parents magazine, where she oversaw all the home content for the publication. A writer with more than fifteen years of experience, her work has appeared in major publications including Better Homes & Gardens, Country Living, Good Housekeeping, and on leading home websites including Remodelista, HGTV.com, ElleDecor.com, Curbed, and Refinery29. Through her writing she has explored the topic of living small for more than a decade. She lives small with her husband, a photographer, and their son in Jackson Heights, Queens, in New York.

Tiny Houses Built with Recycled Materials: Inspiration for Constructing Tiny Homes Using Salvaged and Reclaimed Supplies


Ryan Mitchell - 2016
    Extremely small house, with less than 1,000 square feet of space, are environmentally friendly, less expensive than typical homes, and often movable. Tiny Houses Built with Recycled Materials is full of ideas for using reclaimed materials and upcycled goods to construct a tiny house that is good for the earth and truly unique. Ryan Mitchell, author of The Tiny Life blog, shows you how to repurpose everyday items to create your new home, including shipping containers, salvaged barn wood, and reclaimed shingles. Featuring profiles on tiny house owners with photographs and floor plans of the homes, ideas on where to find materials, and what to look for and avoid when selecting reclaimed materials, Tiny Houses Built with Recycled Materials is a unique book perfect for your biggest DIY project yet!

The Hands-On Home: A Seasonal Guide to Cooking, Preserving & Natural Homekeeping


Erica Strauss - 2015
    A fresh take on modern homemaking, this is a practical (and sometimes sassy) guide to maximizing your time, effort, and energy in the kitchen and beyond. With a focus on less consumerism, it will teach you how to organize your kitchen and home to make the best use of your time. For those yearning to live a more ecologically minded, grounded lifestyle, this book is full of practical, no-nonsense advice, fabulous recipes, and time- and money-saving techniques.

Extreme Gardening: How to Grow Organic in the Hostile Deserts


Dave Owens - 2000
    Written by Arizona t.v. gardening guru, the "Garden Guy," David Owens covers topics including watering, design, tools, schedules, fertilizing, companion planting, and soils.

Craft Activism: People, Ideas, and Projects from the New Community of Handmade and How You Can Join in


Joan Tapper - 2011
    We make to share. We make to connect with others. Crafters all over the world are using their hands and hearts to make a statement, change the world, and build community.Craft Activism is an inspiring celebration of this growing movement. Inside, dozens of superstars of this grassroots phenomenon share their experiences, tips, and advice on living, teaching, and promoting a more meaningful DIY lifestyle. Learn to craft for your cause, connect with other crafters, think green, organize a fair, host an online exchange, create yarn graffiti, and more. The book also includes 17 creative projects from designers who challenge you to reimagine how your craft skills can be used to make a difference. Whether you knit, sew, crochet, or collage--and even if you're not sure where to begin--this book is your guide to the incredible power of handmade.

Ecological Intelligence: How Knowing the Hidden Impacts of What We Buy Can Change Everything


Daniel Goleman - 2009
    We dive down to see coral reefs, not realizing that an ingredient in our sunscreen feeds a virus that kills the reef. We wear organic cotton t-shirts, but don’t know that its dyes may put factory workers at risk for leukemia. In Ecological Intelligence, Daniel Goleman reveals why so many of the products that are labeled green are a “mirage,” and illuminates our wild inconsistencies in response to the ecological crisis.Drawing on cutting-edge research, Goleman explains why we as shoppers are in the dark over the hidden impacts of the goods and services we make and consume, victims of a blackout of information about the detrimental effects of producing, shipping, packaging, distributing, and discarding the goods we buy.But the balance of power is about to shift from seller to buyer, as a new generation of technologies informs us of the ecological facts about products at the point of purchase. This “radical transparency” will enable consumers to make smarter purchasing decisions, and will drive companies to rethink and reform their businesses, ushering in, Goleman claims, a new age of competitive advantage.