Today's session will explore some of the things we can make by hand. These are rough instructions, and you will have to improvise. The more you improvise your techniques and materials, the better, actually! These crafty things will make your daily existence have a little more of the wild human flavor.
*How to make a Button Stone Hammock:
Find a nice strong blanket that stretches a little but not too much, and that you can work with without it tearing or unravelling. Try a mexican blanket, something with stripes or another cool pattern, but strong and soft. Find two strong, straight sticks a little longer than the width of the blanket--you will need one for each end of the blanket. Now, find six round stones, not too heavy, that will anchor the blanket to the stick.
Fold the last six inches of the end of the blanket over the strong stick, up and over. Place a small round stone under the two layers of blanket you now have, and tie a strong knot around the knob made by the stone poking through the two layers. Make several of these knobs at each end of the blanket, to anchor the loop of blanket around the stick (leave a little room for "give"). Tie a length strong rope that won't slip or unravel/break, to each end of each stick, and then hang it between two trees.
Now you have a jungle bed. All you have to do now is string a nice tarp over your hammock at an angle to deflect any rain, and possibly string a line from which to hang clothes and lightweight things. If you have tree branches around, you can possibly set little trays there in the crooks to set your stuff on. This is a great way to camp.
How to Make Beaded Curtains:
Make a soupy paste of flour and water. Find a bar of wood the width of the door or window you want to hang it in. Tack or nail a very long piece of string so it is horizontal (easier to work with). Dip strips of newspaper in the soupy paste, and wind them around the string at intervals, forming a row of beads down the length of the string. When it dries, paint the beads, and finish them with shellac or clear wood varnish. Do this for as many times as you want strings with beads for your door/window bar. Then tack the bead strings to the bar, and hang it in your door or window. Be as fantastically creative as you want to be!
How to Paint a Mural on Your Floor:
When you have the freedom to feather your own nest, it can be a real reflection of your wild human self. It can be dreamy, or pagan, or native american, anything at all. Any floor can be covered with fresh plywood boards and painted in phenomenal ways with acrylic or enamels (house paint works fine, as do artist paints which are more expensive but fun to work with), and then be given a coat of polyurethane (which is liquid plastic), which when it seals is easy to clean and very durable. You can do the same thing with old tables and other woodwork.
You may also want to think about mosaic tiles. These are simply flat pieces of glazed clay. A wall, counter top, fountain, table, anything, are beautiful when covered with mosaic tile. You can make inspirational patterns, and even incorporate shards of broken mirror or colored glass or anything else flat and pretty that will complete a picture you create. Also, you can make these kinds of things and sell them for pretty big bucks. I've seen personal friends fight over a table and a drum that had mosaic and each was selling for over $350 dollars (another table was over a $1000), and they all wanted to be the one to score it. My friend who made these had a very long waiting list and did quite well making mosaic tables and hand made drums with tie dyed heads on them. The mosaic tables were dumpster and thrift shop scores that she completely covered with mosaic tiles and finished with glaze.
How to Make an Outdoor Kitchen for Gatherings and Outdoor Living:
When you're camping out or living in the woods, you quickly realize that the kitchen is the center of your "home". The fire is the center of the action, and we Rainbows call that the bliss pit or kitchen hearth. The fire pit should be enclosed by large smooth rocks that won't explode when heated, arranged in a large circle to make a boundary that will hold wood and keep out children and dogs. You will need to string very large tarps over the whole kitchen and bliss pit, because it will likely rain, and you want to be able to have a dry, clean, warm kitchen. If for some reason you cannot have a ground fire, then you will need a big 50 gallon metal can like hillbillies use for burning garbage--shoot or poke some holes in it, and put some wood in it and light it, and there you go. It will get hot, so keep kids away from it. So you need big tarps, strong rope, and tent stakes to stake down the grommets at ground level. Just eyeball it and figure it out. But first set up the kitchen, then cover it with tarps when you see the size and arrangement of it.
Choose a spot fairly close to the fire, and neatly stack it with dead wood, sticks, and kindling. Put it where no one will trip on it. Next, you need to build a clay oven. I don't have the time or space to explain it right now, but there are directions all over the Internet. Ask any Rainbow and they can tell you all about it. Here's a picture of Jerusalem camp's oven, so you can picture what I'm telling you:
Jerusalem Camp Outdoor Rainbow Kitchen (no tarp though)
Jerusalem Camp Oven (rocks and packed mud with stove pipe and door)
All your food should be stored in plastic, glass, or metal containers with tight fitting lids. Empty coffee cans, cookie tins and glass mason jars work well too. You should label them with masking tape and a marker to make searching for stuff easier. You will want a supply tent, like a small zippered pup tent, to hold stuff in so thieves and animals have less access to it. Insects won't bother it as much either that way, unless you have boxes of produce, and then you will see little fruit gnats, but just put out a glass of sugar water with honey around the rim, and that should take care of it. The bugs will go in there and get stuck or drown.
Shelves are easily constructed of deadwood and rope, boards and nails, bricks or cement blocks, or crates, a combination of any or all of these. You will need a wooden cutting board, a knife, a collnader, and some kind of refrigeration for vegetables, like a cooler or a heavy metal trash can that can be immersed in a cold creek (keep the water out of the can though or your veggies will go bad quicker). The best kind of pots and frying pans are either heavy stainless steel or heavy cast iron. You will need a spatula, a ladle, a stirring spoon, and bliss dishes, plates, bowls, mugs, and silverware. You will also want spices and condiments like coffee creamer, ketchup, pancake syrup etc. Stack crates up on your counter top and put a glass of sugar water nearby to catch ants and stuff.
Speaking of dishes, you will need a wash station. An easy sink is a big bowl with a hole in the bottom, elevated on a rack system of deadwood and ropes or built of planks and nailed together. The hole is for draining the water. Use plastic jugs hung from trees or placed on shelves you build, for your water supply and your hand wash. Label you hand wash with very big dark marker so no one drinks it (hand wash has a capful of bleach in it, to kill nasty stuff before you eat). You can set up a gravity fed wash station, by suspending five gallon buckets, with tubes coming out of them, and even construct a foot release that someone can push down on and have water flow over their hands. For washing dishes, I would suggest having a series of three five gallon buckets in a row, one with hot soapy water (which will have to be heated in a big pan on the fire--takes a couple of hours), one with warm water that has a drop of bleach in it, and one with cold water for rinsing, with a rack at the end to hang dishes on to dry so they don't get dirty on the ground or anything.
Finally, you will want to dig a compost hole, and a shitter. The compost hole needs to be deep and have water in it, to discourage dogs, and have a rope around it so people can lean in and scrape food in but not fall in accidentally. Dogs have gotten their tongues cut off from digging through food garbage, like licking in a can where the lid was not completely removed, so keep dogs out, and remove the lids completely. Most Rainbow kitchens also set up a row of garbage bags with labels, for recycling, one for cans, one for glass, one for paper, etc. with the bags tacked to a railing they build out of deadwood. Then someone on kitchen crew hauls it out at the end of the gathering or when the bags get full.
To build a proper shitter for your sweet little wild human kitchen, take the following into account. The site should not be above or anywhere near a water supply! And it should be far enough away to not bring flies to the kitchen. And it should not be in a patch of poison ivy, or in a snake's den, or any other dangerous place. You will need some big heavy shovels to dig, a coffee can to hold toilet paper and keep it from getting wet, a board for sitting on over the trench hole, a jug of hand wash, a tapestry or two to hang for privacy, a few pieces of cardboard or small flags to mark the trail there (if one can say open/occupied to let people know which is the current condition, that would be good), and a can of lime or fire ashes if you can, to neutralize the stuff in the hole after each use. And when you dig the trench, pile up the dirt real nice, because how it works is that each time someone uses it, they are supposed to sprinkle some dirt over their mess, so the next person won't have to see it, the smell will stay down, the flies won't get to it, and the hole will fill up faster so it is not too full of human waste.
So, you dig a trench at least three feet deep, five feet or even more if you can (depends how rocky or clay the ground is), and one foot wide, and about four feet or more long, depending on how big the gathering is. If it's just you and a friend or two, it can be three feet deep, one foot wide, and three feet long. If the trench is on a slanted area, make sure you dig the trench pointing up and down rather than sideways, or you will squat over it with all your weight on one leg. Put it in a pretty, wooded spot. Hang a dreamcatcher, a small mirror, and maybe a prayer or a quote on the tree, to inspire people to stay in the Rainbow vibe even when they are shitting!
How to Make Instant Canned Heat:
Cut a strip of cardboard one inch wide and about a yard long, and roll it into a tight spiral. Place it in an empty can, a small one like a tuna can. Pour melted parafin over it and let it set. It will burn for a long time.
How to Make Instant Campfire Kindling:
Tear newspaper into strips 3 inches wide. Roll it up tightly into little logs an inch in diameter. Secure with string. Dip in melted paraffin and allow to dry. Store them in a plastic ziplock baggie, with matches or a lighter, to keep them waterproof until you use them. Two will kindle a fire just fine. Make a bunch, just in case.
How to Form a Free Store: Find a place that can be allocated for all the things people aren't using and don't want around, or are ready to pass around or gift others with. Saturday and Sunday afternoons are great for gathering stuff from yard sales that are shutting down, because whatever people don't sell they often want hauled off to the thrift shop. So you can stock up by hitting up those folks. At this Free Store you stock up and offer to people, a person can look through everything to find whatever he or she needs, and share what he or she wants to share. It works great. People never get tired of it. The more they take the better, because it opens the space to bring in more, new stuff. It's surprising how Spirit opens the floodgates to bless ventures like that.
Someone will have to keep the store in order every now and then. Also, put up signs asking the patrons to straighten stuff while they are there, and tell them to not just drop stuff on the floor and leave it there, to take care of one another and keep the blessings flowing. Someone will need to build the shelves and bins. Someone may have to take stuff no one wants to the dump every now and then. It's a shame how some people kick down their worst shit rather than their best, thinking poor people will appreciate it? or just getting rid of it thoughtlessly? I don't know, but it does happen, and after awhile it just takes up space so someone has to get rid of it. The Free Store spot (which can just be a spot behind a store or under someon'e awning or something, small and tight and open) is also a good place for a community bulletin board, to post ride shares and announcements and business cards and stuff.
How to Form a Food Co-Op:
If your tribe buys food and other sundries separately like most people, then a co-op helps to avoid redundancy in trips to town and higher individual expenses. This is good if a bunch of you live far from town, and gas prices are so high and stuff. Simply have each tribe "member" contribute to a gas fund for the person who makes the run to town, and also contribute about two hours a week for driving, shopping, measuring bulk quantities into individual orders, bookkeeping etc). The co-op takes orders for food and other things from its "members", then buys in quantity certain items, which saves money, then delivers them, which saves time and gas money. Your co-op can buy tis food from a big co-op, like the French Broad Food Co-Op in Asheville, which you pay to be a member of in exchange for a good discount, but the public can shop there too.
How to Make a Huge Quantity of Whole Grain Bread:
This technique can empower you to make hundreds of loaves of bread a day at a minimum of expense, so you can feed street people, Rainbows, do a Food Not Bombs table, or whatever. Every slice is to be given away for FREE, although you can put out a donation jar or magic hat for people who do have green energy to share. This is what you will need:
1. a very large oven or two ovens or even more...
2. clean new plasic trash cans for mixing and storing flour (short and squat ones are best)
3. a large flat surface for kneading
4. coffee cans to bake bread in
5. a sink to wash utensils in
6. flour--consider going to "damaged freight" companies, discount grocery stores, etc, and buy broken 100 pound bags. there are a lot if you can find them. otherwise limit it to what you can afford.
7. yeast, salt, and oil. (find your favorite bread recipe)
Step One: The night before baking: mix dry ingredients in the trash cans. Foam up the yeast i warm milk or sugar water. Add yeast to the flour and enough water to make a soft dough. Knead, cover and leave in a warm place overnight.
Step Two: The next morning: wash dry and grease the coffee cans. Knead dough. Fill coffee cans half full of dough. Let it rise until the cans are full. Bake, cool, remove the loaves from the cans, and slice.
How to Make an Outdoor Steam Bath aka Hippie Sauna:
You will need to find some thin sapplings to make a dome of curves poles you will lash together at the top. You will cut down the saplings (about as big around as your finger), pretty long maybe twelve feet. You will arrange them so you dig a deep little hole and put in one end, then arch it over its full length and put it down in a deep little hole you dig on the other side. Then a little ways away, do it again with another sapling. At the center of the circle that is forming, you will use twine to tie them together strongly there. When you have a circle of curved poles put down into holes and tied together, you will cover the structure with tarps and blankets, leaving a door space that opens and closes easily with a big flap of fabric. You will cover the floor with grasses, and dig a fire pit in the center of the circle. The fire pit will NOT hold a fire though. It will hold hot stones over which you will pour water, thus filling the structure with steam which will bring out a ton of sweat and impurities. When it gets too hot, you will open the flap to let in fresh air. When it is very hot, people will lay down on the grass, close to the ground where it is cooler. They may need to vomit, so have a bucket or two handy. A hippie sweat brings out toxins and you feel so much better afterwards.
Outside, build a bonfire with rocks that have not come from a stream bed as they will explode when they are heated up, scattering sharp shards of rock everywhere. Stack up the rocks between the burning sticks and logs of your fire, to heat them up. The fire should burn for an hour or more to heat the rocks thoroughly. Build the fire away from the structure, but not too far, as you will need to use a strong pitchfork or shovel to lift the rocks out of the fire and move them into the fire pit inside. Avoid carrying any cinders of burning wood into the fire pit inside, because cinders create smoke that chokes, rather than steam that cleanses.
The bathers should take off all of their clothes and jewelry. They may want to have a sister sweat with women only, and a brother sweat with men only, because nudity often arouses sexual feelings, and that can be uncomfortable or make people feel anxious or modest. When all the bathers are inside the structure and the door is shut, sprinkle some herbs like sage, cedar and sweetgrass over the rocks and pour water on the hot rocks. Mint or yerba buena leaves are also nice for providing a good fragrance, to cover the body smells of the bathers. You will smell all kinds of things, including deodorant, perfume, garlic, all kinds of stuff, so nice smelling herbs are nice for that.
When the bathers have had enough steam (20 minutes is usually more than enough), they exit the structure and run for a dip in a swimming hole or a bath of ice cold water in a lake, pond, stream, or shower inside. Then the people standing around who have been cooking and talking, serve up a little feast to celebrate everyone's cleansing.
This is not a Native American sweat lodge, but sometimes people will have visions and revelations, for some reason. Honor and empower them in that, uplift and support them.
In tribal solidarity,
Manitou Magwa
NEXT WEEK, I WILL TELL YOU ALL ABOUT HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN WILD HUMAN CLOTHES, INCLUDING SARIS, MOCASSINS, SANDALS, HEAD BANDS, HOW TO DYE FABRIC, HOW TO SEW BY HAND. ALSO, HOW TO CARVE WOODEN DISHES AND UTENSILS, HOW TO MAKE CLAY POTS AND CERAMIC PIECES AND BUILD YOUR OWN LITTLE KILN. ALSO, HOW TO MAKE ALL KINDS OF CANDLES, AND JEWELRY BY MAKING THE BEADS FROM SCRATCH, HOW TO MAKE HIPPIE ART LIKE WINDOW FLOWERS AND GOD'S EYES AND SPLATTER PRINTS AND DREAM CATCHERS.
THE WEEK AFTER THAT, I WILL TELL YOU HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN FURNITURE AND BUILD A TINY, WONDERFUL LITTLE STRUCTURE FOR YOURSELF, HOW TO MAKE A BACKPACK, HOW TO MAKE A BABY CARRIER AND CHILD TOYS, HOW TO MAKE RATTLES, FLUTES, DRUMS, AND WINDCHIMES
AFTER THAT I WILL DISCUSS NAKED GARDENING, MANTRAS AND MEDITATION, HOW TO GIVE A GOOD MASSAGE AND MAKING LOVE TANTRA STYLE. ALSO NATURAL HOMEBIRTH, AS THESE THINGS LEAD TO THAT.
FINALLY I WILL COVER HARVESTING THE GARDEN, CANNING, PRESERVING, HOW TO SMOKE FISH, HOW TO MAKE SOUPS, HOW TO MAKE JERKY, BAKING BREAD AND ALL KINDS OF OTHER STUFF. , MAKING MEAD AND WINE, GROWING THE SACRED HERB AT HOME, AND FAVORITE WILD HUMAN RECIPES FOR FOOD AND MEDICINE AND FIRST AID. AND MUCH MORE!
*How to make a Button Stone Hammock:
Find a nice strong blanket that stretches a little but not too much, and that you can work with without it tearing or unravelling. Try a mexican blanket, something with stripes or another cool pattern, but strong and soft. Find two strong, straight sticks a little longer than the width of the blanket--you will need one for each end of the blanket. Now, find six round stones, not too heavy, that will anchor the blanket to the stick.
Fold the last six inches of the end of the blanket over the strong stick, up and over. Place a small round stone under the two layers of blanket you now have, and tie a strong knot around the knob made by the stone poking through the two layers. Make several of these knobs at each end of the blanket, to anchor the loop of blanket around the stick (leave a little room for "give"). Tie a length strong rope that won't slip or unravel/break, to each end of each stick, and then hang it between two trees.
Now you have a jungle bed. All you have to do now is string a nice tarp over your hammock at an angle to deflect any rain, and possibly string a line from which to hang clothes and lightweight things. If you have tree branches around, you can possibly set little trays there in the crooks to set your stuff on. This is a great way to camp.
How to Make Beaded Curtains:
Make a soupy paste of flour and water. Find a bar of wood the width of the door or window you want to hang it in. Tack or nail a very long piece of string so it is horizontal (easier to work with). Dip strips of newspaper in the soupy paste, and wind them around the string at intervals, forming a row of beads down the length of the string. When it dries, paint the beads, and finish them with shellac or clear wood varnish. Do this for as many times as you want strings with beads for your door/window bar. Then tack the bead strings to the bar, and hang it in your door or window. Be as fantastically creative as you want to be!
How to Paint a Mural on Your Floor:
When you have the freedom to feather your own nest, it can be a real reflection of your wild human self. It can be dreamy, or pagan, or native american, anything at all. Any floor can be covered with fresh plywood boards and painted in phenomenal ways with acrylic or enamels (house paint works fine, as do artist paints which are more expensive but fun to work with), and then be given a coat of polyurethane (which is liquid plastic), which when it seals is easy to clean and very durable. You can do the same thing with old tables and other woodwork.
You may also want to think about mosaic tiles. These are simply flat pieces of glazed clay. A wall, counter top, fountain, table, anything, are beautiful when covered with mosaic tile. You can make inspirational patterns, and even incorporate shards of broken mirror or colored glass or anything else flat and pretty that will complete a picture you create. Also, you can make these kinds of things and sell them for pretty big bucks. I've seen personal friends fight over a table and a drum that had mosaic and each was selling for over $350 dollars (another table was over a $1000), and they all wanted to be the one to score it. My friend who made these had a very long waiting list and did quite well making mosaic tables and hand made drums with tie dyed heads on them. The mosaic tables were dumpster and thrift shop scores that she completely covered with mosaic tiles and finished with glaze.
How to Make an Outdoor Kitchen for Gatherings and Outdoor Living:
When you're camping out or living in the woods, you quickly realize that the kitchen is the center of your "home". The fire is the center of the action, and we Rainbows call that the bliss pit or kitchen hearth. The fire pit should be enclosed by large smooth rocks that won't explode when heated, arranged in a large circle to make a boundary that will hold wood and keep out children and dogs. You will need to string very large tarps over the whole kitchen and bliss pit, because it will likely rain, and you want to be able to have a dry, clean, warm kitchen. If for some reason you cannot have a ground fire, then you will need a big 50 gallon metal can like hillbillies use for burning garbage--shoot or poke some holes in it, and put some wood in it and light it, and there you go. It will get hot, so keep kids away from it. So you need big tarps, strong rope, and tent stakes to stake down the grommets at ground level. Just eyeball it and figure it out. But first set up the kitchen, then cover it with tarps when you see the size and arrangement of it.
Choose a spot fairly close to the fire, and neatly stack it with dead wood, sticks, and kindling. Put it where no one will trip on it. Next, you need to build a clay oven. I don't have the time or space to explain it right now, but there are directions all over the Internet. Ask any Rainbow and they can tell you all about it. Here's a picture of Jerusalem camp's oven, so you can picture what I'm telling you:
Jerusalem Camp Outdoor Rainbow Kitchen (no tarp though)
Jerusalem Camp Oven (rocks and packed mud with stove pipe and door)
All your food should be stored in plastic, glass, or metal containers with tight fitting lids. Empty coffee cans, cookie tins and glass mason jars work well too. You should label them with masking tape and a marker to make searching for stuff easier. You will want a supply tent, like a small zippered pup tent, to hold stuff in so thieves and animals have less access to it. Insects won't bother it as much either that way, unless you have boxes of produce, and then you will see little fruit gnats, but just put out a glass of sugar water with honey around the rim, and that should take care of it. The bugs will go in there and get stuck or drown.
Shelves are easily constructed of deadwood and rope, boards and nails, bricks or cement blocks, or crates, a combination of any or all of these. You will need a wooden cutting board, a knife, a collnader, and some kind of refrigeration for vegetables, like a cooler or a heavy metal trash can that can be immersed in a cold creek (keep the water out of the can though or your veggies will go bad quicker). The best kind of pots and frying pans are either heavy stainless steel or heavy cast iron. You will need a spatula, a ladle, a stirring spoon, and bliss dishes, plates, bowls, mugs, and silverware. You will also want spices and condiments like coffee creamer, ketchup, pancake syrup etc. Stack crates up on your counter top and put a glass of sugar water nearby to catch ants and stuff.
Speaking of dishes, you will need a wash station. An easy sink is a big bowl with a hole in the bottom, elevated on a rack system of deadwood and ropes or built of planks and nailed together. The hole is for draining the water. Use plastic jugs hung from trees or placed on shelves you build, for your water supply and your hand wash. Label you hand wash with very big dark marker so no one drinks it (hand wash has a capful of bleach in it, to kill nasty stuff before you eat). You can set up a gravity fed wash station, by suspending five gallon buckets, with tubes coming out of them, and even construct a foot release that someone can push down on and have water flow over their hands. For washing dishes, I would suggest having a series of three five gallon buckets in a row, one with hot soapy water (which will have to be heated in a big pan on the fire--takes a couple of hours), one with warm water that has a drop of bleach in it, and one with cold water for rinsing, with a rack at the end to hang dishes on to dry so they don't get dirty on the ground or anything.
Finally, you will want to dig a compost hole, and a shitter. The compost hole needs to be deep and have water in it, to discourage dogs, and have a rope around it so people can lean in and scrape food in but not fall in accidentally. Dogs have gotten their tongues cut off from digging through food garbage, like licking in a can where the lid was not completely removed, so keep dogs out, and remove the lids completely. Most Rainbow kitchens also set up a row of garbage bags with labels, for recycling, one for cans, one for glass, one for paper, etc. with the bags tacked to a railing they build out of deadwood. Then someone on kitchen crew hauls it out at the end of the gathering or when the bags get full.
To build a proper shitter for your sweet little wild human kitchen, take the following into account. The site should not be above or anywhere near a water supply! And it should be far enough away to not bring flies to the kitchen. And it should not be in a patch of poison ivy, or in a snake's den, or any other dangerous place. You will need some big heavy shovels to dig, a coffee can to hold toilet paper and keep it from getting wet, a board for sitting on over the trench hole, a jug of hand wash, a tapestry or two to hang for privacy, a few pieces of cardboard or small flags to mark the trail there (if one can say open/occupied to let people know which is the current condition, that would be good), and a can of lime or fire ashes if you can, to neutralize the stuff in the hole after each use. And when you dig the trench, pile up the dirt real nice, because how it works is that each time someone uses it, they are supposed to sprinkle some dirt over their mess, so the next person won't have to see it, the smell will stay down, the flies won't get to it, and the hole will fill up faster so it is not too full of human waste.
So, you dig a trench at least three feet deep, five feet or even more if you can (depends how rocky or clay the ground is), and one foot wide, and about four feet or more long, depending on how big the gathering is. If it's just you and a friend or two, it can be three feet deep, one foot wide, and three feet long. If the trench is on a slanted area, make sure you dig the trench pointing up and down rather than sideways, or you will squat over it with all your weight on one leg. Put it in a pretty, wooded spot. Hang a dreamcatcher, a small mirror, and maybe a prayer or a quote on the tree, to inspire people to stay in the Rainbow vibe even when they are shitting!
How to Make Instant Canned Heat:
Cut a strip of cardboard one inch wide and about a yard long, and roll it into a tight spiral. Place it in an empty can, a small one like a tuna can. Pour melted parafin over it and let it set. It will burn for a long time.
How to Make Instant Campfire Kindling:
Tear newspaper into strips 3 inches wide. Roll it up tightly into little logs an inch in diameter. Secure with string. Dip in melted paraffin and allow to dry. Store them in a plastic ziplock baggie, with matches or a lighter, to keep them waterproof until you use them. Two will kindle a fire just fine. Make a bunch, just in case.
How to Form a Free Store: Find a place that can be allocated for all the things people aren't using and don't want around, or are ready to pass around or gift others with. Saturday and Sunday afternoons are great for gathering stuff from yard sales that are shutting down, because whatever people don't sell they often want hauled off to the thrift shop. So you can stock up by hitting up those folks. At this Free Store you stock up and offer to people, a person can look through everything to find whatever he or she needs, and share what he or she wants to share. It works great. People never get tired of it. The more they take the better, because it opens the space to bring in more, new stuff. It's surprising how Spirit opens the floodgates to bless ventures like that.
Someone will have to keep the store in order every now and then. Also, put up signs asking the patrons to straighten stuff while they are there, and tell them to not just drop stuff on the floor and leave it there, to take care of one another and keep the blessings flowing. Someone will need to build the shelves and bins. Someone may have to take stuff no one wants to the dump every now and then. It's a shame how some people kick down their worst shit rather than their best, thinking poor people will appreciate it? or just getting rid of it thoughtlessly? I don't know, but it does happen, and after awhile it just takes up space so someone has to get rid of it. The Free Store spot (which can just be a spot behind a store or under someon'e awning or something, small and tight and open) is also a good place for a community bulletin board, to post ride shares and announcements and business cards and stuff.
How to Form a Food Co-Op:
If your tribe buys food and other sundries separately like most people, then a co-op helps to avoid redundancy in trips to town and higher individual expenses. This is good if a bunch of you live far from town, and gas prices are so high and stuff. Simply have each tribe "member" contribute to a gas fund for the person who makes the run to town, and also contribute about two hours a week for driving, shopping, measuring bulk quantities into individual orders, bookkeeping etc). The co-op takes orders for food and other things from its "members", then buys in quantity certain items, which saves money, then delivers them, which saves time and gas money. Your co-op can buy tis food from a big co-op, like the French Broad Food Co-Op in Asheville, which you pay to be a member of in exchange for a good discount, but the public can shop there too.
How to Make a Huge Quantity of Whole Grain Bread:
This technique can empower you to make hundreds of loaves of bread a day at a minimum of expense, so you can feed street people, Rainbows, do a Food Not Bombs table, or whatever. Every slice is to be given away for FREE, although you can put out a donation jar or magic hat for people who do have green energy to share. This is what you will need:
1. a very large oven or two ovens or even more...
2. clean new plasic trash cans for mixing and storing flour (short and squat ones are best)
3. a large flat surface for kneading
4. coffee cans to bake bread in
5. a sink to wash utensils in
6. flour--consider going to "damaged freight" companies, discount grocery stores, etc, and buy broken 100 pound bags. there are a lot if you can find them. otherwise limit it to what you can afford.
7. yeast, salt, and oil. (find your favorite bread recipe)
Step One: The night before baking: mix dry ingredients in the trash cans. Foam up the yeast i warm milk or sugar water. Add yeast to the flour and enough water to make a soft dough. Knead, cover and leave in a warm place overnight.
Step Two: The next morning: wash dry and grease the coffee cans. Knead dough. Fill coffee cans half full of dough. Let it rise until the cans are full. Bake, cool, remove the loaves from the cans, and slice.
How to Make an Outdoor Steam Bath aka Hippie Sauna:
You will need to find some thin sapplings to make a dome of curves poles you will lash together at the top. You will cut down the saplings (about as big around as your finger), pretty long maybe twelve feet. You will arrange them so you dig a deep little hole and put in one end, then arch it over its full length and put it down in a deep little hole you dig on the other side. Then a little ways away, do it again with another sapling. At the center of the circle that is forming, you will use twine to tie them together strongly there. When you have a circle of curved poles put down into holes and tied together, you will cover the structure with tarps and blankets, leaving a door space that opens and closes easily with a big flap of fabric. You will cover the floor with grasses, and dig a fire pit in the center of the circle. The fire pit will NOT hold a fire though. It will hold hot stones over which you will pour water, thus filling the structure with steam which will bring out a ton of sweat and impurities. When it gets too hot, you will open the flap to let in fresh air. When it is very hot, people will lay down on the grass, close to the ground where it is cooler. They may need to vomit, so have a bucket or two handy. A hippie sweat brings out toxins and you feel so much better afterwards.
Outside, build a bonfire with rocks that have not come from a stream bed as they will explode when they are heated up, scattering sharp shards of rock everywhere. Stack up the rocks between the burning sticks and logs of your fire, to heat them up. The fire should burn for an hour or more to heat the rocks thoroughly. Build the fire away from the structure, but not too far, as you will need to use a strong pitchfork or shovel to lift the rocks out of the fire and move them into the fire pit inside. Avoid carrying any cinders of burning wood into the fire pit inside, because cinders create smoke that chokes, rather than steam that cleanses.
The bathers should take off all of their clothes and jewelry. They may want to have a sister sweat with women only, and a brother sweat with men only, because nudity often arouses sexual feelings, and that can be uncomfortable or make people feel anxious or modest. When all the bathers are inside the structure and the door is shut, sprinkle some herbs like sage, cedar and sweetgrass over the rocks and pour water on the hot rocks. Mint or yerba buena leaves are also nice for providing a good fragrance, to cover the body smells of the bathers. You will smell all kinds of things, including deodorant, perfume, garlic, all kinds of stuff, so nice smelling herbs are nice for that.
When the bathers have had enough steam (20 minutes is usually more than enough), they exit the structure and run for a dip in a swimming hole or a bath of ice cold water in a lake, pond, stream, or shower inside. Then the people standing around who have been cooking and talking, serve up a little feast to celebrate everyone's cleansing.
This is not a Native American sweat lodge, but sometimes people will have visions and revelations, for some reason. Honor and empower them in that, uplift and support them.
In tribal solidarity,
Manitou Magwa
NEXT WEEK, I WILL TELL YOU ALL ABOUT HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN WILD HUMAN CLOTHES, INCLUDING SARIS, MOCASSINS, SANDALS, HEAD BANDS, HOW TO DYE FABRIC, HOW TO SEW BY HAND. ALSO, HOW TO CARVE WOODEN DISHES AND UTENSILS, HOW TO MAKE CLAY POTS AND CERAMIC PIECES AND BUILD YOUR OWN LITTLE KILN. ALSO, HOW TO MAKE ALL KINDS OF CANDLES, AND JEWELRY BY MAKING THE BEADS FROM SCRATCH, HOW TO MAKE HIPPIE ART LIKE WINDOW FLOWERS AND GOD'S EYES AND SPLATTER PRINTS AND DREAM CATCHERS.
THE WEEK AFTER THAT, I WILL TELL YOU HOW TO MAKE YOUR OWN FURNITURE AND BUILD A TINY, WONDERFUL LITTLE STRUCTURE FOR YOURSELF, HOW TO MAKE A BACKPACK, HOW TO MAKE A BABY CARRIER AND CHILD TOYS, HOW TO MAKE RATTLES, FLUTES, DRUMS, AND WINDCHIMES
AFTER THAT I WILL DISCUSS NAKED GARDENING, MANTRAS AND MEDITATION, HOW TO GIVE A GOOD MASSAGE AND MAKING LOVE TANTRA STYLE. ALSO NATURAL HOMEBIRTH, AS THESE THINGS LEAD TO THAT.
FINALLY I WILL COVER HARVESTING THE GARDEN, CANNING, PRESERVING, HOW TO SMOKE FISH, HOW TO MAKE SOUPS, HOW TO MAKE JERKY, BAKING BREAD AND ALL KINDS OF OTHER STUFF. , MAKING MEAD AND WINE, GROWING THE SACRED HERB AT HOME, AND FAVORITE WILD HUMAN RECIPES FOR FOOD AND MEDICINE AND FIRST AID. AND MUCH MORE!
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North Carolina
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