Try fixing it first

We have made a commitment that whenever something at our house breaks, wears out or otherwise stops working, we will try to fix it before considering throwing it away and/or replacing it.

It's a commitment I suspect most parts of the world - and most previous generations in our part of the world - would be astounded to know even needed articulating.

To aid in our endeavours, we have established the 'fixing box'. It lives in a high place in our living area (it's got enough brokenness in it already without putting it where Small Boy can reach!). Mostly when toys get broken I am too busy with other things to be able to immediately repair them, so they go into the fixing box to wait for a fixing session.

Results of two Fixing Box sessions (above and below)

 

(As a parenting tip: the fixing box also works a treat for things broken beyond repair that threaten floods of tears if they head towards the bin: into the fixing box with 'we'll have a look later to see if we can fix it' followed by a good few weeks hidden in the box usually means they get completely forgotten and can be disposed of without fuss at a later date).

Tyson's (tiny) shed is also something of a 'fixing box'. Although some may interpret that as 'unruly pile of rubbish' I am confident that fixed things do eventually emerge from there.

 

Eva at Sydney Airport, aged two

And if it really can't be fixed (like this much loved bag) we salvage what we can for future projects.

I'm particularly proud of this ugg-boot re-soling using fabric from old jeans

Fixing most things does not require fancy tools or equipment. I have a sewing machine. Tyson has no workshop and his tool kit is pretty basic. For a work bench he clamps a hunk of recycled timber beam to the ladder, and works in the back courtyard.

When special tools are required (very occasionally) he borrows from his dad, who has a much more extensive collection. If this is not an option for you (because you don't know his dad... or don't have a handy friend or family member with lots of tools) there may be a tool library near you. Or just put the word out to your networks that you need something - its amazing what people have lying around.

Fixing also rarely requires special knowledge or skills, although it sometimes requires a bit of confidence to give something a try. For example, yesterday Tyson transformed three derelict kitchen chairs from this:

to this:

 

The only 'special tool' was a staple gun - very easy to use. These chairs were verge pick-ups originally and were about to head that way again.

Eva helped with sanding back so the paintwork could be resprayed. I said encouraging things and took photographs. Small Boy supervised.

Fixing furniture may seem daunting but it is often not that difficult - and so rewarding! I once re-strapped an armchair with only a hammer, tacks and strips of old jeans, and it lived for many more years.

Initial Time: This varies from a couple of minutes to glue a piece of toy back on or sew a quick button to projects requiring research, part-shopping and considerable work. Tyson is more likely to do those ones than me. But to be fair, he gets a great deal more pleasure out of figuring out & implementing cunning make-do fixes than I do. There's a lot of the Ken John in him (his grandfather). The chairs above took about 1.5 hours each - a little longer for the two that he re-glued (loose joints).

The fixing box method takes about two hours every three months to have a blitz on accumulated broken things.

Initial Cost: Again, this varies enormously. Most things can be fixed with a bit of thread, tape or glue, which I estimate costs us about $25 a year. 

Some fixes are a huge cost saving - like the car door latch pictured above. Tyson did that for me last Christmas for about $45 (cost to join online Picasso-owners forum, and buy a manual and a just-right tool) and half a day fiddling around, after the Citroen mechanics quoted us $1000+ for the same work.

Others cost more in dollars and/or time than it would take to just buy a new one.

Pedestal fans are a good example of this. You can pick them up for $10-$20, and every year there must be hundreds of them put out on hard-rubbish days because of minor faults. We have three and Tyson is getting quite good at stopping their odd rattles, making them turn (or not, depending on the problem) or getting them started again when they have apparently died. Pedestal fans should be kept out of land fill! They use about 50W of electricity compared with our reverse cycle air-conditioner which uses 2.5kW. That is, our aircon is equivalent to running fifty pedestal fans together.

Ongoing time or cost commitment: As above, ongoing.

Impact: Australian households produce an estimated seven million tonnes of waste per year. Our average rubbish per person is higher than Canada, Germany or the UK (although less than the USA). LivingSmart illustrates this quantity graphically as each Australian family producing the amount of waste it would take to fill a three-bedroom house from floor to ceiling. Compressed. Every year.

It is crucial that we don't put anything into the waste that doesn't need to be there. Fixing everything we can is a big step towards that.

It also gives much joy. Here that pesky pram handle finally comes good.

And as a household norm, it helps to set our children's default to 'fix' rather than 'bin'.

PS: I just want to clarify that the reason I am not in any of the photos is not because I don't do any fixing; its because I take all the photos. Except when Eva takes them, when focus can be a bit optional. Here's one of Eva's to prove I do fix some things myself:

Links:

Tool libraries in Brunswick VIC and Angle Park SA

Wikipedia article on tool libraries including links to tool libraries all over the world

Or find your local men's shed and take your project there to use their tools. (If you're a bloke, presumably. I understand that men's sheds are an important men's mental health initiative, but... I would like to have somewhere I could take my project too! I guess I could try the Australian Sewing Guild but I would prefer to wrestle the staple-gun away from Tyson and have a go at upholstery)

Australian Bureau of Statistics data on waste

LivingSmart data on waste

Living Smart Queensland offers a free online course to help you reduce your household footprint - tips, calculators, information, suggestions... its good stuff.

Books - Borrowing and Recycling

I think its time I stopped trying to assign actions to specific months! We remain committed to monthly actions but in reality we take things on as we think of them and sometimes that means four in a week and other times nothing for several months, or just recognising after a long time that an established practice is in fact a sustainable practice but we hadn't thought about it that way. And I blog infrequently, in sudden rushes like today.

We have been public library members and users for years, and signed Eva up when she was tiny. I have been a long-time collector of picture books, and at least half of those I purchase are from second hand book shops, most commonly the shop selling discards from the State Library of Western Australia which sells children's books for $1 each. Some of these are torn or drawn in, although very rarely in a way that reduces the enjoyment of the book, but most are simply surplus to the library system's requirements.

Initial Time: Joining the public library took about ten minutes, and for Eva was even easier, as a rep from the library visited our mothers' group.

Initial Cost: Zero. 

Ongoing time or cost commitment: Public library membership is free. A library trip takes about half an hour. About once a year there are a few extra minutes to renew our membership records. I can lose an hour easily in the discard bookshop, especially at sale time when extra piles of books are brought out. I rarely make a special trip but I seem to find myself there anyway (mostly because I do research work that takes me to the Battye library, in the same building).

Impact: We borrow about 200 books in a year, mostly picture books for Eva. If we were to purchase these books it would take about 40kg of paper, as they are mostly board books. Once she graduates to soft paper books this could reduce to only 20kg of paper per year to keep her supplied in paperback picture books, or rise closer to 70kg for a year's supply of hard-cover picture books. (I've just weighed piles of books and was very surprised to find hard cover paperbacks weighing so much more than board books!). I don't know how to calculate the quantity of ink used to print these beautiful books but at a guess they substantially do not use natural dyes!


I admit to some discomfort about not purchasing books new. I value the high quality of children's literature produced in Australia (and elsewhere) and I recognise that borrowing or buying second hand makes it harder for the industry to survive. This is one of the ways I justify to myself that I do also purchase new books. Since Eva got into books, nearly every book I have purchased for her has first had several runs from the library until we are sure it really is a winner. I also try to support actual bookshops, especially independent stores (including Oxford Street Books , Lane Bookshop and St Johns Books Fremantle), rather than purchase online, as I value the atmosphere of a real book store and its contribution to a neighbourhood. There is no bookstore in our neighbourhood at all and this seems a terrible loss to me.