Hello, dear readers.  Natural burial is a subject that has been on my mind for years, and I have been pondering how best to introduce the theme on The Tangled Nest, so I was thrilled to meet “death midwife” Nora Cedarwind Young at a recent speaking engagement, and even more thrilled when she agreed to write this guest post.  There’s something for everyone here:  personal philosophy, care for the earth, and even a DIY coffin plan.  I hope you’ll share this post with your friends and dear ones as a way of inviting discussion on this essential theme–finding our way gracefully through the turning of life.  Here’s Nora…

Greetings friends! Recently I had the pleasure to meet Lyanda when she was the keynote speaker for People’s Memorial Association. I have been a fan of hers, so imagine how deeply touched  I was she asked me to be a guest author for The Tangled Nest!  I am Nora Cedarwind Young ~ Death Midwife, Green Burial Educator, Hospice Chaplain and Ceremonialist. I live and work on the Olympic Peninsula, teach nationwide and assist families remotely; but I am especially devoted to the area in which I live, Western Washington. I create and facilitate ceremonies for all of life’s passages, from birth through the grave; however, my heart truly lies in end-of-life work. My belief system, deeply grounded in the seasons and cycles of nature, has taught me that death is as certain and sacred as birth. I envision individuals and families fearlessly facing death, feeling free to extend this “time out of time” with a loved one, and knowing who to call for support. I believe in educating families that at-home-after-death-care is their legal right, and I help empower individuals and families to make educated choices around their final act–especially how small choices can create amazing change when it comes to greening our final act in this world. My dictum is “proudly reclaiming family directed choice at end-of-life.”

Procession to burial at White Eagle Memorial Preserve in Goldendale, WA

Today, the United Kingdom and Australia together host over 200 natural burial locations; in the US we have sadly, only twenty. Even more shocking is the reality that every year in the United States 22,500 cemeteries bury:

• 827,060 gallons of embalming fluid (including formaldehyde)

• 104,272 tons of steel for caskets & vaults (enough to build another Golden Gate Bridge!)

• 2,700 tons of copper and bronze for more caskets

• 30 plus million board feet of hardwoods

• 1,636,000 tons of concrete

(Statistics compiled by Mary Woodsen, VP Pre-Posthumous Society of Ithaca, New York, and a science writer at Cornell University).

Natural grave at White Eagle Preserve

More than ever it is time for each of us on the planet to awaken our mortality and our deepest nature. We can live with heightened awareness of how we affect others and the interconnectedness of all. As we embrace the idea that we are the stewards of this beautiful earth, we welcome “womb to womb” awareness.   May we have the wisdom to return from the toxic environment

Burial with shroud at White Eagle

of institutions, consumerism and sterile buildings to the safety and sacred space of home.

Until the modern era, our formaldehyde-free bodies were laid in the ground, serving as nutrition to the earth. Embalming is often unnecessary and not required in any state under most circumstances. Metal or hardwood caskets and steel reinforced concrete grave liners are options people can choose to go without. Ask yourself; is it necessary to place your casket into a concrete and steel reinforced lined grave, simply for easy maintenance of the cemetery grounds?

We are learning it does not have to be all or nothing, simple changes will create great change. For a Natural Burial you can choose all or any part of the following:

• A clean, unembalmed body

• A biodegradable container such as a plain pine box or natural fiber shroud. You can go to my website and find directions of how to build your own wooden casket that serves as bookshelves until you are ready to repurpose it to be a casket!

• A vault free grave

Some natural graveyard providers have restrictions such as no synthetic materials, jewelry or buttons. Some allow headstones; others reveal no trace that a burial site exists. Global positioning satellites can allow us to have marker free graves, while precisely locating and visiting our loved ones. Even if you are buried in a conventional cemetery and choose any part of natural burial, you lessen the ecological footprint for the planet.  You can:  avoid synthetic and non-natural materials in your container and clothing;  choose biodegradable or recycled materials, wicker, sea grass and woods like pine for caskets; choose non-virgin, organic materials and sustainable production, supporting local family business, handcrafting, and artisans; support burial goods with organic, fair trade, and eco-certifications; talk to your local cemetery provider–tell them you want Green and Natural Burial options.

In Washington State, we are fortunate to have two options for Green Burial. Other community resources are considering this change, so you need to let your local providers know you want Green Burial available in your community.  Moles Funeral Home in Ferndale has dedicated four acres for Natural Burial called The Meadow,  and White Eagle Preserve in Goldendale is a perfect model for Conservation Burial.

About Biodegradable Coffins

Biodegradable coffins, also known as green caskets, come in a multitude of styles and materials. They were designed to satisfy the growing number of individuals who prefer to have a “natural burial” instead of a traditional funeral. Cremation was long thought to be an eco-friendly option, but many people have been raising concerns about its excessive use of fossil fuels.

Biodegradable caskets can be made to bury someone in the ground or at sea. They will not harm the environment and budget-wise, they are a very cost-efficient burial option. These coffins do not use a vault — cement or otherwise — and everything, including the hardware and lining, is completely natural.

Biodegradable coffins can be made from:

• Cardboard
• Biodegradable plastic
• Fair-trade-certified bamboo
• Wood
• Recycled paper
• Formaldehyde-free plywood
• Hand-woven willow or wicker

You can always consider building your own casket, or a plain pine box–have a look at these simple plans from Last Things.  You can even build a coffin that doubles as a bookshelf or an entertainment center until you are ready to repurpose it! My website has several resources and pictures for you to consider.

Simple pine casket, from Last Things

Thank you for taking into account some of the simple choices you can make that will add up to great change. When I imagine eight Olympic-sized swimming pools full of embalming fluid being buried every year in this nation it inspires me to be a change maker; I hope it will inspire you also! Join me in committing to change and to the stewardship of our planet. Join with me and choose to green your final act! All or some, the choice is yours!  Together, we are creating change we can live with! Blessed Be!

From Lyanda: Thank you, Nora, for your wise words! And thanks to the good folks at White Eagle Preserve for the beautiful photos.

For more information, and links to many many more resources, explore:

–Nora’s lovely Thresholds of Life website, and sign up for her Newsletter

–White Eagle Memorial Preserve website

–People’s Memorial Association

–I also highly recommend the documentary, A Family Undertaking

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses, and to die is different from what anyone supposed, and luckier.
~ Walt Whitman, Song to Myself

"Last View," courtesy of White Eagle

My Parker Sonnet is simple blue lacquer with silver trim, and a fine nib.

Now I do, and I am not exaggerating when I say it is one of my favorite life-changes that I have ever made.  One evening, while making notes for a new chapter, I remarked to Tom across the room,  “I LOVE my fountain pen!  Why aren’t we all using them?”  “Um,” he answered, “Because we’re not all nerds.”  Tom is a cutie-pie, but I have come to believe that using a fountain pen for everyday writing is something that should not just be for pen enthusiasts, or for special occasions, but for all of us, everyday.  Using a refillable pen, with bottled ink, should be normal.  Here’s why:

1.  Fountain pens create far less waste than standard pens. Think of the river of disposable pens that follows all of us through the whole of our lives, and their cardboard/plastic packaging.  And their import packaging and travel.  Refills for pens are also overpackaged tubes of plastic destined for the landfill.  A good pen will last a lifetime, and is elegantly refillable from a recyclable glass bottle of ink.

2.  Ink for fountain pens leaves a glistening flow across the page that is beautiful and inspiring, and it comes in every gorgeous color you can imagine.  Like many, I am partial to Noodler’s Inks, created in the USA by a wonderfully eccentric ink-maker named Nathan. Start with one of Noodler’s many standard colors with the catfish on the bottle, as some of their other formulations are a bit fussy.  My personal color has become Noodler’s Sequoia Green, but I also love their Nightshade, and in my sketching diary I use their standard Brown.  Noodler’s ink comes in 3 ounce bottles that are filled to the brim (I can’t imagine ever getting to the bottom of one) and cost about $12.

I keep this little trio of favorite Noodler's colors in a tray on my desk.

3.  Writing with a fountain pen makes our writing look more beautiful. I find myself adding little flourishes at the ends of words, and sketches in the corners of pages, almost without my willing it.

There is a layer of earthen-moss color to this ink that doesn't come across in the photo. I love it.

4.  You won’t lose your fountain pen. Trust me.

5.  Using and filling a fountain pen is easy.  The first time or two I filled mine, it seemed like a  major undertaking, and my fingers were covered with blobs of green ink.  Now it is nothing–takes seconds, no mess, hardly a thought.  I very much enjoy it, actually–uncapping the pretty, shining ink bottle, a little moment of meditation in the middle of my day.

6.  The flow of ink helps us think. OK, this one is a little woo-woo, and I don’t know exactly how it works, but the smooth flow of ink from a fountain somehow links to my brain, and I find myself writing more, and possibly even better thoughts and words.

7.  It’s fun. Having a fountain pen and ink bottle just makes me happy, bringing more delight and beauty to my everyday life.

A couple thoughts on pen acquisition:

Economics: In this economy, it is difficult to recommend dropping $100 or more on a pen.  You can shop for vintage pens, often at a very good price, comb the drawers of your grandparents for old pens, and just generally keep your eyes out.  That said, it is absolutely true that a nicely priced pen will pay for itself rather early in its lifetime, and spending some time trying the many pens at a shop will insure that you find a pen and nib that fits your unique hand and needs. There are also some “budget” pens that work tolerably well.  Noodler’s makes a serviceable, basic pen with a built-in piston-fill mechanism for under $20; and people swear by their Lamy Safaris, under $35 (designed by a German architect, they are a bit industrial for my tastes, but work great…if you get one, make sure to get the converter also, which will make it refillable–sold seperately, about $5).  These pens do not offer the satisfying heft, or extra-smooth writing experience of a better pen, but they write well enough, can introduce us to the joy of “real” inks, and make a nice scritchy sound on the page, very much like Charlotte Bronte’s quill nib as she penned Villette.

I carry this inexpensive Noodler's pen in my satchel with my diary/sketchbook. I like the fine nib for this purpose. The pen is filled with brown ink, softer than black, and lending a nice old-fashioned look to my scribbles.

Pens as Gifts: A fountain pen makes a wonderful, symbolic gift.  But because pens are so personal–the feel in the hand, the width of the nib, the way a pen writes on a person’s favorite paper–I highly recommend giving a gift card to the pen shop, or a handmade “Outing for Lunch and Trip to the Fine Writing Counter” coupon, so your loved one can choose the pen that best suits her.

Make sure your pen either comes with a converter for refilling with liquid inks, or that one is available for it.  Some cheaper pens will only take disposable cartridges, which to my mind defeats the whole purpose.

Less waste, more joy in daily life, more beauty in the world.  There is very little reason to use a “normal” pen, almost ever.  Let’s switch. Find a pen that feels right, fall in love with an ink color, make it yours.  I hope you’ll join me in this writing revolution, and carry your friends and loved ones along.

Peecyle directly or by peeing into a container you can carry outside and:

–Apply to soil or woodchips

–Add to your compost pile (pee helps leaves and woodchips to compost more quickly)

–DILUTE with 9 PARTS WATER to 1 part pee and pour around (not on) plants (distribute widely to prevent nitrogen burn).

Goodness, I hope my friends will still eat salad at our house after reading this!

For more information on the process and hygiene of peecycling, see Carol Steinfeld’s book, Liquid Gold:  The Lore and Logic of Using Urine to Grow Plants.

No matter what you think about peecycling, it’s time to reconsider our shockingly wasteful water treatment system.  Separating wastes and toilet paper at the source, rather than mixing them directly with clean water, makes good societal and ecological sense. The wonderful folks at Eco-Waters, a Massachusetts-based nonprofit, are exploring ways to incorporate source-separation, graywater use, and composting privies into our everyday lives. Steinfeld’s newest book, Reusing the Resource:  Adventures in Ecological Wastewater Recycling, available through the Eco-Waters website, is enlightening.

Meanwhile, the invitation to awareness offered by Pee-On-Earth day is a great place to start.

At dawn on the Solstice (also the anniversary of my wedding to Tom!), I will be, inshallah, climbing the ruins at Tikal, Guatemala with my family.  I promise I will not pee on the ancient, sacred ruins!  But I will be thinking of you all, and wishing you a beautiful Solstice in the spirit of another favorite William McDonough quote:  “Celebrate Fiercely.”

Claire came home from school today with a backpack full of tinfoil balls. Apparently at lunch all year she has been collecting tinfoil from her classmates’ sandwich wrappings, and making a ball each day. She had ninety two balls of various sizes, which she showed off with pride.
And seeing them reminded me that I wanted to write about a plastic cup.

Three years ago this month, we traveled to the American southwest on a week-long family exploration of Zion, Bryce Canyon, and the Grand Canyon. It was a great week, with lots of wonderful outdoor adventures as we explored those majestic and iconic landscapes.

The week came to a somewhat jarring conclusion in Las Vegas, where because of an early flight, we were staying one night at another icon: the strip’s Stratosphere Hotel. It was super cheap, and Claire and I liked the look of the pool from the website. None of us had ever been to Vegas before.

Sprawling, overbuilt, car-dependent, Las Vegas is almost gleefully unsustainable, with the highest per-capita water use in the country, as well as the highest mortgage foreclosure rates. It’s the poster child for sprawl, indulgence, materialism, and American excess, and it didn’t disappoint. Despite the fact that I took them to see white tigers and bought them dinner at the foot of the Eiffel Tower (and an eclair in a French patisserie, even!), three years later Lyanda and Claire still haven’t quite recovered, and like to exclaim about (Claire) the giant TV screens in baggage claim at the airport, and (Lyanda) the cooling misters on the sidewalk to gently mist Lake Meade water onto the passers-by in the 110-degree desert heat.

Still, we needed a souvenir, so on our departure from the Stratosphere, I took the two disposable plastic cups that had been left in our room (each of them individually wrapped in plastic for us). They’re no different from the plastic cups they gave us on the airplane in both directions, except that they say “Stratosphere” on them, and I kind of liked the idea of a little sin city memento as my bathroom cup back home in our den of organic all-natural earthiness.

To make a long story short, three years later, the cups are still with us. They come out to hold water or juice when we have little children as guests. They do occasional duty in the bathroom. They travel out to the picnic table. They are indestructible.

Not green in any way whatsoever.

There’s no great epiphany here. If you’re here reading this then you already know that America is insanely wasteful, that we use over a million plastic cups per day just on airlines, and that tinfoil and all manner of other detritus streams into our landfills at an alarming clip. Many other wonderful blogs focus exclusively on the plastic issue, and although our family tries, we are not even especially good about leading plastic-free lives ourselves.

But we do try, and somehow the endurance of that plastic cup from sin city keeps me a little more honest. It’s like a mindfulness bell – every time I open the cupboard and see it there among our recycled Mexican water glasses and our hippie mason jars, I am awakened a little bit, reminded to try a little harder.

The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, of course, our kid diligently collecting her funny little tin foil balls all year long. There was lots of joking around the house tonight about which of us needed a tin foil beanie, and what kinds of mischief we could get up to with all those foil balls. Then we settled into a serious round of Napoleon, a simple but addictive trumping card game we highly recommend. The foil balls worked perfectly as our score keeping “chips.”

And as usual, I overplayed my hand, and they beat me mightily. One more reason why I’m not cut out for Vegas.

Check out Tom’s great blog Bikejuju.com for more from him.

A few weeks ago, David sent an email around to his many intrepid gardener friends, inviting us to try out coffee bean chaff–the light, airy husks blown off the beans during roasting–as mulch and compost.  I said “sure,” and it wasn’t long before David darkened my doorstep with a big bag of the fluffy stuff.

I admit I wasn’t feeling super-hopeful about the mulch idea–the chaff is so soft and light, and the winter garden is so wet and mucky–I thought I might wait until spring.  But David mentioned he’d been using it in place of wood chips in the chicken coop, and that captured my imagination.  Next time I cleaned out the coop, I replaced the white wood shavings with a few inches of coffee chaff.

The chickens were hilarious.  Like cats, they can be unnerved by novelty, and I wasn’t sure what they would think of their new chaffy home.  But they all immediately ran into the coop, and started “playing” in the chaff, tossing it up with their bills.  SO funny.  There are pros and cons to coffee chaff in the chicken coop, but on balance, I’ve decided to keep using it.  Here’s my report:

Cons: So light that it flies around, gets in the chicken water.  Turns slimy when wet.

Pros: Free!  Upcycled!  No link to the timber industry.  Smells like coffee.  Light–easy to handle.  Clumps with chicken poop a bit  like scoopable kitty litter–easy to remove from coop.  Swiftly composts.

At first the chaff is so ultra-fluffy, the chickens sort of sink in it. They seem to really enjoy this!

Most coffee roasters will be happy to pass their chaff along to you. Just ask. Usually it is just tossed into the compost bin or, more often, the landfill.  Spent coffee grounds and over-roasted beans are often available as well (check out this little article by Seattle garden doyenne Ann Lovejoy about the many uses for coffee industry by-products–for mulch, compost, garden paths…).  Coffee chaff is rich in nitrogen and other nutrients, and I look forward to mixing it with my vegetable garden mulch.  Tomatoes are reputed to love the stuff.  David is also looking into the use of those great burlap bags in which coffee is imported as a replacement for that plastic weed-blocking material (see his website for info on obtaining and using post-coffee burlap).   More to come on all of this…

Meanwhile, if you are a latte-sipping urban chicken farmer, I hope you’ll give coffee bean chaff a try in your coop, and let us know how it works for you!

We love this little bicycle–it’s about six inches long, and the handlebars and pedals turn.

Tin cans are one of the primary materials for sculptural artists on the streets of East Africa.  Metal cans there tend to be painted, rather than covered with a paper label, so the sculptures  often show off colorful images of tomatoes and ingredient lists.

Sometimes the paint is burned off in the welding process, as with this bat mobile:

In Zanzibar, Tom became fascinated with the process of farming seaweed for toothpaste–the work is done mainly by women when the tide is out in the morning.  Jambiani village where we stayed is Muslim, and the women’s long skirts would float around their ankles as they worked.  One morning, Tom met this young boy, who had made a model dhow boat entirely by himself with found materials.  You can see on his face how proud he is of it, and rightfully so–it’s just beautiful.  The dhow boat we rode out to the reef was similar–hand carved, lashed together with rope and wire, and with a patchwork sail of rice bags.  Tom took this lovely, peaceful video.  Enjoy.

I love the little rubber-stamped labels.

They aren’t fancy.  The turned-in top edges are finished with pinking shears,  and the drawstrings are just bits of yarn.  The fabric is always from some quilter’s scrap pile, and often the bags are made of two or more colors of cloth.  So simple, but so delightful!  I treasure them, and use them for all manner of things.

With these as my inspiration, I’ve been making cloth bags for gift wrap.  If you have a sewing machine set up, then it truly doesn’t take any longer than wrapping a gift with paper, they can be used again and again, and they’re super-darn cute.  It’s fun to wonder what the recipient will do with the bag–wrap someone else’s gift, stow doll clothes, keep freshly-baked bread?

Here are two I made this afternoon for a child’s party we’re attending tomorrow.  Strictly scrap bag affairs.  Any dig through the fabric scraps is a sentimental  journey:  the larger bag is tied with ricrac leftover  from a dress I made for Claire when she was three, and the gingham is from some long-ago kitchen curtain that didn’t turn out as I’d hoped.

Pinked edges are quick and entirely functional for a little project like this.

Drawstring bags make an excellent first machine-sewing project for kids (or adults for that matter!).  If you don’t know how to make a drawstring bag, find directions here.  But remember–if you are in the mood to just whip a few bags together, you don’t even have to turn the top under twice.  These bags are for light use, and pinking the edges works perfectly well.  (Of course, it is nicer to iron the edges under, and only takes one more minute, but we do have options!)

We so often think of sewing as a big production.  We have to “get set up,” plan a project, shop for matching thread, and find other ways to make it into an ordeal that can be put off.   I’m trying to remember that sewing can happen in a a few minutes, with a pile of scraps and bit of white thread.  Enjoy!

The very cute Sister Monika Ellis, OSB, and her fab bag.

On a recent visit, Sister Monika Ellis told me about a market bag she’d crocheted.  I wouldn’t have believed it if I hadn’t seen it.  For “yarn,” she’d cut sixty (SIXTY!) plastic grocery bags into half-inch strips.  She snipped them in loops, from seam to seam, so they could be strung together like rubber bands into a long, long line, then rolled into a ball.  This she crocheted into a strong, beautiful, open-work bag using a free pattern she’d found on the internet.  I love how different colored bags were used to create a striped pattern.

Many of the sisters at St. Placid spin and knit wool from the fleece of local sheep, and the resulting creations they offer for sale are often wondrous, but this bag is something new altogether!  People want to buy Sister M’s bag, and she says, “You want me to make more of those?  Are you kidding me?”  But she has provided a demo roll of the plastic yarn, along with directions to inspire people.  “If I need something, I always try to figure out if I can make do with what I have first,”  Sr. Monika told me.

The bottom of the bag is reinforced with two discarded CDs, covered by crocheted circles.

In Seattle, the city council recently passed a “bag tax”–twenty cents for every new plastic bag we take at the grocery checkout line.  Good heavens, from the resulting outcry you’d think they’d told us we had to sacrifice our first born children.  The detractors provided some astonishing math.  It would cost $1 every time we shopped!  In a year, we would spend the same amount on plastic bags that we would have spent on 77 gallons of milk!  200 loaves of bread!  (Um, not if we bring our own bags…).  It didn’t take long to gather the 20,000 signatures needed to get a “Repeal the Bag Tax” referendum on the ballot.

When I think of all this, and when I find myself feeling unmotivated to make the simplest life-giving steps in my own everyday life–out of laziness, or hurry, or cynicism, or lack of creativity, or even despair, I try to remember Sister Monika, patiently transforming our refuse into something practical, lasting, and beautiful. Thank you Sister!

As an alternative, we’ve been loving our homemade granola.  This recipe evolved through trial and error, and meets Claire’s rigorous 10-year-old taste-testing standards.  Since apple juice provides both sweetener and liquid, it uses less oil than some recipes, and is lower in fat.  It’s both fun and super-easy to make.  Of course you can play with the dry ingredients–add wheat germ, flax seeds, different nuts–to suit your taste.  Just keep the ratio of dry and wet ingredients about the same. Most of this stuff is typically available in bulk.  Enjoy more nutrition, more yumminess, and less waste.

Tangled Nest Granola

Mix on a high-rimmed baking sheet, and toast for at 300 degrees for about 25 minutes, stirring halfway through:

6 cups rolled oats
1/2 cup sunflower seeds
1 cup chopped walnuts, almonds, or mixture
1/2 cup sesame seeds
1 cup shaved coconut (OK–even though we get lovely fair trade, organic coconut at our local food coop, it still comes from Sri Lanka!  Not a great use of our food miles, we admit–but it is a concession to Claire, who learned to love granola when we were traveling in Tanzania, where coconut is a much different thing–falling all around us from the trees.  We are thinking about weaning coconut out of our granola slowly, without Claire noticing…Meanwhile, if you do use coconut, add it halfway through the toasting time, when you take the granola out to stir–otherwise it will overbrown.)

In a liquid measuring cup or small bowl, stir together:

1 cup frozen apple juice concentrate, thawed (we live in Washington state, where local AJ is plentiful–another sweet juice concentrate could be substituted)
1/2 cup brown sugar or honey
4 Tablespoons vegetable oil
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon, or  to taste

Turn the oven up to 350.  Tip the toasted ingredients into a large bowl, pour the apple juice mixture over the top, and mix thoroughly.  Oil or spray the baking sheet, or line with parchment, and spread the granola into the pan.  Bake for about 30 minutes, stirring halfway through.  Let cool, and store in an airtight container.  Add berries, raisins, dried fruit, and milk or yogurt.  Enjoy!

More box-free breakfast recipes to come, but meanwhile try:  quick-breads, scones, summer berry muffins, home-mixed hot cereals…

Full disclosure:  we still have a box of Trader Joe’s Os in the cupboard…