Nov 7 event postponed - Natural Building event ready to go on Nov 14

This is not Chris & Wil's home, it's a a straw bale house pic by Peter Blanchard.


Sorry to say we've had to postpone the Sustainable Energy Panel that was scheduled for November 7th. We hope to reschedule this event for the new year.

HOWEVER - you can join us at the Living Centre on November 14 for a fascinating talk on Natural Building by Chris & Wil Dancey.

For the past twenty-five years, Chris and Wil Dancey have been accumulating knowledge about the many materials and methods that are used to build healthy, sustainable, natural buildings.  As owner builders, they have built with local materials including industrial hemp, lime, clay, wood and stone.  Their home is a round log timber frame with hemp and lime infill for insulation. They have constructed a living roof and a heating system that includes a masonry heater and radiant floors.               


During their presentation, they will take you on a virtual tour of building projects from around the world that have had a minimal impact on the environment, while providing truly beautiful structures for play, work and living. There will be many examples of natural building in Canada and discussion about using local materials will be included.

Free, with donations greatly appreciated.

The Power of Community - October 2nd free movie night

Almost any event Transition Middlesex has organized could be subtitled 'The Power of Community', but this week's free movie night features that as the main title, and as a subtitle: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil.

In the early 90s, the fall of the Soviet Union meant economic collapse for Cuba because the flow of oil from its only major trading partner ceased. This documentary follows the dramatic steps taken both by the Cuban people, and the Cuban government during this time called by Cubans the 'Special Period in Peacetime.'

Far from being a film only about a unique historical moment, the film-makers argue that the world needs to look at how Cuba adapted to a shortage of cheap oil (and came out the other side), in order to start making real changes in the global economy to prepare for a time when the amount of oil available is surpassed by the amount desired.

The film is about 45 minutes in length, and afterwards, we will have a discussion.

The event is at 7pm on October 2nd at the Poplar Hill Baptist Church in Poplar Hill, just north-west of London at 24415 Poplar Hill Rd.

I hope you can join us.

By the way - last week's event on local food was amazing! We had a great crowd out who heard what Helene St. Jacques had to say about local food hubs, and then worked in small groups to brainstorm and share their ideas about this topic. I'm working on a blog entry that will describe this evening in more detail to be posted soon. Thanks for all who came.

We're working on putting together a Food Work Group, so if you are interested in contributing to that (and live in the London or rural Middlesex area), please send me an email at readrobread at gmail.com. One of the important roles we're looking for is someone to organize meeting times and locations and communicate these to others who are interested.

Food: Centre of the Local Economy event on September 26, 2012

Not a likely scene in Southwestern Ontario this fall, as much of the apple crop was lost due to spring weather. Photo credit: Muffet (Liz West)

Title:   Food: Centre of the Local Economy

Presenter: Hélène St. Jacques

When:     Wednesday, September 26, 7 pm

Where:   Poplar Hill Baptist Church, Poplar Hill             

We've got another event coming up next Wednesday - one at which group interaction and sharing one’s own food experiences will be strongly encouraged. The event will be part presentation, part working group where participants will be able to explore options such as food hubs, and presently available sectors. A limited number of local snacks will be available (if you have some to share, feel free to bring them!) 

About the Presenter

Our facilitator, Hélène St. Jacques serves in an advisory capacity with the Toronto food co-op, FoodShare (& a former board member). She is also citizen co-chair of Toronto Food Policy Council, and is very active in the development of comprehensive food security policies, programs and principles of healthy public policy. Hélène has conducted extensive research across the entire food value chain from eaters to growers, studying consumer attitudes, purchase, usage and consumption patterns.  This includes consumer packaged goods and processed food companies (international and local/Ontario/Canadian).

Through her firm, Informa Research, Hélène has also provided the following research services:

- to retail (health/organic, independents and chains) including alternative channels (food box programs, farmers' markets and buying clubs)

- to distribution (organic/natural food distributor) and wholesaling

-to producers and marketing boards (beans/legumes, turkey, vegetables, eggs, milk/dairy)

- to farmer owned co-ops  (Gay Lea Foods and OntarBio - Organic Meadow brand)

- to industry organizations (Organic Council of Ontario and Canadian Organic Trade Association)

- to farm owned, value-added products (Mapleton's Organic)

Hélène favours a hands-on collaborative approach when bringing together the corporate and community worlds. She is currently engaged in a variety of volunteer activities and community development initiatives, including Enoch Turner Schoolhouse, Jessie's Centre for Teenagers, Canadian Foundation for Women's Healthcare, Dixon Hall, and Sheridan College School of Crafts and Design.

If you are at all involved with local food (and let's face it, everyone is, whether we are eating it or involved in its production or processing), we hope you can make it out to this event. One hope is that we will have the start of a  Local Food Subcommittee of Transition Middlesex beginning to form by the end of the evening! 

Forest Garden Tour 7pm Sept 12, 2012

Martin Crawford, a well-known British champion of Forest Gardens. 

Photo by London Permaculture.

This free tour presented by Shantree Kacera for Transition Middlesex takes place at the Living Centre (follow link for directions). 

 Ever since I learned about Forest Gardens, the idea just made sense. Here was an approach where you look at pointers from ecology, and applied them to the growing of food forests where every aspect of the design had been considered and reconsidered.

As I learn more about permaculture, the field modern forest gardens have come out of, I've had to come to terms with their being no easy and fast way to set-up a forest garden - like any forest, we can't expect the sort of turn-around we do with typical buildings being constructed, for instance. It takes time for a forest garden to grow into what it will eventually be: a beautiful and functional landscape that provides food, fuel, and 'farmaceuticals' as well as building and textile materials for humans and animals alike, all while being highly resilient to pests and climate fluctuations, improving the water table, and absorbing CO2.

Shantree Kacera will be giving a tour of his own forest garden, likely the oldest in Canada, but based in a slightly longer tradition from England (see photo above of Martin Crawford, a guru in the field of forest gardens). Shantree will give an introduction to the idea of forest gardens, a bit about how they work, and will be ready to answer your questions.

The Living Centre, where the tour takes place, is run by Shantree and his wife Lorenna. They offer courses in Forest Gardening, permaculture, raw-food cuisine, primordial movement and many other fascinating fields.

(Note that this post previously had a typo saying the tour was on Sept 21 - it's on Sept 12 - sorry for the inconvenience.)

2012 Events Announced

Well, we're trying something different this year. The Transition Middlesex group is growing, and in order to keep that growth happening, we decided to do not just one movie night. Not just one speaker. But a whole program of nine free movies and speakers.

A few members of the group read The Transition Handbook by Rob Hopkins (founder of the Transition model) this winter, and over the course of a couple of spring meetings, we decided that our group is really still in a state of 'awareness raising.' Something specific that struck me was how when Transition Town Totness (the first transition town) was first getting started, they showed movies and had speakers REALLY frequently. In the past, Transition Middlesex has done one or two movie nights per year, but inspired by the model that Transition Town Totness used, we decided to plan a really ambitious fall schedule of events, and advertise it all in one shot, therefore putting just a little more advertising work in for a lot more events.

Believe it or not, the nine free events listed below for September, October, and November 2012 is actually a paring down of a longer list of what we imagined doing! There are plenty of great speakers and films around, and lots of ideas for future events still in the wings. But for this year, we edited down to the movies we felt have the most impact, and describe must succinctly what transition is all about.

As for the speakers, I’m really excited about the speakers we have this year. From a tour of a forest garden (likely the oldest in Canada) to a talk about local techniques for sustainable building, we have some very experienced people giving talks that I for one am looking forward to. More details will follow here on the blog as we get closer to each event.

The full list of speakers and films follows below, as well as information on locations. Keep in mind these are all free, though donations are greatly appreciated.

7pm, Sept 5	In Transition 2.0	Film screening	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Sept 12	Forest Garden Tour: Growing and Eating for a Nourishing Future	Speaker: Shantree Kacera	The Living Centre
7:30pm, Sept 19	Transition Middlesex Meeting	Regular meeting	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Sept 26	Food: Centre of the Local Economy	Speaker: Helene St. Jacques	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Oct 2	The Power of Community	Film screening	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Oct 10	The Heart & Soul of Transition: The Psychology of Change – or, How to not go crazy during these changing times	Speaker: Lorenna Bousquet-Kacera	The Living Centre
7:30pm, Oct 17	Transition Middlesex Meeting	Regular meeting	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Oct 24	In Transition 2.0	Film screening	Strathroy Library
7pm, Nov 7	Sustainable Energy Panel	Speakers: John Miller, Gary Zavitz	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Nov 14	Sustainable Building	Speakers: Chris and Wil Dancey	The Living Centre
7:30pm, Nov 21	Transition Middlesex Meeting	Regular meeting	Poplar Hill Baptist Church
7pm, Nov 28	In Transition 2.0	Film screening	The Living Centre

Poplar Hill Baptist Church – 24415 Poplar Hill Rd, Poplar Hill (Middlesex Centre)

The Living Centre – 5871 Bells Rd, SW of London (Middlesex Centre)

Strathroy Library – 34 Frank St, Strathroy

Name change, song remains the same (new harmonies?)

In March 2012, Poplar Hill/Coldstream Resiliency Initiative officially changed its name to Transition Middlesex.

Since this is the first post on the blog, I'll start with some information about the group, for those finding us for the first time. I'm (Rob Read, secretary of the group) in the midst of updating the website, though with little kids around, this may take awhile yet to do. For the time being, much slightly dated information about the group can be found at www.phcri.net. It's also worth looking at www.transitionnetwork.org, which gives lots of information about the Transition Model, and the many 'Transition Towns' around the world.

In February, 2010, Poplar Hill/Coldstream was recognized as one of Canada's Transition Towns, showing that we were on our way to bringing together a grass-roots group of people with concerns about a future without cheap sources of fuel, yet also with a positive vision for this low-energy future, and a passion to plan how we'll get from here to there through eventually developing an Energy Descent Action Plan.

So - back to the name change...

We'd been noticing for awhile that the group was changing - active members were being drawn from outside Poplar Hill/Coldstream (the original stronghold of founders and early members), including Strathroy, Ailsa Craig, and Lucan. We talked about whether there was a natural way to rename the group which spoke to what we were already becoming, and also to the future of the group.

We decided it made sense to re-name the group to Transition Middlesex, using the political boundaries already in place for our county, and received the blessing of the Transition Network to make this change, which effectively makes us more of a regional hub than a Transition Town proper. Eventually we hope self-sufficient Transition groups will start in smaller towns around Middlesex County.

We see our group beginning to provide a counter-point to the more urban focus of the nearby Transition London, by adapting the Transition Model to the challenges rural areas will face in a low energy future. Already we've been starting to see new interest in the county, and plan to push our awareness raising campaign to a new level this fall with multiple movie nights and speakers.

In the meantime, the Coldstream Farmers Market, which a subcommittee of the group is currently organizing, will be staring on June 9th, behind the Marsh Store in Coldstream (9am - noon), the same day as the annual Poplar Hill Picnic, which starts at noon over at the Poplar Hill Park. The market continues on Saturday mornings through until Thanksgiving.

If you're interested in learning more about Transition Middlesex, we meet the third Wednesday of each month at the Poplar Hill Baptist Church at 7:30pm. I can add you to the email list to get a reminder about the meeting, and very occasional updates about other items of interest, just email me at readrobread (at) gmail.com.

Meetings consist of discussion about various things, such as local food, alternative energy, permaculture, self-sufficiency, disappearing skills and practices (that may be useful in the future), edible weeds and plants, and food preserving practices. We usually have an agenda for planning future events, or initatives, such as applying for grants, and while we do get to these items, there are plenty of fun and interesting tangents, and meetings are a really fun time. They're also a great way to meet other people with concerns about the future, and who are making the leap to thinking about how good that future can be if we actively engage in its creation.