City living Old Style?

Bitsy_Beans

I live in the 'Burbs - I have local common land a short walk away which has blackberry's and sloes (although I'd never noticed the latter until this year ). I have a veggie plot in my garden and grow stuff in pots too. Don't have the space for chooks sadly. No open fires round here - my first house had an open fire in the lounge but we had to use smokeless fuel <rollseyes> We lived about 5 mins from an extremely busy 2 lane road - if pollution was going to be an issue surely cars were a bigger problem then a wood fire?!

j.e.j.

ceridwen wrote: »

I recognise a description of Brighton when I read it:rotfl::rotfl:.

ditto ceridwen
I lived there for about 10 years. Nice to be somewhere quieter/less expensive now though.
Wish you luck with your move, fayhare

meritaten

I am very lucky to live in a village in the South Wales valleys - not sure if this lends itself to OS lifestyle though. most of the surrounding green fields belong to someone (and that someone gets very irate if you trespass!). the council seem to feel that all land which belonged to them should now contain executive housing so there are a lot of 'little' estates. there are allotments - but you cant really count them as 'free food'. hmmmmmmmm but, I did find a fantastic source of free blackberries the other day - surrounding a not much used local graveyard! and very nice they were too in the three pies I made!

valk_scot

I live in a small town just outside a big city. My flat is a grey 30's monstrosity over the top of a row of shops but it's huge, it has a garden with three apple trees, a pear tree and room for a greenhouse. I've got an allotment ten minutes away by car, fifteen by bike and grow fruit, veg, flowers, dye plants and willow for baskets. My neighbour keeps chickens and I trade veg etc for eggs. In the other direction from the city smoke there is open country so plenty of foraging opportunities but I don't really need them. I'm in the craft community here, lots of country folk around and there's always someone giving away their glut of plums etc or eggs or whatever. I know several people who raise sheep, thus wool for my spinning and there's a great trading circle for baking, jams etc. There are farm shops and good specialist shops too.

But in the big city there's lots of charity shops, a huge Freecycle and lots of supermarkets in fierce competition with one another, ethnic grocery shops, £££ shops and discount stores.

I don't think I've tried to keep up with the Jones in my life. My OH works but we took the decision for me to stay at home when we started having kids and though we're a lot poorer than many of our friends it really doeesn't matter because I think we have a pretty good quality of life. I think our town has a lot of advantages...small enough to have a bit of community atmosphere, big enough to have some good facilities. Best of both worlds!

Petlamb

I live in sunderland. About the only real advantageous side of where we are for OS is if I were to go fishing with my dad as we're right on the river (in fact just along from the rivermouth - some great fish to be had, according to my angler dad!)... Aside from that, it can be a bit rough...

We have a single tesco metro. There is also an iceland in the city centre. To get to any other supermarket (morrisons/asda) you'd either [ideally] need a car, or alternatively resign yourself to spending money on transport to get there - not ideal on a shoestring. I haven't found any foraging spots round here either, and while there are some market stalls for fruit and veg, they're so-so.

To top that, we live in a building with no garden/yard. I'm thinking about getting pots next summer though, if our LL allows us to use out parking space (locked) out back to put some pots etc in! :P

1sue23

I live on a narrow boat and grow veg and herbs on the top ,I have a woodburner so heating is cheap I can move either into the town or out into the country I love my boat and would not choose to live in a house again .

Kitcaboodle

When I was little my parents were very OS, they even kept goats!

I currently live in a small rented flat just off a dual carriageway in a big town.

All I can do where we currently live is to cook home-made food and be arty-crafty, though I'm limited in storage space for both!

One day I hope to have a house with a real fire and a garden I can grow some fruit & veg in. One day!

ubamother

I live in a coastal town not too far from newcastle (I'm a Brummie transplant not a born Geordie) with enough garden for some fruit and veg - raspberries, blackcurrants, potatoes, onions, beans, courgettes etc., but my town has several butchers, a good baker, a fab cheap greengrocers, all of which, I'm happy to say are busy even though Mr T and Mr S both have a small presence in the centre of town. A large proportion of our shops are privately owned - a few haven't made it through hard times but most are still hanging in there so we have a lovely diverse high street. Have a great choice of fishmongers on the quay a few miles away. Various farms with shops within a few miles, including free-range chickens/meat/cheese farms within ten miles. Can't forage myself any longer, but send family to the blackberries that are within half a mile.

tru

We live 2 miles from Gloucester city centre. If we go 2 miles in the other direction, we're in the countryside with farm shops, a fab cider farm and plenty of foraging. The canal is just down the road and the river's nearby too.

There's a local shop (takes me 4 minutes to walk there - I timed it!). Lidl and the Co-op are about 15 mins walk. Near Lidl there's a fruit and veg shop, he sells the usual bananas, oranges etc. but he likes to sell from local producers too. There's also a proper old-fashioned DIY shop that sells everything you could possibly need (we've found things in there that B&Q don't stock).

We're not in a smoke-free zone. We've taken gas fire out and are toying with the idea of having an open fire. We have a large veg patch and 10 chickens. Love bartering with the neighbours

The thing which would make this house perfect is if the garden was about 15 times the size it is now

Pitlanepiglet

I think it's swings and roundabouts - I live in a city Monday to Friday and then go back to a more rural area at weekends. I rent a room from a friend M-F so few opportunities for OS although I do cook from scratch. The bonus of being in a city is that it's much easier to find bargains, I have easy access to huge supermarkets and Lidl, Poundland etc. Plus Costco on the doorstep for meat and fish.

At home we have the village post office in our village, the adjacent town is very touristy and whilst we now have a Tesco Express it's stonkingly expensive compared to the ordinary store (stocks mainly branded stock) and everything else is lovely artisan food aimed at the grockles. Lovely, but not good for those on a budget.

The nearest proper Tesco is 5 miles away but is a small store again and again works out more expensive than shopping in the big stores.

The absolute high point for me is that the Tesco in one of the "big towns" 30 miles away now delivers to our area, it was soooo exciting when it happened! This means we can order the own brand stuff and the full range of offers that our small stores don't stock. I tend to shop once very six weeks and we keep enough stock to avoid having to shop locally (we support our local farm shop for veg)

Even in the city there are places to forage blackberries etc that aren't roadside, it's sometimes worth getting an Ordnance Survey map of your area and looking for the green spots on it.

So whilst city living doesn't obviously lend itself to an OS life, ultimately, it's down to the individual and there are huge benefits in terms of bargain hunting over those of us who have to travel 30 miles to a decent set of shops (usually without decent public transport)