** I really welcome feedback or comments on this blog **
m.start70@btinternet.com
Findhorn Eco House - Lunablu
This site is intended to provide more information on the house and what it is like to live in the Findhorn ecovillage. As my children think it is normal to live like this and my wife, Maria, prefers to resist the internet and ’stick to reality’ the views expressed here are Michael Start’s and not those of any other person or organisation.
Best wishes - Michael
The house has dried out beautifully from a winter of ice and snow. It has been very warm inside with minimal use of woodburning stove. The main issues that need tackling now that the warm weather is here are:
1- Condensation at sites of “cold bridging”. The aluminium threshholds and even doorhandles could be dripping with moisture during really cold days and this has discoloured adjacent flooring.
2- Condensation in bathroom and showerooms. Better extraction needed for next winter as roof velux shows signs of mould staining.
3 - Frost damage to the render. We have always had issues with the stunning orange oxidation being uneven in colour but now we notice some render crumbling due to frost over the winter period.
All in all the house has performed really well over a very tough winter.
We are able to know our Gas costs for the 12 months of 2009. The house has a Veissman gas condensing boiler to provide cooking, back up heating and hot water when the sun doesn’t shine.
The propane tank is a large one buried under the garden so we can take advantage of bulk delivery. We have my inlaws visiting at Christmas so to avoid the risk of my mother in law getting cold we refill annually just before her arrival! This year the tank took 950 litres to fill at a cost of £436.
Thats £36 a month for cooking, heating and cloudy day hot water.
For the Morso wood burning stove, we are still working our way through our first ever delivery of Whisky barrel wood in 2006, the lorry load cost us £80 and is now about two thirds down.
Electricity for the month of December, with up to Nine people staying in the house, was £46 from the Parks windmill suppliers.
It is very difficult to be frugal with teenagers and the elderly in residence, so I am really pleased. The house is contentedly warm!
Last Friday evening the entrance into the Field of Dreams had a new width restriction and pair of signs appear. These were provided by the “Asset Developement Group” of the Findhorn Foundation. Today (wednesday) they are going to be moved. Thank goodness, not only do they make a cold and unwelcoming entrance, they have been placed 50 metres in front of the fantastic (and Public) Moray Art Centre. Hopefully to be replaced with a sign that is warmer and more welcoming, more in keeping with the spirit of the place.
Pair of Signs with Moray Art Centre beyond
Sunflowers (actually last years, this years are even better!).
The summer has been busy with all kinds of celebrations, BBQ’s and festivals, today was the Cullerne Gardens Games and tonight the Park resounded to Dancing and Singing from the Gong house, something to do with the Blue Moon, my family were celebrating A level results with a dinner in the town.
The Field of Dreams Association is a re-birth of the old residents association, and next weekend we are having its first meeting at our house. Hopefully we will be able to better represent the views of people on the Field at the larger Title holders meetings, which have been quite exercising last year.
The invite - the hand drawn flying heart motif!
I am still here and posting. This Summer has been busy with Fun, Fun, FUN!
Not my fun, but the hard work of managing and monitoring my three teenagers fun, what a fantastic life they lead! very near the “line” at times, always with their clans and pushing the limits. Now at an age when they are truly “in their power” and the community no longer intimidates them but reassures and nourishes them, like it should. The house has been like a beehive of hormones.
School and the normal work routine starts soon and then I will upload some pics and some more insightful posts. Its SUNNY!
Off for a quick flit to Cyprus where I am so happy to be invited to meet some of the people from the Free Gaza movement.
www.freegaza.org
Their small boat with an international crew has just been forcibly taken by the Israeli Navy in International waters as it tried to bring medicine and food from Larnaka into Gaza port. Thank goodness they were not rammed and sunk like the last one, I have been so worried.
It will be fantastic to meet & express my support for some Hero’s, the sort without a gun or bomb between them!
Living on an Ecovillage as part of a Spiritual Community is strangely unconnected with politics or real world disasters like war and famine. There is little activism and quite a conservative attitude to politics. After the GM Food trials and then Gleneagles G8 , there has been little activity in any field except Climate Change and perhaps Tibet. The energy is more one of promoting peace by meditation rather than marching.
The Findhorn name sells.
Some of the goods and services that benefit from being here are: pottery, paintings, alternative therapies and healings, spiritual and personal development tools, dance, B&B’s, flower essences, printing, life coaching, wealth coaching and more InterFaith Ministers per square inch than heaven itself. On one level it can feel like the Field of Dreams is a sort of new age business park where many of the residences are also businesses.
This extra income does help offset the costs of living here (Hoco fees & Deli Shop) and also provides an added value to house sales which can become very profitable B&Bs if a single person or couple buy a 3 or 4 bedroom house.
The latest financial ‘quirk’ is a new condition placed on property to be sold by the Findhorn Foundation, that 2 percent of the future sale price of that property must be given back “for community use” as decided by the Findhorn Foundation with input from the titleholders (changed wording following feedback. Thank You!).
There is also considerable ambiguity over the geographical extent of financial responsibilities for Field of Dream residents. With some remarkable variation in individual responsibilities. Email me for more info! (m.start70@btinternet.com).
Does all this make the Field attractive to families. They don’t usually have any extra space and family budgets are usually tight. Does it encourage a varied mix of people, a diverse community?
P.S:
The large eco-residence pictured below is trialing my new underfloor solar panels. Email me for a brochure and discount details.
StartsSolarFlor Inc "Underfloor Solar Panels"
Its a balmy summer Solstice here in Findhorn and this week the first Title Holders Council meeting took place since I started the blog. Now I don’t have TV so I can’t watch Eastenders or Coronation Street but THC meetings are just as good. The group meeting represents different elements in the community, Findhorn Foundation, the Caravan dwellers, the Art Centre and the representatives of HOCO which runs the various services and needs a big budget. The Findhorn foundation has 66% of the vote at these meetings which makes them a strangely imbalanced affair.
Most issues are to do with finances and there is a lot of uncertainty over who pays for what. I am hoping to revive the old Field of Dreams Residents association soon so we are better represented. As most of the eco houses are very swish there is a view that the people in them have pots of money, this is not the case, but from the point of view of a caravan dweller on a £200 a month wage I can understand why.
The Solstice has seen many activities today, (we are dancing on the green after lunch) and my thought go back to Avebury and Silbury Hill, I have such fantastic memories of the many solstices I spent there, being looked after by the police and introducing my babies to the glory of the Sun. 
Our Kitchen/Living/Dining Room
Clean, clean, tidy & hide, what a way to spend a Sunday morning, two loads of washing and a hoover designed with the acoustics of an RAF Tornado, day of rest it is not. We have just spent this glorious sunny day showing groups of people around every nook and cranny of our home as part of “Renewable Energy Open Day”. Read the rest of this entry »