Bayou City Barter Fair: March 28 and November 27, 2009 (1-4
pm)
Simplicity
Folks Around Houston
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We announce simplicity events and connect people to local simplicity circles. These are groups of five to ten people meeting regularly to support their personal process of simplifying. Some circles use the Northwest Earth Institute’s Voluntary Simplicity discussion guide, others select a book on simplicity to read and discuss, and some choose Your Money or Your Life. Join a simplicity circle or start one with support from our experienced facilitators.
WHEN?
v
Saturday,
March 28
v
Friday after
Thanksgiving, November 27 -- “Buy Nothing Day”
WHERE?
Live Oak Friends Meetinghouse
WHY?
To practice simplicity and provide
an alternative to media-driven consumerism.
WHAT?
The Barter Fair provides an opportunity
to trade objects and services without using common currency.
This gives us a chance to
think in a new way about the way we place value on objects and services within
our community.
HOW
can you get involved?
Simply come by and join in
the fun!
Bring a table, shelf, rug or
blanket to display your goods or a sign that describes the service(s)
which
you would like to barter.
Bring some food to share, if
you wish.
In
past years, many who participated enjoyed the experience and expressed an
interest in creating events like this more often in
In
addition to each individuals’/family’s table where their items are displayed,
we will have a designated area for "free" items that you are willing
to give to whomever wants them. Visitors may then use such items to barter and
trade with if they wish. (Three way trades are possible, too.) See below for more information on how to
barter.
No
money will be exchanged for services or goods. *
CHILDREN ARE WELCOME!
Children are
often the best models of how this can work. They have the ability to add value
to an item by describing potential uses.
Some creative kids have baked cookies or homemade doggie treats to use
as their barter currency. The sky is the
limit on possibilities.
Directions to the Meeting House --
·
Take
Ella exit off North 610 Loop
·
Go one
block south on Ella
·
Turn
left on
·
Live
Oak Friends Meeting House will be the right side a couple blocks down
For more information about the event, or to offer your services
as a volunteer, contact:
Lidney Molnari
832-466-1342
*Monetary donations may be made to Live
Oak Friends Meeting House for the use of their space.
Our November Barter Fair is held on the
day after Thanksgiving, which is International Buy Nothing Day
-- now in its 17th year.
Comments from Barter Fair participants
from
At the fair, people will have tables where they display their goods: apples
from their fruit tree, some sports (baseballs, etc.), a chess game, oil
paintings, comic books, and other things. They can bring photos or descriptions
of things that are too big to display: a desk, or a bunk-bed.
We will have a list of things which we want so we can set up deals more easily.
If people have the paperback books which we want, they can look at our list and
see whether we have anything which they want. Or we can offer them something
which is not on the list. Maybe they will make a deal with you.
We have many things which we can trade. We can swap the old stuff which we
don't want any more. Some of those things might be the T-shirts and pants which
we have outgrown. Our toys and sports equipment can be bartered, if we don't
want them. We might trade our bicycle, and our old computer monitor, and the
ping-pong table which is in your dusty attic.
When we barter away our old things, we will get something wonderful. We might
get a better bicycle, or some computer programs, or an oil-painting set. Maybe
we will get a baseball or a music CD, or a pair of black ice skates. We might
find someone to give us some lessons in skiing, or website design, or nearly
anything else.
Ideas for SKILLS we can trade.
1. Be confident and creative. We do have many skills which are useful to other
people. Even "un-skills" are barterable; there is demand for
leaf-rakers, lawn-cutters, and other odd-jobbers.
2. Barter your primary skill -- the one which we use use at our job. For
example, a carpenter can moonlight with some additional carpentry
jobs.
3. Barter what you like to do. If we are imaginative, we might find a way to
barter the activity which we enjoy the most. For example, if we enjoy being
with animals, we can groom dogs or walk dogs or wash dogs -- or care for other
beasts. Do you like to talk? Then offer some telephone time to a social club
(in exchange for your free membership).
4. Consider your off-beat skills. At one barter club, some people registered
themselves in these unusual categories: teller of tall tales, pool hustler,
clown, parrot trainer.
5. Use the skills which you have developed in your pastimes. For example, a
bookworm can read to a blind person or to someone else who simply values the
companionship and entertainment. If our reading has given us an expertise,
maybe we can tutor in the subject which we have read about.
6. Even our mere presence is worth something. "Just being there" is
worth something if we are a babysitter, house-sitter, plant-sitter, or
pet-sitter. Imagine how much more we are worth when we are actually doing
something.
Ideas for THINGS we can trade.
If we have lists, we'll be quicker to make a deal. When people approach us for
a trade, we can give them the list, and then let them compare their
"haves" with our "wants" . Our lists can include these
items:
1. Our used items. This category includes books, magazines, furniture,
gardening equipment, etc. People have swapped more glamorous items, too; a
weekend at a beach house for a piano.
2. Our unwanted items. For example, we can swap away never-used gifts.
3. Our outgrown items. We have outgrown some of our clothing. Our children have
outgrown many items -- their clothing, toys, books, furniture, etc.
4. Our handmade items. We can trade the products of our hobbies: our baked
goods, paintings, beadwork, frames, etc.
5. Our surplus items. We will have more things to trade if we use some
strategies. For instance, we can plant extra vegetables in our garden so that
we will have a surplus to barter. We can offer to clean out a friend's garage
and trade away the "throw away" items.
6. Our "junk." Even an old trashy item might be valuable to a
collector who needs that particular piece to complete a collection.
7. Try a "triple trade." George has an electric drill to trade
and needs tools for his new garden. We might meet a woman with
garden tools but no desire for George's drill. However, she does want our
bookshelf -- so she gives the tools to George, we give the bookshelf to her,
and he gives us the drill.
Affluenza - An American Epidemic
Do you have time for what's really important to you, like talk to friends? In the last 25 years, the time Americans spend having friends over has fallen 45% according to bestseller Bowling Alone . The average married couple spends only 12 minutes a day talking to each other. Americans spend more time shopping than with their kids.
A PBS program named this disease Affluenza, an epidemic of stress, overwork, waste and indebtedness caused by dogged pursuit of the American Dream. It's bad for us and bad for the planet. It is unsustainable.
Do you suffer from Affluenza? Test yourself.
The cure - Simplifying Simplicity is slowing down, relaxing, and taking time to smell the roses. We weed out the clutter filling our homes, schedules and minds. We think for ourselves and follow our hearts instead of conforming.
What is a simplicity circle? Simplicity circles are support, study, and reflection groups of half a dozen or so people. We help each other live deliberately by reading and discussing a study course. We help each other determine what is most important to us and what steps we must take to make time for it in our lives. It's called a circle because there's no boss.
The environment, sustainability, and simplicity The American way of life is overgrazing our pastures. It is ecologically unsustainable. Our children and great grandchildren will pay the price. Simplifying is both good for us and for the planet.
Simplicity - part of a great movement of
change. A quarter of Americans have realized American Culture has
problems and are creating a new culture according to demographer, Paul Ray, and
psychologist, Sherry Anderson, in Cultural
Creatives . We just becoming aware of ourselves as a
group. We are optimistic and altruistic. We might be the key to a
culture of integrity. Are you a Cultural Creative? Test yourself.
Connecting to a Simplicity People around
Woodlands/Spring -
Circles in other
Sugarland: Mary Lockwood 281-495-7548 h mplockwood@worldnet.att.net
Pearland/Alvin Cathy Albrecht 281-585-0856
Wharton - Gerry Schmidt 979-282-9173 gerryschmidt@excelonline.com
Brigid's Place - spiritual growth
and empowerment of women
Citizen's Environmental Coalition connects
Decade of
Non-violence
Indigo Sun - Your Source to Self-Discovery
KPFT Radio Station
Ten Thousand Villages - fairly traded
handicrafts from around the world
National links
A simple introduction to simplicity by Cecile
Andrews and Carol Benson Holst
Seeds of Simplicity, Cecile's
nonprofit network for simplicity students. Join their network to get a
great quarterly newsletter and to help them promote simplicity in the
The Simple Living Network - Tools
for Sustainable Living - Buy books online, chat room, email
newsletter, and discussion boards
Alternatives for Simple Living
equips people of faith to challenge consumerism and live justly.
Northwest Earth Institute has four study courses: Voluntary Simplicity, Deep
Ecology, Sense of Place, and Choices for Sustainability.
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How you can help
The Houston Simplicity Network is all volunteer. We need your help
to tell the good news that less is more.
Would you like to be a convener for a circle?
Would your group enjoy viewing Affluenza?
Would you like to join Seeds of Simplicity, the national simplicity organization? Seeds promotes simplicity nationally to grassroots and the press.
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