Living Lightly is a collection of local stories about sustainable living.
The column commenced in 2012 and until 2023 was published in the Border Mail newspaper each week.
The content is community sourced – groups, organisations and individuals have written and contributed each of these informative and entertaining articles – all overseen by a local volunteer coordinator.
We are currently considering a monthly schedule for articles, stay tuned as we explore this option.
Here you can browse and search previous articles or subscribe to receive an email each time an article is published.
The Living Lightly coordinator is always keen to receive articles! Use the link below to find out how you can submit an article for the column.
With a big thank you to all the Living Lightly authors for contributing to this wonderful collection of articles.
By Matthew Charles-Jones Matthew is a member of Yackandandah Sustainability Straw bales may offer a beautiful solution for those planning a new home or extending an existing structure. There are many examples of people creatively using straw to construct garden walls and decorative features using straw. Bales can also be
By Lauriston Muirhead Lauriston is chair of WATCH (Wodonga Albury Towards Climate Health) What do Playboy, the latest bodice ripper and the Bible have in common, apart from some boring bits and some jolly good bits? They all need a good light to be thoroughly enjoyed. Daylight is the best
By Erin Mathews Erin is a former Border Eco-Living Program participant Everyone has different motivations for going local with their food. To be honest, the driving force for me was number 5. 1. Shrink your eco footprint 2. Support the producers in your community 3. Save money and cut down
By Lauriston Muirhead Lauriston is chair of WATCH (Wodonga Albury Towards Climate Health) It wasn’t just Lady Chatterly’s greenhouses that got hot. Greenhouses also get hot because light enters easily through the glass, but when it bounces around in the greenhouse some of the light changes to heat which does
By Shae Gillmartin Shae is a member of the Border Permaculture Association So what is a food forest? It is an edible garden that uses the model of a forest to meet people’s needs of food, medicinal plants and an enjoyable setting. Food forests have a diverse range of plants
By Ben Habib Ben is a member of WATCH (Wodonga Albury Towards Climate Health) Part of living lightly involves acknowledging that some of our ideas that have served us well in the past are no longer appropriate for the times we are moving into. One of these sacred cows is
By Lizette Salmon Lizette is the convener of WATCH (Wodonga & Albury Towards Climate Health) and a member of Transition Towns Albury Wodonga. Isn’t it funny how you often end up mimicking your parents in ways you swore you never would? As a youngster I couldn’t understand why my parents didn’t
By Lizette Salmon Lizette is a member of Transition Towns Albury Wodonga and the convener of WATCH (Wodonga & Albury Towards Climate Health) In a previous life I worked at a hospital in Melbourne where I became very concerned at the huge volumes of paper wasted on site. It was
By Rowena Booker Rowena works for the Victorian Relief Food Bank We all hate to throw out excess produce from our backyard but there really is a point where we realise that we just have too much and we don’t know what to do with it all. Sometimes it’s even
By Gabrielle Prior Gabrielle is a member of Beechworth Sustainability and the North East Regional Sustainability Alliance Are you tired of tired of living in a winter cave with the curtains drawn to keep in the warmth? Are you wishing you had double glazing, but can’t afford it? Or perhaps
By Lizette Salmon Lizette is a member of Transition Towns Albury Wodonga and the convener of WATCH (Wodonga & Albury Towards Climate Health) In recent times I’ve heard several nightmare stories about people’s electricity bills. Obviously electricity retailers have hiked their prices because of infrastructure upgrades but many of the
