“We cannot wait for governments – we must act immediately – and moving to a plant-based diet is the most impactful thing any individual can do”
Dr Richard Nicholson, Councillor for Haywards Heath
In July 2022, Haywards Heath Town Council became the first town in Europe to endorse the Plant Based Treaty, this was later followed by the City of Edinburgh Council in January 2023.
Dr Richard Nicholson, Councillor for Haywards Heath says, “The South East of England has endured the highest ever summer temperatures in history and people’s properties have been destroyed by fire and flood. We cannot wait for governments – we must all act immediately – and moving to a plant-based diet is the most impactful thing any individual can do to help address the grave situation we face. I’d encourage all Town, District, County and Metro councils to sign the Plant Based Treaty immediately.”
A coalition of groups is urging town and city councillors up and down the country to support sustainable diets by signing the Plant Based Treaty.
You can read the Plant Based Treaty in full here but, in a nutshell, it is a promise from the towns and cities who sign, not to build new or expand existing animal farms; to promote the benefits of plant-based diets in hospitals and schools; to teach farmers how to transition from animal to arable farming; and to redirect subsidies to fruits and vegetables growers so that everyone has access to healthy food.
Twenty cities have so far endorsed the Plant Based Treaty – in India, Turkey, the USA, and the UK – have you written to your town council? It’s easy to do. The nice people at the Plant Based Treaty have written the letter for you (which you are free to personalise) and have already worked out who the councillors are for each town so all you have to do is add your name 😀
It’s that time of year again and, for those who haven’t read it before, here begins our Christmas Story: Big Blue Sky. I will share a little of it every day this week, but if you want to read it all at once, here it is 😀
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Story continues tomorrow ❤
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Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating funny, enlightening and sometimes action-packed vegan children’s books for readers of all ages since 2012.
I’ve always loved bread but it doesn’t love me, so in recent years I’ve had to avoid it. I feel better if I avoid gluten and yeast most of the time but once in a blue moon I just can’t resist a bit of toast. So I decided to have a go at soda bread. Unfortunately, they usually put egg and/or milk in shop-bought soda bread, and anyway it comes in a plastic bag. So I looked online for vegan soda bread recipes and discovered that they include buttermilk, which is made by adding vinegar to milk and makes the air bubbles form in the dough when it’s cooking. The vegan recipes therefore do the same with plant-based milk. But I didn’t have any of that either, so I thought I’d try substituting plain old water. And it worked! Here’s how: First pre-heat the oven to Gas Mark 6 (200*c, 400*f).
Weigh out 12 ounces of self-raising, gluten-free flour and put it in a mixing bowl. You can add a couple of pinches of salt if you want to.
Separately, add one tablespoon (15ml) of organic apple cider vinegar to 250ml of cold water and mix.
Add the liquid to the flour and mix well with a wooden spoon.
4. Then spoon the moist mixture into a lined loaf tin,
and flatten it with the back of a wet spoon.
5. The next bit is VERY important – I learned this the hard way and still have a scar on my left index finger. Before you put it in the oven, cover the tin with foil. If you don’t, the top crust will bake very hard and the weight you’ll have to put behind your sharp, serrated bread knife to slice through it, could result in a bloody mess 😮
I use if you care foil and greaseproof paper because it’s recycled and eco-friendly. Since this won’t make the foil dirty, you can fold it up afterwards and reuse it 🙂
Oh, I’ve just noticed, on the if you care website, that they have an illustration of a roasted chicken on one of their products, which is very disappointing.
I’ll have to tell them that people who care wouldn’t be roasting chickens. It’s horrible when someone you trusted lets you down.
Anyway, back to the vegan soda bread:
Bake in a medium-hot oven (gas mark 6) for 40 to 45 minutes.
7. Don your oven gloves, hold your head away from the oven when you open the door, take out your loaf, remove the foil and put the bread on a wire rack to cool.
When it’s cool you can use it right away, or freeze it, but what I do at this point is slice up the whole loaf and put a small piece of greaseproof paper in between each slice, wrap it, put it in a container, and then freeze it.
That way, I can take my bread out of the freezer a slice at a time, keeping it fresher for longer.
I prefer mine toasted, so it goes straight from the freezer to the toaster, add some peanut butter, Marmite and baked beans for a delicious nutritious meal in minutes. 😀
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Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating vegan stories, vegan comics, vegan poems, vegan things-to-make-and-do, and vegan children’s books since 2012.
If you’d like your own Megan doll (from the Megan & Flos vegan science fiction comics), here’s how to make one 😀
First, find a pattern. I used Jean Greenhowe’s “ten of the best” pattern which is from this book but there are plenty of others to choose from, including lots of free ones you can download.
So, I won’t give you pattern details, you can just download whichever pattern you fancy and then make her look like Megan. If you don’t know how to knit yet, you can either learn, or sew a ragdoll instead 🙂
Anyway, this is what I did:
I used DK (Double Knitting thickness) acrylic yarn from my bag of oddments – no need to buy anything new. Her clothes don’t have to be blue, you can choose what she wears, and if you don’t have a bag of oddments, they often sell bags of leftover yarn in charity shops. I used UK size eleven (3 mm) needles.
The pattern I used starts at the ankles and works up to the top of her head (working in stocking stitch – one row knit, one row purl). I started in dark blue, for her jeans, then I changed colour, and knitted her light blue top, up to her shoulders,
then I changed colour again, to pink for her head. Then I cut the yarn, leaving a long length to thread through the stitches. Hey – didn’t I say I wasn’t going to explain the pattern? Sorry – I guess that’s useless information if you don’t have the pattern, and superfluous if you do. Oh well 😀
Excuse my photos by the way, my camera phone is very old. But you get the idea with that 🙂
Arms
Feet
Then I knitted the arms and the feet. Megan is wearing baseball boots, so I knitted the feet two thirds white, one third red. As you can see from the photo of the finished doll, they are proper red. I don’t know why the photos here make them look brown 😀 Then I sewed laces into the red part.
Then it was time to sew her up and stuff with kapok (natural organic fibre harvested from kapok trees, used for centuries – probably – for stuffing pillows and soft toys). But if you don’t have any kapok, you could fill your doll with cut up strips of old T-shirt. Any soft material will do.
Before stuffing, it was necessary to sew down the middle of the dark blue legs section, to create two legs, and after stuffing I tied a length of yarn around the base of the pink section, to make the head 😀 The boots were folded, sewn and stuffed before being attached to the ankles; and the arms sewn, stuffed and attached at the shoulders.
Next she needed a face! I just sewed her features on, and not very well at first – embroidery is not my strong suit – so I unpicked it and tried again. And again, until I was happy with it 😀
She doesn’t look like Megan yet does she? That’s because she needs hair!
So I made the hair by cutting lots of long lengths of yellow yarn, tying them in the middle, and sewing them from top to bottom of the back of Megan’s head. Ouch! Your pattern will show you how 😀
If you only have a little bit of yellow for her hair, the pattern shows you how to make a hat or a hood for her, and then you’ll only need a little bit to stick out the front. 🙂
Now she looks very Megan-ish! But there’s still one more thing she needs – do you know what it is?
Her solar-powered gravity-adjusting belt of course!
For this I cast on five stitches of purple and worked in moss stitch (every row knit) until it was long enough. I kept measuring it up against the doll as I went along, until it was the right length. Then I cast off, sewed the ends of the belt together, and added the gems. Or did I sew on the gems first, and then sew the ends together? You decide 😀
Ta-daa!
She looks ready for adventure doesn’t she?!
Why don’t you make yourself a Megan doll? Or a Reflecto Girl doll? Or any of our heroic vegan characters. And do send us photos if you make any, we’d love to see them 😀
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Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating vegan comics, vegan stories, vegan nursery rhymes, vegan children’s books and vegan things to make and do, since 2012.
What will you read next? There are tonnes of vegan children’s stories, with lovely vegan characters, to choose from on our stories and comics page. Read them for free, any time you like. 😀
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Wednesday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Sindyyy!!!!! 😮
Why is the Flat-Capped Menace taking baby Sindy to a ship?! Will our heroes get there in time to stop him?! These questions and more will be answered when this story continues, which will happen as soon as Miranda finishes drawing it.
For now – have a great weekend! 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Monday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Blast that Flat-Capped Menace and his robots! Hurry Mildred – they’re getting away!
Come back on Friday to see if our heroes can stop them before they reach the ship 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Friday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Uh oh. This is not going well at all. Poor Sindy Snowdrop is getting further and further out of reach! Come back on Wednesday to see what our heroes do next! 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Wednesday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Bungee cord? Whatever next?!
Find out what’s next by coming back here on Monday 😀
Have a great weekend 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Monday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Uh oh 😮 Plan B?
If at first they don’t succeed, they’ll try and try again – on Friday 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from Friday. For the story so far, click here 😀
Oh my goodness! So close! 😮
Will they be able to rescue little Sindy? Come back on Wednesday to find out 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
For previous episodes of Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, click here. Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from yesterday:
😮 Pedal fast girls – that baby’s life depends on it!
Have a great weekend but don’t forget to come back on Monday to find out what happens next 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
For previous episodes of Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, click here. Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from yesterday:
Hurry girls! Will our heroes get there in time to save Sindy Snowdrop? Come back tomorrow to find out! 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
For previous episodes of Marvellous Mildred and the Girl Scout Twins, click here. Episode 4 – Serious Trouble for Sindy Snowdrop – continues from yesterday:
That evil kidnapping fiendish villain! Where on Earth are Mildred and the girls?! Come back tomorrow to find out! 😀
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Marvellous Mildred, the Girl Scout Twins and the Flat-Capped Menace are characters from the vegan comic by Miranda Lemon.
We were absolutely thrilled to be interviewed last year by Supreme Master TV for one of their kids’ programmes. Being long-term fans of The Loving Hut, her vegan restaurant chain, we knew the Supreme Master Ching Hai, but never in a million years expected to be invited to share our work on her vegan TV channel. We were very, very excited, but also very, very scared!
Then, after doing the interview, we were told that the kids’ show for which it was filmed was being shut down 😮 So that was that 😀
But then, yesterday, more than a year after the interview was filmed, I got a message from Supreme Master TV saying that our interview was going to be on a different show. They showed us the finished video and it’s so much more than just the interview.
Thank you to all the lovely people at Supreme Master TV for the huge amount of work you’ve done on this. We love it!
By the way, in the video Miranda is dressed as Claudia – one of the Girl Scout Twins. I was supposed to dress up as Reflecto Girl but I wimped out 😀
And, to avoid any misunderstandings, it should also be noted that, though the artwork from the wonderful Oliver’s Vegetables is featured repeatedly in this video, that is only because we have read it in one of our Storytime videos. It’s not one of ours. It is written by Vivian French and the brilliant artwork is by Alison Bartlett.
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Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating funny, enlightening and sometimes action-packed vegan children’s books, poems and things to make & do, since 2012.
And the most popular story for 12 and up – Maddicts!
Have you read them yet?
What will you read next? There are tonnes of vegan children’s stories, with lovely vegan characters, to choose from on our stories and comics page. Read them for free, any time you like. 😀
What will you read next? There are tonnes of vegan children’s stories, with lovely vegan characters, to choose from on our stories and comics page. Read them for free, any time you like. 😀
What will you read next? There are tonnes of vegan children’s stories, with lovely vegan characters, to choose from on our stories and comics page. Read them for free, any time you like. 😀
Did you know that May is Get Caught Reading month? Reading is a great way to relax, to take your mind off whatever’s worrying you, or to lose yourself in adventure without leaving your armchair, deckchair or bathtub. I mean, one of the joys of reading is that you can do it pretty much anywhere, no power source required. Well, we’ve got a lot of reading suggestions for you.
If you’re looking for comics and stories of adventure, or ghost stories or fairy tales or hilarious naughtiness, we’ve got you covered! On the other hand, maybe you’d like the picture book about an alien with a funny name, or the one about a furry friend who bakes a cake, or the one about two little piglets on the run. Look no further – we’ve got the best selection of vegan-friendly storybooks around!
Even the seagulls love our books! 😀
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Violet’s Vegan Comics – creating funny, enlightening and sometimes action-packed vegan storybooks for readers of all ages, since 2012