Successful Swap

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Sometimes people add other items—toys and books—to the collection, but the chests are mainly used for wearables. The system is a fine way for many people to barter, to give, or to receive as they need with no hassles. Clothes swapping beats clothes shopping any day.

Grace Morton
Cambridge, Mass.

I recently decided to build a traditional Norwegian wood-burning kiln from some old plans I found (wood is a much cheaper fuel than oil or gas), but I couldn't afford to buy the firebricks I needed. When I told a farmer friend about my problem he offered me over 200 bricks from an oil burner that had heated his old, unused chicken barn if I'd fire his girlfriend's pottery along with mine. He also volunteered to give me all the manure I wanted for dung firing (another primitive way of firing pottery).

For some time I've been wanting to take riding lessons ... but the $5.00 an hour charge was a little out of my reach. Last week my riding teacher saw the quilt I'm making and offered to take a patchwork coverlet in place of money for lessons. Since I'm unemployed and have plenty of time to quilt (but little cash to spare), the deal seemed perfect. She gets a quilt and I get 15 lessons.

When I was in art school we students—who couldn't afford to purchase art pieces—traded our work. Swapping was a great way to start an art collection ... and, who knows, one of my friends might someday become famous.

This winter I had a bad case of "cabin fever" and longed to visit a city where I could go to museums and other public places. So I arranged to paint a mural on a friend's wall in exchange for six weeks of city living at her place . . . a real treat for an artist who spends most of her time in the country.

Tracy Perez
Vassalboro, Maine

Last fall Judy and I and our two dogs took a trip across the States with an eye out for possible homesteading areas.

We decided to hole up for the winter in southern California . . . a perfect place to enjoy the sunshine and some good friends before resuming our search in the spring. In one particular area—which has tremendous potential for avocado and citrus groves—land and rents are sky high. Finding a home was not an easy task.

One day a great gal named Irene picked up a copy of MOTHER and glanced through it, taking special notice of the Positions and Situations column. She's got a large place on two acres of land that her husband had tucked away for their retirement. Unfortunately, he died three years ago and Irene had neither the time nor money to keep it up. The home didn't have electricity, but Irene discovered through MOTHER that wall sockets don't mean all that much to a lot of us.

Well, to make a long story and cut six of the best months of our lives short, we moved in and swapped every imaginable type of clean-up, fix-up work for totally free (Irene took care of us as if we were her family), slow-paced country living.

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