Next week we can expect the next wave of baby goats (I thought Urania might have kidded last week, but apparently not ), and we’ve got a lot of baby rabbits as well (if anyone has rabbit cages or hutches out there for sale cheaply in reasonable driving distance, please let me know – I haven’t had time to build cages and the situation will be dire in a few weeks ).  We’ve got hens setting, chicks hatching and probably some ducklings due soon, so things are busting out all over.

It is becoming apparent we lost a lot last year from the perennial crops – the combination of flooding, a winter with some very low temps even though there was no snow cover, and the fact that flooding damaged fences letting some livestock at the perennials really did a number on us, so we’re working on restoration and building for more water in the future.  Hugelkultur works well in both wet and dry conditions, and lord knows, we have enough downed wood to build just about anything, so that’s part of my summer project, to rebuild some beds that way.  We’re also doing some new fencing and redesigning of pastures, so that’s a big time suck.

Otherwise, we’ve been mostly focused on getting everyone’s needs met and our eternally shifting family.  Oh, and despite my gigantic stash, I was totally unprepared to have three boys in the same sized (8) pants .  So there’s a lot of shopping going on as well.

Plant something: Potatoes, onions, rhubarb, carrots, beets, chard, kale, mizuna, lettuce, scallions, chives, thyme, sage, mint, dahlias, marigolds, pansies, sweet peas.

Harvest something: Nettles, chard, radishes, turnip greens, lettuce, eggs, milk, garlic mustard, ramps

Preserve something: Nope.

Waste Not: The usual feeding stuff to other stuff, collecting brush for hugelkultur.

Want Not: Got a huge stash increase two weeks ago, so I’m totally set for much younger kids – then got older kids .  Still you never know what the future will bring!  Building up stores of wheat, oats and beans a bit after a winter’s draw down as well.

Eat the Food:  We’ve eaten so much junk with the boys here because they are adapting from real and serious deprivation.  We had a great jambalaya, and I made some whole wheat pumpkin-chocolate bars, but that’s about the extent of it.

Build Community Food systems: Not much this week

Skill up: Does learning fart jokes from your kids count?

How about the rest of you?

Sharon

Busy time right now – getting the barns cleaned from winter is taking up a lot of time – we’ve  had a fair bit of rain and had to wait for some of the mud to dry up to haul barn cleaning stuff where we need it.  The good news is that a lot of compost is a very happy thing.

The weekend was spent celebrating Eli’s twelfth birthday – it was glorious and he really had a great time, mostly due to the warm weather – warm enough that the kids could swarm all over the creek.  All that time out in the sunshine watching kids play (including my visiting niece) may not have been productive, but boy was it nice.

Lots of seed starting going on right now, taking advantage of the warm weather to get things out to a good start – but I took the covers completely off my low hoops, figuring that I was much more likely to fry things than to get any advantage at night for this week.  Next week we go back to cooler weather.

Eleven baby bunnies this week, the first setting of chicks should hatch soon and all in all, new life coming apace.  Mina is due in mid-April, the rest of the does begin kidding in early May.

Plant something: Tomatoes, Huckleberries, Tomatillos, Ground Cherries, Marigolds, Calendula, Malva, Chamomile, Bok Choy, Cilantro, Dill, Cabbage, Kohlrabi, Celeriac, Root Parsley, Parsley, Sage, Geranium Cuttings, Lots of Lettuce, Basils, Mizuna, Arugula, Spinach, Peas, Fava Beans.

Harvest Something: Milk, Eggs, Lemon Verbena and Geranium cuttings, parsnips.

Preserve Something: Not a thing

Waste Not: Worked on cleaning out the garage, accepted six bags of summery girl’s clothes for the foster kid stash, kept most of it, passed some of it on.

Want Not: Ordered bread flour, oatmeal, pasta and beans in bulk.  Sold beef to my neighbors.

Eat the Food: Lots of salads of early greens and anything involving eggs – we are now egged for the forseeable future.  Time to start selling them again on a larger scale!

Build Community Food Systems: Volunteered on a new community garden project.

Skill Up: Working on a braided rag rug that won’t look stupid.

How about you?

Sharon

The big decision facing us is one that I never really anticipated – we were told that there was a significant need for foster parents in our area, and particularly for foster parents to take larger sibling groups, and assumed that our home would be full and busy.  At times this year it has been, but we’ve had no placements longer than a month, and none at all for the last two months, which leaves us wondering whether our county really needs us.

First, it leaves us wondering whether we should remain with our county or switch to an agency, or whether we should start seeking out children legally free for adoption from other places – so that’s one part of this.  Second, because we don’t have a stable placement situation, I’m not sure what new projects to take on for spring – three to five more kids are likely to cut into my time for new business projects, and I’d anticipated this might be a quiet year while our family adjusted, but given the absence of any kids, it isn’t clear where to go next – lots of decisions to make.

As the world reawakens, I’m also tense with anticipation of finding out for real what the long term garden damage caused by the flooding last year was – I haven’t made any commitments to selling perennial plants this year because I honestly don’t have the faintest idea what survived or will come back.  The total lack of snowcover (until last week) is also an issue – ironically, warmer winters are actually probably harder on my plants in many ways that our normal ones are.  Usually we can count on fairly consistent snow cover to provide insulation for perennials from bitterly cold temps – but not this year.  We only had a few short periods of really bitter cold, but without any snow, the plants got the full brunt of it.  The extreme weather fluctuations are tough too – consider that tonight’s low is expected to be 2 degrees here – and by Thursday we’re anticipating a high of 65 degrees.  If the weather forecast is right (and when is it?) this is the last stretch of cold weather for weeks, though, and spring is on its way – which will reveal many truths about my garden.

Despite my being on tenterhooks in a lot of ways, we have done a few useful things.  The rabbits are bred for babies in a few weeks, and on Thursday will move back outside for the rest of the year (they very successfully spent the winter on the sun porch).  Does are being dried off in anticipation of spring kidding, and we think almost everyone is bred (we hope ).  Plants are proliferating on every windowsill and seeds are being sown at fairly regular intervals.   At this point the next big dream is getting the barns cleaned out!

Progress on many fronts has been limited, but at least there’s some, and I swear this is the last time I will be sick or hurt for the forseeable future, dammit – too much to do to have the creeping crud!

Plant something: Tomatoes, Basil, lettuce, bok choy, nasturtiums, sweet peas, malva, kale, parsley, celeriac

Harvest something: Milk, eggs, sap

Preserve something: Made some maple syrup

Waste Not: Nothing New

Want Not: Nothing New

Eat de food: I haven’t been eating all that much lately, honestly – no innovative cooking as I’ve been busy coughing up a lung.

Build Community Food Systems: Worked on a community garden plan for a friend

Skill up: Totally mastered sitting on my ass .

Well, you all are going to be way ahead of me this week!

Sharon

That said, even when you know it is a sign of wrongness, it is hard not to appreciate less wood burned, easier barn access and more days outside for the critters.  The goats, unconcerned about climate change, do appreciate all the opportunities to follow me around and get in my way – everyone needs a dozen does to help them carry firewood (help here is defined as “stand in front of me and refuse to move, stick your face in the wood bin to check for any snacks left lying around, untie my shoelaces and then nibble my coat buttons), hay or water (tripping me while I’m doing the water is the little one’s favorite game).

The calves and our buck goat who gave us four cryptorchid babies this year went to the butcher on Tuesday, so we were able to open up the fence and move the remaining couple of bucks down the hill with the does.  The poultry (ducks and chickens) will move up to the barn that held the calves and bucks, for several reasons – first to get them further away from the house where they have been flying over the fence and trashing my perennials, and also because that gives us more space down the hill for goats.  Moving everything around is a bit of pain, but well worth it.  So was the baby beef operation we did this year – we are hoping to do more next year, since this was so successful.  We are also debating buying a heifer calf to be raised up as a milker as well.

Real seed starting (rather than the little bit of desultory stuff) commenced this week – early tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, flower and herbs that need a long season got started this week, along with some more things that require stratification.  I also took geranium cuttings for spring as well – both brightly colored red, white and pink, and lemon and rose scented.

I’m still pruning fruit trees, which I should have done earlier in the winter – normally early February isn’t too late, but this isn’t a normal winter.  The goats and the rabbits have eagerly devoured our offerings.

We had the first winter litter of rabbits when Marigold, one of our does kindled with 9 beautiful babies – this is the first time we’ve crossed our American Blues with the Cinnamons, and I’m anxious to see what color combinations we get, and also whether the Blue’s faster rate of growth gets transmitted.

A kind reader sent me a box of cloth diapers from her children (THANK YOU) and I’m expecting a few more, so I took the time to sort out what I’d saved from my own kids – it turns out that there was more than I thought that survived my children (and a lot of it had come from a friend of my mother’s with twins, so more than my four) including some wool diaper soakers and a few precious wool covers – my favorites.  I may knit a few other covers as well – but I’m glad to be able to cloth diaper again.

The foster stash is in increasingly good shape – which is a huge relief.   The main issue for me, given where we live, our one-vehicle situation, our ongoing schedules and Eric’s work schedule is that I may have to go four or five days before I can go shopping for children’s clothing, and yet the kids have to be dressed – and for visits or trips to synagogue, dressed fairly nicely.  I think I can now do that for just about all sizes, which is a huge relief – after all, no one either wants, in a house full of 7-10 overstimulated kids to either take all the children to a store or worse, be the one stays home with them alone while the other goes shopping – this gives me the time and space to get everyone settled without dragging kids out all the time.

We’ve managed to do almost all the major reorganization of the house, except for the garage (which will by necessity be done next week since we have to clean out the freezer in said garage to put the beef from butchering in).  We’ve now got the door between the kitchen and dining room gated, so that we can use the wood cookstove while foster kids are at our place (previously we tried to gate around it, but really can’t cook on it that way, so had just been only using the other stove).  There is still cleaning, sorting and organizing in small places yet, but we’re WAY ahead of what we’ve been.  I suspect it will all go to pot when we finally get a large sibling group placement that stays, but at least we start ahead.

I haven’t done much on  building up my pantry – actually, sort of the opposite, as we’ve been rearranging it, I’ve been working on us eating down some things.  Still, the time to build on this will come.

Skill-wise, the main thing I’ve been working on is figuring out whether couponing is worthwhile for us.  I’ve never bothered much since we purchase so few things at the supermarket.  Foster care, however, has changed some of that – besides the desire to sometimes offer familiar foods and snacks as kids transition to our home (we can work on food issues gradually, but comfort is the most important thing initially), we also now need more things like toothbrushes and toilet paper – and need toiletries that can go home or on to other placements with kids.  I’m still not totally clear on whether this is worth doing for us generally – while using the occasional good coupon is always nice, serious couponing and sale shopping requires a. more driving (in some cases, Eric goes past some of the stores coming from work some days) and often the best savings are found in buying the smallest sizes, which increases net packaging.  Still, I’m playing with running the numbers and seeing what we can make work for us within the bounds of our general environmental priorities.

Best of all, we began the week with a lovely celebration of Tu’Bshevat, the Jewish New Year of the Trees.  We ate fabulous things – including Key Lime pie (with limes brought back by a friend from a FL trip), Black Forest Cake (from cherries frozen over the summer by another friend), Banana Cream pie (from totally non-local bananas) and apricot-applesauce.  It was wretched and delicious excess, and a lovely time was had by all.  I celebrated the actual day by planting the seeds of some quinces and apples gone mushy to stratify.  It may be too late (I planted others in the fall) but hope springs eternal, which is kind of the point.

Ok, official results:

Plant something – Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplant, Hawthorn, Quince and Witch Hazel, Coneflowers, Galliarda, Geraniums, Eryngium, Echinops, Basil, Dianthus, Alyssum, Parsley.

Harvest something: Eggs, Milk, Beef and Chevon.  Also fruit tree prunings for bunnies and goaties.

Preserve something:  Nope.  Should can some applesauce from the soft apples, though.

Waste Not: All the sorting out and organizing have been great – the kids are thrilled with the exciting “new” things we find in the back of the attic or in boxes, and we’ve managed to give away a lot of good stuff.  Otherwise the usual composting and feeding wastes to various critters.

Want Not: I can’t take credit for the cloth diapers, but they were awesome!  I am totally out of peanut butter (our dumpster diving friend and our foster son’s WIC had us stocked for what seemed like eternity), so I need to add that.  I also will need to buy apples pretty soon – my kids eat 5 – 7 apples a day, and we use them in cooking, but this year’s supply didn’t keep as well as usual due to the warm temperatures.  We will buy a few bushels from the local coop.

Eat the food – Nothing really new.  We are eating the small hen turkeys we bought from a friend (we didn’t do turkeys this past year for reasons that were really stupid ) – at 13-14 lbs, they make two meals for a family of six straight and the one large pot of laotian chicken soup (basically chicken soup seasoned with lots of citrus juice and soy sauce and a bit of brown sugar, ginger, garlic and ciles until it is salty, hot,  sweet and sour, and then with added onions, canned pineapple (if we have it), and I usually stir brown rice in.  With a few extra ingredients, one chicken is 4-6 meals, depending on size and how many people are home.   The apple-apricot sauce was also really fabulous – a bunch of apples, some dried apricots (about 5-1 proportions), a little apple cider and a splash of vanilla.  You can add sugar if you want, but it doesn’t need it.  A hand blender, food mill or food processer all work equally well at smoothing it out if you want.  Just cook until the apricots are very soft and the apples are applesaucy.

Build community food systems: Not a thing

Skill up: Aforementioned coupon research.  That’s about it.

How about you?  You can report here or just stick in a link to your blog!

Sharon

The whole idea is to get the positive sense of your accomplishments – it is easy to think we haven’t done anything to move forward, but in fact, we all do, almost every day.  We just think of accomplishment as a big thing – a whole day spent putting up applesauce or a hundred tomato plants.  The Independence Day project makes us count our little accomplishments and see that we are moving forward.  So for each week, tell us what you have done in the following categories:

Plant something: A lot of us were trained to think of planting as done once a year, but if you start seeds, do season extension and succession plant, you’ll get much, much more out of your garden, so I try and plant something every day from February into September.

Harvest something: Everything counts – from the milk and eggs you get from your animals to the first dandelions from your yard to 50 bushels of tomatoes – it all counts.

Preserve something: Again, I find preserving is most productive if I try and do a little every day that there is anything, from the first dried raspberry leaves and jarred rhubarb to the last squashes at the end of the season.

Waste not: Reducing food waste, composting everything or feeding it to animals, reducing your use of disposables and creation of garbage, reusing things that would otherwise go to waste, making sure your preserved and stored foods are kept in good shape – all of these count.

Want Not: Adding to your food storage or stash of goods for emergencies, building up resources that will be useful in the long term.

Eat the Food: Making full and good use of what you have, making sure that you are getting everything you can from your food, trying new recipes and new cooking ideas, eating out of your storage!

Build community food systems: What have you done to help other people have better food access or to make your local food system more resilient?

And a new one: Skill up:  What did you learn this week that will help you in the future – could be as simple as fixing the faucet or as hard as building a shed, as simple as a new way of keeping records or as complicated as making shoes.  Whatever you are learning, you get a merit badge for it – this is important stuff.

Ok, you can sign up in comments, publicize on your blog and tell the world – let’s see what we can get done!

Happy Independence Days!

Sharon

We are back up to 1 billionish hungry people in the world, and 1/3 of all food goes to waste worldwide.  Now I’d like to say that none of it went to waste in my house – after all, I’ve been writing about food waste and food security issues for years, and I really have tried hard to ensure that everything gets eaten here.  It does – by someone.  But the best use of my lentil-kale soup is really feeding the people in my house, not the chickens, and embarassingly often, some human food gets fed to dogs, cats, rabbits or goats.

A summit of farmers and food policy experts in Germany makes the stakes clear:

Consumers in rich countries dispose of 220 million metric tons of food waste every year, equal to the entire food output of sub-Saharan Africa, Jose Graziano da Silva, the director general of the United Nations’ Food and Agriculture Organization, told 64 agriculture ministers meeting in Berlin over the weekend.

“We must change our way of thinking, we must have more education, we must have discussion about best-before dates,” German Agriculture Minister Ilse Aigner said. “Every food item thrown away is wasted.”

One third of the food produced in the world every year is lost or wasted, amounting to 1.3 billion metric tons, according to Graziano da Silva. As many as 925 million people faced hunger worldwide in 2010, based on the FAO’s most recent estimate.

In rich nations in the global north, the majority of food is lost not in the fields, but somewhere after it begins the process of getting to your table – in shipping, processing, at the store and in our homes.  In the global south most food is lost in the fields, due to lack of adequate capacity to process it.  Food loss in the global south could be reduced by very small increases in available resources – large scale dryer to dry grain crops damaged by moisture, dehydrators and collective refrigeration.  In the north, most of the food loss is *ENABLED* by our fossil energies – it gets freezer burned and tossed in the deep freeze, it gets damaged by fluctuating temperatures during long haul trucking, it isn’t pretty enough to sit out under flourescent lights or it turns green the fridge.  We use vastly more energy in our food system, waste similar amounts of food, but only after we pour fossil energies into it.

What does this have to do with the “eat the food” category of the Independence Days challenge?  Someone once observed to me that they found it harder to eat the kale, or get the green beans before they got overripe, or make sure they cooked with the organic vegetables they were buying at the farmer’s market than they did shopping or growing them, and I don’t think this is a unique experience.  Ultimately, the problem of managing the food in our pantries and our gardens and everywhere else is a task that requires an attention that most of us haven’t given in the same way that we may have given our attention to the learning curve of actually starting seeds or cooking.  We don’t want to waste, we don’t intend to waste, but the art of making full and good use of everything is one that we have not treated as requiring the same attention and thought as the rest of the food project.  There will never be a fully waste-less society, and indeed, our livestock are grateful for a little extra – but a little is what they need.

One of m goals for re-starting the Independence Days project, then, is to be more artful in my use of food, taking full enjoyment from what we have and ensuring we don’t over buy, don’t miss the windows of opportunity for enjoyment, and that we make good meals from what we have – all of it, whenever possible

Sharon

I’m debating expanding the categories a bit to cover non-food related sustainability activities, but I don’t want it to get too unwieldy – I’d welcome thoughts on how to do so, or what you’d like to see.

I’m also going to push the “challenge” part of this harder and publicize it more – after all, this is just plain fun stuff, right?

Thoughts?

Sharon

Let’s just say that in upstate NY, February 2 does not start spring, not even a little.  On the other hand, it does mark the point that humans and animals both begin getting really annoyed with winter .  I don’t usually allow myself this luxury until March, but for some reason this year I’m having a little trouble with it.  Meanwhile the goats are just plain cranky – they want grass, dammit.

The good news is that around now is also when I start in earnest getting ready for spring.  First the seed starting begins. I’ve already put some perennials on to stratify and seeded a few early herbs and flowers, mostly just to make the kids happy – they can’t wait to get things in the ground.  We’ve got lupine seedling and yarrows, and tiny sage leaves sticking up.  But the onions will begin in a week or two, as will any perennials I’m starting early for first year bloom, and then we move on to peppers and eggplant, so there’s hope yet.

Meanwhile, Arava and Bast are at least starting to show their pregnancies (they’ll be the first to be bred) and the junior does meet the goat of their dreams in a couple of weeks.  I’m hoping all the information for joining my vegetable and herb plant CSA will be up by the end of next week, and the herb CSA will follow.  We’ve got chicks coming in mid-February (they’ll live by the woodstove for the first few weeks) and will be boarding a friend’s baby goat (she won it as a prize!) soon.  So things are going on under the surface.

Our first home visit from the social worker is Tuesday, so we’re cleaning the house and trying to look like we’ve got our lives together .  I’ve got the garden calendar underway, and am working on marketing plans.   It is a good time for cutting wood, harvesting barks and enjoying peace and quiet, at least if we ever get any .

We’ve used up a lot of last year’s preserves and root cellar produce, and more has to be used.  Now is the time when we count jars on the fingers of one hand, and try to save things for special occasions -the last jar of raspberry jam, the last of kimchi, the last of whole tomatoes, the last hubbard squash.  Such things are bittersweet – we won’t miss them once spring comes in but they remind us why late winter and early spring were called “the starving time.”  We won’t starve, but we do feel that it is worth experiencing the sense of not having everything outside its time, and enduring some minor privation.  Still, eating store jam is privation enough .

Otherwise, we’re mostly dreaming of the real spring – of the days when we start taking daily peeper walks and the first green shoots pop up.  But that’s not for a while yet – under our 18 inch blanket of white, things are waiting, and so are we.

Plant something: Lupines, yarrow, sage, snapdragons.

Harvest something: Eggs, milk, sprouts

Preserve something: Not a thing

Waste not: We’ve been getting rid of some old expired canned goods by mixing them into dog food, otherwise the usual composting and feeding things to other things.

Want Not: Seed orders!!!  Woot!!!

Eat the Food: Lots of veggies getting towards their end, the last of everything.   Lots of stuffed cabbage, too, since we’re on a kick.

Build community food systems: Gave a bunch of radio interviews on food and gardens!  Am arranging a kosher slaughter workshop for my region, and starting up my CSAs!

How about you?

The dreaming and planning is the more acute right now because so many of my other enterprises depend on this – particularly the bedding and native plant sales.  I’m hoping to have all the information about my seed starting CSA up within a week or two, allowing people to choose their plant varieties from a good, wide list (oh, heavens, I’ll have to buy more seed varieties…how…terrible!).  I’m also totting up what seed I have left from last year and making garden plans.  I’ll put the CSA information up as soon as I can get it all together.  I’m also plotting open farm days for plant pickup, and where I might do drop off in Albany, Schenectady and other local spots.

All six of the senior does seem to be settled now, with breeding due dates from early April to early May.  The junior does (last year’s babies) will be bred in February for July kidding.  Among other things, I’m curious if the reason we’ve had so many singles (when Nigerian Dwarves are generally famous for multiples) is that we’ve been breeding out of season.  Someone suggested to me that they had more babies in season, even though they breed well year round.  Curious to experiment – not so much because I want more babies, but because singles are actually harder to deliver than twins or triplets since they tend to be bigger, with much bigger heads. 

I’ll breed the rabbits in February as well for spring kindling.    I’m also awaiting my poultry catalogs, since I need to replace a lot of my older layers. I’m also thinking of purchasing an incubator – we’ve had uneven results from setting hens, particularly with the duck eggs, and I’m looking for greater control and consistency.  If you have one, do you recommend it?  Which one?  Also, has anyone tried crossing Speckled Sussex and RI Red chickens to produce a sexable (males are white, females speckled or red) dual purpose bird?  I’ve used Sussex in my crosses before, but not in this combination, and have had it recommended to me.

There’s a lot of management of food this time of year – making sure that the apples that go wrinkly get used first, and that any carrots that go soft go to the rabbits and goats.  Some of the squash that don’t keep as well are coming to the end of their season and need to be cooked or dried or frozen.  I make some applesauce and can it now and again, but mostly this is a quiet time, and the jars proliferate like mad on the shelves as they get emptied out.

Besides the seed and poultry catalogs, there are the bee catalogs.  From one thing and another last year, while I spent much of the winter planning to, I never got bees.  This year, Eric asked for them for a 40th birthday present from his Mom, so now we’re getting our act together. I’m not sure his Mom was totally ecstatic to give him tens of thousands of bugs for his birthday, but she’s convinced he really does want them!

The big project right now is cleaning out and decluttering.  Oh, and recluttering. Our decision to adopt more kids made me realize that I should probably stop getting rid of all the stuff Asher has outgrown – for so many years I kept every size clothing from newborn to well, now 18.  I was thrilled when Asher finally outgrew it and I could get rid of most of it, but of course, the odds are good that at least one if not both of the kids we adopt will be smaller (even if not younger) than Asher – the kid is huge, with 2 inches and 1 lb being all that separate him from his 2-years-older brother.  I’ve given away a lot of the 2-4t stuff, but I’m saving what I’ve got left, and stopping putting away all the board books and the younger kid books.

The first home visit won’t be for a few weeks, but my goal is to get the room any new kids will move into basically set up, not to presume too much, but just because we’ve got the space and I might as well move what’s going to be in there anyway in earlier.  I don’t have beds for kids – I’ll have to keep my eye out on Craigslist for some bunkbeds or something – but I already have the dressers (bed and a dresser for each kid is required) left over from Eric’s grandparents, and I can move some of the extra kids’ books and beanbag chairs and things in to the room.  I have to buy a door, though – for some reason that front room never had one.

The room the kids will be moving into had been a guest room and my sewing and yarn space – I have *tons* of yarn, since a store near me went out of business and the proprietor (a friend) sold a lot of it to me for 10 cents on the dollar or less.  I’ve barely been knitting this past year – I spent so much time sitting in front of the computer that it was hard to organize myself for sedentary activities, but cleaning out and moving the yarn around has me excited to knit again, and lord knows, the kids can always use more hats and mittens!  Particularly since Asher likes to wear mittens in the house, which doesn’t exactly contribute to ease of location later.

Ok, onwards:

Plant something: Nada

Harvest something: a few greens out from the snow during the warm spell, mint, rosemary and lemon verbena from overwintered indoor plants.

Preserve something: A few jars of applesauce, dried some willow bark, froze some extra squash.

Waste Not: Well, I’m working on using up all that yarn!  Otherwise, the usual managing stores and feeding things to other things.

Want Not: Replaced two winter coats – Eli’s because he’s grown *again* – his coat was fine in October, but his wrists were hanging out by December and Isaiah because of an irreparrable zipper.  Got everything from after holiday sales.  Also stocked up on spices.

Eat the food: We’ve been letting the kids choose meals and help cook, so we’ve eaten a lot of good stuff lately.  I forgot how much we all love stuffed cabbage.   We made shishkebabs with grilled marinated root vegetables and tempeh, and more conventional ones with chicken, and rice pilaf.  I’ve also been trying recipes from cookbooks for my “31 Books” series over at the Science blogs site www.scienceblogs.com/casaubonsbook. 

Build Community Food Systems: Have arranged some talks and projects – I’m also plotting open farm days – thinking of having one in April, one in May and one in July.

How about you?

Sharon

The tulips went in last week and were promptly dug up by my damned chickens, who keep sneaking into the fenced yard. The problem was largely resolved by the reintroduction of something in a missing species niche – ie, we put the dogs in the side yard to defend the tulip bulbs with their lives. 

The hens have just about stopped laying, so I actually bought eggs to make enough pumpkin pie.  We probably should light the hen house, but the results have never been impressive, and I tend to think that the hens need their quiet time too, just like I do in the winter.

The big news is that the goats are being bred for spring babies – older does only.  Bast, Arava and Jessie have already had their day, with Mina, Maia and Selene yet to go.  Frodo is happy as a clam!

I have a bit more late garlic to go in, and a few more bulbs, and then I’m done.  But my next garden project starts almost immediately – I have to set up the seeds to winter-stratify outside – so many of the medicinals do best when they’ve had a nice period of cold. 

We have to get the rest of the firewood under cover, and the rest of the hay moved over to the barn, but after that, winter can come, and I’m ready to settle in. I’m hoping to get most of the major projects done by the end of this week – it will be a quiet one, with guests only for the actual day of Thanksgiving, and Eric is off for most of the week, so we’ll get a lot done. 

For Thanksgiving, we’re having our usual turkey, plus our friend Joe makes Peking Duck (he’s half chinese and not from turkey) as well, which is a lot of fun.  Otherwise, we’re traditional – we’ll be eating the enormous Hubbard squash that Mac the Pyr is afraid of (vengeance!) and there’ll be the usual roots and sweets.  We already have had pumpkin pie – that’s what Simon wanted as his birthday “cake” and I’m always amazed at how delicious those winter luxury pumpkins are – they are far and away the best pie pumpkin on the earth.

I cleaned out and moved the food storage over, and found some ummm..tasty snacks for the chickens.  Let’s just say that I can’t think of any good reason why there would be baby food in my food storage, given that the baby is five, but so there was .

I managed to get some of the pruning done, but I really need another afternoon with the shears.  The buns are moved to their winter quarters in the hay barn, so winter preps are coming together. I’ve got to knit faster, though, since the boys are expecting hats and mittens!

After all the chaos, it feels like we’re coming into a homestretch of sorts – that life is getting manageable. I’ve been travelling way too much – I’ve averaged twice a month, which is just too hectic and taking up too much of my mental space.  It is the season of the year to cuddle in, and I just want to be at home.  And now I am.

Plant something: Tulips, daffodils, hyacinths (ground and pots for forcing).

Harvest something: Turnips, beets, kale, chard, bok choy, arugula, turnip greens, pea shoots, jerusalem artichokes, chinese cabbage, burdock root

Preserve something: Canned up some applesauce, dried burdock root

Waste Not: Fed babyfood and a few other things to chickens, collected lots of leaves for mulch, fertility and goat snacks.

Want Not: Sorted through the blankets and flannels and mended a lot.

Eat the food: Pumpkin pie!  Shepherd’s pie (I had extra pie crust) with veggies.  My first lamb and lentil soup of the season!  Massaman curried root vegetables. 

Build community food systems: Did a talk in Albany about our local food system.

How about you?  And what are you cooking this week?

Sharon