Cu Dona Valley

Homemade Christmas part 2- Gifts!

2014-12-09T10:07:00.002-05:00

Ok hubby has promised me he won't visit the blog before Christmas (and if he does he only ruins his own surprise!) so I'll tell you a bit about the homemade gift projects I have on the go.

I'll start with the easy part, the baby. It's his first Christmas, he's only 9 months old, he doesn't really know what's going on, but he might just find it fun to tear the paper! For him, I'm making a fleece sleep sac, since he's suddenly so long his feet touch the bottom of the ones he has now. I might make two if I have enough fabric. I'm also going to make him some little mittens, since the stores don't seem to sell anything besides thin scratch mittens for babies under two. I might also knit a muffler for his face. This way he'll be warm and toasty on our sleigh rides with kaylee. I also bought him 4 little books because reading is so important! It was $10 for all four of them, how could I refuse?

For Andrew, I'm making him a cozy warm flannel shirt that he can wear when we're reenacting in cool weather. It is appropriate for the time period, but it isn't part of his uniform, so it will be something he wears when we're hanging out in camp. Because I can and because it's more authentic looking, I am hand stitching the whole thing. I kinda let the cat out of the bag on this one by asking him what he thought of the fabric too close to when I took his measurements, but at least it means I can still be working on Xmas gifts when he's home and awake.

I made AMAZING (if I do say so myself, and I clearly do,) venison jerky a few weeks back out of a venison roast my dad gave to us. I cleverly pulled out a tidy bundle of strips and wrapped them up and hid them in the deep recesses of the freezer, so those will make an appearance in his stocking. I am also knitting him a pair of fingerless mittens for the stocking.

One of the smallest gifts, though also proving to be the most work, is a small wooden bear I am whittling for him (pictured above). I've never done any whittling in my life, but I was given a whittling knife, and one day in the fall I grabbed a cut off scrap of a 2x4 that was lying in the driveway and thought "lets see what it can become". He needs a little bit more work, and then I think I'll take some sand paper over a few spots and maybe finish it with some melted beeswax and a little oil? I'm not too sure what I'm doing, I'm kinda out of my depth when it comes to woodwork, but I'm having fun.

There might be a few other things, but I'm trying not to get carried away with great ideas until I see how much I can actually get done! I'll post more pictures as things progress to photogenic stages.

Top gifts for gardeners

2014-11-30T07:33:00.001-05:00

Ok I don't know how many trowels a girl needs, but those little three tined rakes that seem to always come with them are- in my opinion- totally useless. And everybody thinks they should give them to their gardening pal. Because she doesn't already have a set, surely. And those cute stepping stones/gnomes... More decoration means less space for plants people! So if you want to show the gardeners in your life you care with a meaningful, useful gift, here are my top picks:
(Keep in mind, I'm all about maximizing food to feed my family, and maintaining the health of the soil for next year. My garden is my pantry. If your gardener is raising prize begonias to enter in fancy flower competitions... Well, I'm a little out of my depth. Their needs may be different)

1. Seeds!

Seeds make a wonderful gift. Do you grow a variety s/he's always loved and admired? Save some seeds for a really personal and meaningful gift.
Or give the gift of a seed catalogue from a company such as seed savers exchange, or veseys or stokes. Let them drool over the rainbow of varieties, and then offer to pay for the seeds they pick out for next years garden. (My mother in law is paying for my seed savers order this year, and it is hands down the best gift she's ever given me!)
Who doesn't want to start planning ahead for sunshine and green things in the middle of winter? It's like a mini, mental vacation.

2. Gloves

This might seem like it goes in the same category with owning ten trowel sets, but it isn't. Gloves wear out. I burn through at least a pair a year, usually when I'm doing the heavy spring work like adding compost and tilling/cultivating the soil. Also, I'm fairly certain there are creatures who live in garden sheds and steal them. These creatures are a lesser known variant of the ones who steal socks from the dryer.
I have small hands and I hate big, clumsy gloves with long floppy fingers. They complicate every gardening task. My current favourite gloves are digz signature series, they fit great, are comfortable and give me the protection I need.

3. Subscriptions/ memberships

Another good one is a subscription to a gardening or farming magazine such as Mother Earth news, or any other magazine she likes. Bonus points (in my opinion) if it's a magazine she can receive and read on a tablet/ereader/computer. Saves paper and it's less clutter, though I do understand why some people still like the feel of paper in their fingers.
Alternatively, you could get them a membership where they like to buy their gardening products. Many of the memberships support good work (like saving varieties of scarce heirloom vegetables) and your friend will get a discount all year long when she shops.

4. Canning Gift Basket

If your friend grows food like I do, it's likely they preserve the food they grow too. The canning supplies that get used up and need replacing always make a welcome, practical gift. Try putting together a basket with the flat parts of mason jar lids (it's recommended you only use those once), pickling spices, pickling salt, pectin, cheese cloth, jar labels or a marker designed to write on glass, maybe even some more jars (I never feel I have enough... And I have a lot!). You can spring for any pieces of equipment that would make her life easier but that she's too thrifty to buy herself and makes do without. A food mill for instance, or a mortar and pestle, perhaps even a canning pot.

Those are my top picks for gardener gifts, what are you giving your gardeners this year? And gardeners, what are you hoping Santa brings this year?

Homemade Christmas, Part 1- Ornaments

2014-11-27T11:16:00.000-05:00

Last Tuesday I had my mom, my brother's girlfriend Nicole, and my bestie Christina over to the house. It was a day of making Christmas, and it was a tonne of fun. Nicole made some awesome little snow globes out of mason jars with dollar store ornaments inside that were just so charming and sweet, I wish I'd taken a picture. She wrapped and glued twine around the lid of the jar (the base of the snow globe) and added a little raffia bow, and it was just so rustic and lovely.

I made a batch of these charming cinnamon ornaments. They're the easiest darn things, there's only two ingredients: equal parts of cinnamon, and applesauce. In this case I used a cup of each. If your apple sauce is a little wet (my homemade apple sauce always seems runnier than the store bought stuff) you might need a little extra cinnamon. The dough shouldn't be so wet that it is goopy and sticks to your hands, but if you make it too dry it will crack and not hold together. The dough doesn't do so well with a lot of handling/shaping, so I just roll it out and use a cookie cutter, then use a straw to poke a hole to hang it by. Then I bake/dry them in the oven at the lowest possible setting with the door propped open a little to let moisture out. They're done when they're mostly hard, mine had a bit of give in the middle when poked still, but I left them on the table overnight and they finished drying on their own. You could just let them air dry, but it takes days. The hearts here are maybe two and a half inches across and an inch and a half tall, the recipe made about 30 of them, and only one cracked on me while I was trying to thread the string through it!

My mom, inspired by the Table Runner that we made her for christmas 3 years ago, found some birch branches and had dad slice them into 1/4 inch thick rounds for us to get crafty with. We keep using birch rather than some other woods because I was told it's less likely to crack as it dries out.

With the help of a wood burning tool and some twine we turned out some pretty neat snowflake and woodland animal ornaments, and a couple of Christmas-y banners like the one above.

Wood burning tools are easy to use, and fun, but of course also dangerous, so use with care, they get extremely hot. They can be picked up for $10-20 at most craft stores or hardware stores. You just plug it in, wait for it to get hot, and write or draw with it like a pen. It takes a while to get the knack for how fast it will burn the wood, and sometimes it'll catch the grain of the wood and skip along trying to follow that if you're not careful. The edge of each ring is tougher so it will take longer to burn and if you try to go too fast the tip will turn aside and follow the softer wood between the rings. Go slowly.

The last thing I made that day is a garland for the tree. Here it's strung up in my door way to keep it from getting crushed until our tree goes up. All I did was take strips of paper from an old book that was falling apart, fold them accordion style, and cut out little hearts, making sure to leave a section of the edges intact, like making paper dolly chains. Then I took a huge darning needle and some twine and poked it through the center of each heart and when they were all on the string, starting from the needle end, carefully spread them all open. It really didn't take that long, and I think it's gonna look great on the tree.

I've got plans for more, but that's all I've got for now.

Homemade Christmas

2014-11-27T08:37:00.001-05:00

"It came without ribbons. It came without tags. It came without packages, boxes or bags. (...) What if Christmas, he thought, doesn't come from a store. What if Christmas, perhaps, means a little bit more.”

- Dr. Seuss

This year I am opting out of all the crazy commercialization and going for a homemade christmas. In a several part series, I'll detail what I'm doing to make this house diy festive, from homemade tree ornaments and home decor, to christmas candies and treats, and homemade christmas presents. I figure Connor's too young to think it's lame, and my hubby isn't really needing or wanting for much, so it's a good time to do it. I will be purchasing one gift (maybe two?) for him, but the rest will be handmade.

I'm not forsaking any of the christmas trappings and trimmings we already have, but the truth is we don't have many. Last year was our first christmas, and we didn't really do a tree, so we've got a few rag tag ornaments we've collected over the years, but nothing substantial. Not enough to decorate a whole tree with. I'll be using flour-salt dough ornaments, cinnamon ornaments, birch biscuits decorated with a wood burner and some paper crafts. I also want to try some dried fruit decor, with a cranberry string and dried orange slices. We are getting a real tree this year, and I'm so excited! I've always wanted one and never could because of my family's allergies.

I'm also going to attempt to make some candy canes, and hard candies. Perhaps a batch of fudge? And of course, make up some of my hubby's favourite- Shortbread Cookies!

I'll also detail the gifts I'm making, but first I need promises that he won't visit this site until after the gift giving is done!

What are you doing to make christmas a little more sentimental this year? Join me, and lets make a Homemade Christmas!

New Gardens

2014-11-26T10:52:00.000-05:00

This is what my garden looked like this summer. Hubby built me three new garden boxes, 3'x10' in one long row along the fence there, and in the back you can see my gorgeous new wooden compost pile. I'm not using food scraps in it at the moment because there is a municipal compost program here, and it's just easier than trying to keep the critters out of it, but for garden trimmings, grass clippings and fall leaves it's just the ticket. This year I grew potatoes, green and yellow zucchini, kale, black krim tomatoes, carrots, snap beans, straight neck squash, cucumbers and onions. There was a lot of bed space that wasn't well used, but it wasn't bad. I got 50 lbs of food out of there this year, just including the stuff I remembered to weigh (not beans munched on here and there, or a handful of kale and a zucc hastily picked for dinner). Next year I plan to use all three beds more fully and the potatoes will be in a separate "tire tower", so hopefully the yields will be even higher. I want to get a good kitchen scale and keep a log book beside it and keep track of every ounce of edibles that come from the dirt here. My fairly modest goal is a pound per sq. foot, so 92 lbs of food. I think it's doable. There are some old window panes in the garage that I'd like to rig up into a little hot bed to keep hearty greens going longer into the fall, I also want to try letting some carrots winter in the ground.

Buddies

2014-11-26T10:34:00.001-05:00

It's love.

My Cu Dona

2014-11-26T10:25:00.000-05:00

So, I suppose I should tell you a little about my "bad dog" since I realized I haven't introduced her on the blog yet. This is Kaylee. I suppose we took her in just shortly after I stopped writing the blog. She comes from the far north, we got her in Moosonee, but she was born in Attiwapiskat.
One of the fellows working for the MNR up there came across a den of puppies left orphaned after one of the nuisance dog round ups. There were as many pups as there were MNR... er... officers I suppose? living up there, and moved by sentiment, they each decided to keep one of the pups. The man who took in Kaylee (he had called her Tweezer... we changed it) had an uncle who lived next door to our trailer. He left the pup with this uncle, saying he'd come back for her when his 6 month posting in Atta was up, and he moved back to Sudbury. The uncle had small children and an allergic wife and was now faced with a rambunctious, exuberant, bitey, strong, shedding pup who had never been exposed much to people, spent the first winter of her tender life out of doors living rough in the extremes, and had never been in a house. Certainly wasn't potty trained. But he meant well by her, after all, it was only temporary, and so he put up a chain link fence in the back yard with a snug little house and she seemed happy enough. She was better off than most dogs who run loose, she was protected from round ups, fed daily, and sheltered from the worst of the weather.
Come damp spring and humid boggy summer, that little pen was quickly torn up to a mud pit by the relentless pacing of a husky mix born to trot along tirelessly for hours on end. The flies and mosquitoes that kept us all inside crawled all over her eyes and ears and constantly stung and bit her. She was walked, but not often, and with pent up energy and a flat buckle collar, she took the poor uncle for a drag each time they went out. Her "owner's" contract had ended and he was back in Sudbury, making no move to reclaim his dog.
The pen butted up against our yard. When I'd go outside to rake the lawn or trim back the brush she would stare wistfully at me through the fencing and whine gently. I was feeling a little lonely, and missed having a dog, so I waited until the neighbour was out in the yard one day and walked over and asked him could I start walking her? The exercise would be good for both of us, and I thought maybe I could help with her relentless pacing, and maybe train her a little so she would be easier for him to walk.
That's when he told me her story, and explained that he really didn't think the backyard pen was a fair solution for her long term, and that they were going to be looking for a new home for her. One moment please... hold the phone... let me go consult with my husband.
He was smart enough not to argue with his pregnant wife who told him with tear filled eyes how lonely she is when he's gone to work all day, and just how much a companion would mean to me. We both had concerns however. This dog was.... raw. Raw is the best way I can describe her, and very wild. With a baby on the way, would she be safe? So, I said let me try her for a week. I'm a fair hand at dog training, and while she won't be perfect in a week certainly, I figured I'd have a pretty good idea of whether she would turn out ok, or whether she was just too much dog for our young family.
She was very rough around the edges, scared of all the things in a people house... the steps to get inside, the hum of the fridge motor, the dvd tray popping out of the machine, the toaster. She played hard and had no "off switch" once she got going, we pretty much had to throw her outside by herself for a while to cool off. Her play bites broke skin. She would scratch and paw at people. She sure wasn't potty trained (though she did learn quickly). She was very food agressive. I had my doubts the first few days, but I could really see the potential in her. She came to trust and love us. I walked her for over an hour every day in all weather, which really made a big difference. And I use a halti, which puts pressure on her nose rather than a collar around her neck. She may be only 40 lbs, but she is STRONG and she was born to pull things. Yep, I could work with this, I decided, and so we named her Kaylee, and decided to keep her.
In the winter I bought her a harness, and we learned the ins and outs of hauling with dog power. Quality food made her eyes bright and her coat shine, she was healthy, vibrant, and did I mention STRONG!? She settled down into life in a people house incredibly fast. She has become a brilliant companion for our son. When he was little and helpless she was very respectful of his space, and now that he's more active, she's his partner in crime. He thinks up mischief she would never dream of on her own (like raiding the diaper bag for cookies) and she uses her strength and coordination to help him implement his devious little plans. He bites her ears, pulls fur out of her tail, plays with the tags on her collar, steals her bone right out of her mouth and even tries to eat out of her dish. She takes it all in stride, and licks his feet until he giggles. She was, in fact, the first thing he ever laughed at. We rigged up a baby sled for her to pull him around in, and both seem to enjoy our outings (though, the road crews here are far too diligent for our liking, we practically have to drop everything and go when we see it start to snow.).
In short, she turned into an amazing dog, one of the best pets I've ever had. And if she sometimes jumps up on guests and happens to think one corner of my garden is her personal litter box, well, I suppose it could be worse!

Rebranding

2014-11-17T21:19:00.001-05:00

Hiya folks. If any of you are still with me, you've noticed I've been away for a while. I could say that life got busy, I was working full time, pregnant, and then a mommy, the whole usual story. It would all be true, but not the true reason I left.

I felt like a bit of a fraud.

I felt like I had no new, meaningful things to talk about. The byline suggesting I was working on acquiring a farm. Lets face it, if I win the lotto tomorrow it's first on my hit list, but otherwise it's gonna be decades at least. I wasn't doing much in the way of using my homesteading skills where I was. I was living way north and nowhere permanent to do anything meaningful, I abandoned 2 sets of gardens, and a beautiful compost bin before getting anything to show for either investment of time, effort and money. Food made me ill, I really didn't want to talk about that. So I left.

Now I'm back. Both on the blog, and back in the city. I've been up to all kinds of good things that I keep thinking would be fun to blog about, and thought it was about time I made a come back, rather than just sighing whimsically while taking pictures of "boot sauce" that will never see the light of day outside of my own camera.

Cathartica farm sounded misleading. I don't have a farm. And there are no Cathartica or Buckthorn trees growing here, so it was just kinda silly. So, Cu Dona Valley.

Cu Dona is gaelic, it means bad dog. She isn't really a bad dog, but she does have moments of naughtiness. Usually it means I've failed her, she needs more exercise than she's gotten and turned her sharp little mind and boundless energy to other pursuits. I call her my cu dona lovingly. The "valley" part is a bit of self deprecating humour. Through years of neglect, when all the neighbours were studiously adding fill and topsoil to their yards and building them up with soil retaining grasses, the lot at this poor house was growing a smattering of scraggly weeds and gradually becoming the low point in the neighbourhood. It floods in the spring, or really, any good rain. We're working on it.

So, we're in an elderly house in disrepair with a shabby, ill kempt yard, and trying to turn it into something beautiful. Already we've done much cosmetically (painted the kitchen cabinets and given them new hardware, painted.... well, every wall in the house, replaced some of the flooring, totally redone the bathroom, added new window dressings etc) in the house, taken out some old and dangerous trees that were damaged by the ice storms last winter (the sawdust helped sop up some of the lake, and the grass seemed to like to grow in it? Which I wouldn't have guessed, but am happy about). We've temporarily mended the fence and will replace it next year. Built two whole new walls for the leaning, leaky, garage and put a new roof on it. Should be sound and tight through the winter. We've built 3 raised garden beds that are 3x10, and a compost bin, and I've planted red currant, blueberry and rhubarb plants. This year I harvested roughly 50 lbs of produce from my garden. Not a bad start, but not great either. As I sit here shivering and listening to the wind howl through the place, I mentally note that windows and doors are up next on the to-do list.

I could say more, but its late and, well, I'm a mommy now, and Connor likes to wake up at the crack of dawn, so I better shuffle myself off to bed.

If you've stuck with me from Cathartica Farm, bless you, and if you're new to Cu Dona Valley, welcome and I hope I write some stuff that makes you think. I promise not to sound as preachy as those last few posts. Yikes, I blame pregnancy. It's weird man.

Gardens!!

2013-09-08T12:19:00.002-04:00

So one of the days last week that I was at work and my wonderful hubby had some time on his hands, he built me these!!

It's not going to be a whole terrible lot of space, but each box is 3x6, and that adds up to a lot more garden than I had last year! As of today, both beds are covered in a thick mulch of dead grass I spent the last couple weeks raking up out of the lawn. I'll add any fall leaves that accumulate over the next month or so, and then staple some burlap over the frames to hold it all in place and keep it from blowing away. Then come spring, it should be broken down enough to turn into the earth and make for good planting, and help add some air space into our densely packed, clay-ish soil. This is the plan anyways, we shall see.

Coming up soon- compost bin. We figured the best we could do is just go ahead and try it. If the bears bother it and it becomes a liability, well then so be it, but in the mean time we're gonna give it a go.

Folks, This Ain't Normal!

2013-08-31T20:42:00.000-04:00

This is the book I was reading this week, and it was incredible. I had heard of Joel Salatin, I had a rough idea of what he does even. Better grass makes better animals, so feed your grass, and then feed grass to your herbivores. That's really all I know. I'd heard a couple of the catch phrases he often uses, like salad bar beef, and pigerator pork, but I didn't really know what was behind these little slogans. What made these food animals so special? I didn't really know, but I thought it was about time I found out.

I loved this book. I thought I was pretty hip to a lot of the issues he would be talking about in his book. How cheap commodity corn and soy are the ruination of our food system, and how we look for increasingly bizarre ways to process and recombine these products into different "food items" to keep feeding the coffers, so we can keep subsidizing cheap commodity corn. How local food is important. Yeah yeah, I got it, I read the 100 mile diet (another great read, fyi). I was wrong. Yes, I have been introduced to a lot of these topics, but I've been introduced to them largely as a consumer. It was really interesting to hear about them from the other side of the fence, the farmer's side. Sure, we the eaters say rah rah, give us local food, grr to the industrial system, why is everyone so lazy, why don't more people provide food on a more reasonable scale near where we all live? It made me think to hear about it from the other side. How fear, and paranoia and a lot of mutual stroke jobs go into creating systems that require close monitoring to keep us "safe" and governmental agencies that institute prohibitive and expensive policies for regulating food that the little guys can't afford to comply with. And since it's illegal not to, they either cave to the pressure, build the infrastructure and turn into an industrial food monoculture like everyone else, or get out of dodge and leave the farm. It's not sloth, it's fear.

And the way that polyface farm is run is innovative, yet ancient. Uses new technology and old, old ideas of normal. The basic premise of the farm is to mimic natural patterns as closely as possible to express the natural behaviours of each part of the food chain, and ensure the greatest health of each element of each species through what they all offer to each other. Cows move about in mob grazing pens that stimulate maximum healthy growth of the grass, weeds and herbs (the "salad bar") and restart the carbon sequestration cycle with each pass. Chickens follow the cows, scratching apart the cow pats to keep down on parasite and insect infestation by eating the larvae growing in the poop. This gives the chickens a protein rich diet that helps them to thrive. In the winter, those cows need to be kept in a barn, but they're kept on deep bedding that gets layered on throughout the winter. It stays smelling great, and then in the spring when the cows go out to pasture, the pigs are introduced who hungrily go after fermenting corn in the bedding. This turns it, aerating it (hence, pigerator) and helping it break down into compost, that goes back out to fertilize the market garden and pastures. This is a vast simplification of the vast network of interconnected, looping synergies and symbiotic relationships that makes up polyface farms, but know that I will forever rethink my definition of "proper farming". If you want to know more about his farm (and you should!) please pick up this book, or one of his others, such as "holy cows, hog heaven", or "Everything I want to do is Illegal". I'm waiting on the former right now, should be here from chapters.ca by Tuesday, but in that sad lull I feel between books, that feels like forever.

It was a lot of book to wrap the noodle around. I love reading books like this, and like the omnivore's dilemma (which does actually talk about Joel and Polyface farms now that I think about it...) and the 100 mile diet, but they take some time to process. To really let the message sink in. To take the facts and figures and give them the time to penetrate my reality (because lets face it, numbers are prone to roll off me like water off a duck's back). I find myself reading chunks, starting to go cross eyed (not quite literally) and then needing to take a break to process and turn over what I've learned before I'm ready to take in another chunk. Much like trying to digest real, nutrient dense food rather than cheese doodles. This isn't a fluffy beach read. But it's a read that matters.

Crazy Weather...

2013-08-31T12:10:00.003-04:00

Thursday was hot. I didn't check the weather network, so I don't know how hot, I just know that I couldn't find anything to wear that fit my growing bump, and was loose enough and light enough to keep me cool. The kind of day you drink gallons of water and just feel wilted. We went to bed with all the windows open and just a sheet. A cold front moved in over night, and I woke up shivering hard. Despite bundling up, I had a hard time getting warm all day. By last night, the temperature had gone down to almost zero! Now, it's back up in the low teens, and raining. Neither of these extremes is particularly uncomfortable really, but when it yo-yo's like that it seems harder to acclimatize to. Hard to choose what to wear for the day. I love when the temperature slowly creeps down, and you can feel fall slowly encircle us with her fingers. This is like being plucked out of bed in the middle of a nice dream, then dropped on your head!

Real Food, Real Wastes.

2013-08-27T16:29:00.000-04:00

If you eat a lot of processed, pre-packaged foods, not only do you feel crappy, but with the packaging, and the production processes, you pretty much are left feeling like you raped the Earth (or at least, I am). But if you make a lot of whole, real foods from scratch, you end up with a lot of totally different kinds of waste, and again, at least where I currently live, you're left feeling like you raped the Earth.

I've always lived in a town with a municipal compost program in place. At the very least since I was old enough to be concerned, and conscious of the problems. It just goes into the nifty little bin they provide, and I mean everything, butter, cheese, meats, all kinds of food waste, gets dumped into a bigger bin when it's full, and carted off on garbage day. Then once or twice a summer, they dump a big pile of black gold in the centre of town during the farmers market, and you show up with buckets, barrows or pick up trucks to cart off what you need or want for your garden. Beautiful.

No such program exists here. In fact, this town doesn't even recycle. All waste is garbage waste, it goes in a black bag at the curb and gets carted off to goodness knows where, to sit and putrefy, and stink in its little black prison for lengths of time unknown. Even things that would naturally decompose can't do so trapped in the little black wrappers of doom. This bothers me.

Back in the spring, I acquired a double handful of red wrigglers, and set them up in a bin full of paper shreddings with a bowl full of kitchen scraps and thought gee whiz isn't this something! I'm keeping this paper, AND this food waste out of the landfill. I was quite pleased with myself, and I suppose in the end, any little bit makes a difference. The problem is the scale. At the rate my worms consume things, I was only able to put one small bowl (pictured above) of kitchen waste in each week. And I was warned not to add anything greasy, or any meat or dairy products. If you're the kind of person with an active lifestyle, who eats out a lot, who's main contributions to the compost pile are coffee grinds and paper towels, this might work out for you. It wasn't a scale that was compatible with our volume of kitchen waste. Each week, I could easily fill that bowl at least thrice with vegetable stems, ends and peelings, fruit stems, seeds, cores and skins, and the occasional piece of produce that ripens too fast or we open to find rotten on the inside. We try to avoid this, but where we live, the moment food hits the back room of our grocery store, it's already, at the very least, 5 days from harvest. Things like bananas are picked green to give them a longer shelf life, potatoes, carrots, squash and apples store pretty well, but tomatoes, berries, peaches, spinach and some other more delicate produce just don't keep very long. So we have some spoilage. Add to this a filter full of coffee grounds at least once a day (it's our vice, don't judge), some tea bags, and soft paper products (paper towels, facial tissues... I personally think in most cases a dish cloth, tea towel or hanky can serve, but hubby likes the paper towel), and you're looking at a significant amount of food waste. Not to mention the things our worms just can't handle. What about that paper towel I used to grease my baking dish? How about bones, and meat? what about the mouldy bits that form sometimes on our cheese and need to be trimmed away? I'm a little unclear about bread. We're not great at eating up the crusty ends, especially if they're sliced too thinly, so can those go to the worms or not?

I hoped that as my little colony got established it would grow and allow for greater volumes of foods to be stashed away in there, but this hasn't seemed to be the case. They aren't eating appreciably more than they were back in the spring. I would need three or four colonies that size, just to handle the waste from my own kitchen. I just don't have that kind of indoor space!

I've been looking at composting, but everyone I've talked to discourages it due to the problems with nuisance bears in the area. Now, these bears, for a very brief period in spring and fall (when they're thin and hungry, and when they're trying to avoid being thin and hungry next year) will pillage the garbage bins with great delight. Now lets not forget, everything goes into these garbages. They reek to high heaven, and if I can smell it at the curb from my front door, you can bet the bears can smell it for miles around. I haven't heard of there being problems with bears preying upon bird feeders, or getting into storage sheds for pet food, or really being destructive towards anything except the smelly, ripe, garbage boxes.

Surely, if I make sure to pad all food wastes with ample carbonaceous material (dead grass, dead leaves, paper, cardboard, sawdust, straw etc) and bury them properly into the pile, the stink shouldn't be that attractive? Especially if I'm still not adding the meats and animal products that they would find especially attractive? What if I refrained from adding the attractive food (like fruit for example) during the lean times, and stuck to just junk mail, paper towel and coffee grounds while the bears are prowling and hungry? Surely they wouldn't be interested in the pile then? We're putting a fire pit in the back yard. Wouldn't adding the wood ash help keep the smell down too? I could release my worms into said compost pile, letting them help break things down faster, and add all kinds of beneficial micronutrients to the compost coming back out. Because lets face it, in my new one bedroom tiny home, I don't have room for even the current worm colony inside of the building, and they won't survive a Moosonee winter in a rubbermaid tote.

It's all food for thought I suppose, but like farmers who have "manure problems" (hello!? This is garden gold! The key to sustainable land usage! Not a problem!), I can't help but feel like I'm squandering resources, and creating bigger problems every time I put my food wastes out in the trash. I'll keep doing my research, but I can't help but think that a few laying hens would make short work of nearly all the kitchen wastes I could throw at them. I suppose then I'd have bigger problems with keeping predators from eating my chickens!

Good luck to all JBAS applicants!

2013-08-27T09:16:00.000-04:00

Well, it's 2013's hiring season for the James Bay Ambulance Service (JBAS), most of you (maybe all of you?) will be done your testing by now. For those of your who made it through, I can't wait to meet you all and get to know you over the next couple of months. If you need anyone to show you around, or just a friendly face in this cold northern town, just drop me a line and we'll get together.

If you didn't make it through this time take heart. There's always next time, and maybe now you've got a better idea of the things you need to brush up on. You'll get there one of these days. Whether it's here or another service, you'll make it through.

Moccasins

2013-08-24T13:07:00.000-04:00

I was saying to Andrew that I'd really like to get a good pair of moccasins before this winter. My feet are always cold, and with a "when in rome" mentality, I think it would be neat to have a pair of moccasins while living in the far north, just a hearty stone's throw from a reserve. But a pair of hand crafted moccasins around here runs somewhere between $80 and $120. I understand why, and I don't begrudge them for charging that for something so tough to sew and expensive in materials. Right now though, I feel like that's money I could be putting to better uses. Then I started really thinking about it. I've got a chunk of chocolate brown suede that was given to me by a friend sitting around gathering dust, and I even have a nice, dark rabbit pelt that I could use to trim a pair of moccs... hmmm...

I drew the template for the moccasins from an online guideline. I wish I had left an even larger margin around the edges of my foot than it called for though, then the slippers would have taller sides on them. As it is, they'll be very low. Oh well.

This is what that same template looks like cut out in the suede.

Here I've sewn up the toe puckers and heel cup. All that's left to do is add the uppers (called vamps) that I want to do some beadwork on first, and then the rabbit trim around the edges. Or maybe I'll just add a cuff of the same suede to add a bit of height to the sides, and save the rabbit for another pair. I do have enough suede for another two or three pairs. I might put a liner fabric in them, or I might not. Haven't decided yet.

And this is a close up of the stitching along the heel cup. Pretty happy with how they're turning out so far!! Stitching suede by hand though is no easy task. It's not bad through just one layer, but with a heavy needle, and doubled, thick thread, it's a bit of a bugger to muscle through two layers. I've been wearing my leather gardening gloves to help me grip the needle and help protect my sensitive finger tips. Really not a project for the faint of heart, or upper body strength! Any leather stitching I've done in the past has been through pre punched holes, but the suede really didn't seem thick enough to warrant it. Now I'm not so sure!

I Saw the Lights!

2013-08-23T09:41:00.001-04:00

Ok unfortunately I don't have a picture for you. It was a pretty bland, mostly whitish show and my technology just can't capture that, but I saw them! Finally saw them! Only took about 8 months...

If you didn't know what you were looking for, you could almost believe that it was thin, stringy cloud cover. Except that no clouds were in the sky, and no clouds ever moved like that. The lights don't really move I don't think. At least, you can't perceive that wispy, sliding sort of movement that clouds make. I think they just kind of fade in spots while getting brighter in other places. You can stare at it and would swear it's not moving at all, but then you look back a second later and the shape of the spectacle is wholly different. There were two little moments when a bit of green showed up, and perhaps if we'd waited longer we could have seen more. The show is always most intense from 1-2 am, we were watching from around 11:30-12. But hey, in my pregnant state, even that was well past my bedtime. Just so happy to have finally experienced the northern lights.

Bird Feeders

2013-08-21T17:33:00.001-04:00

Andrew mentioned the first day that we moved in that we should get a bird feeder. I don't think he's ever had a better idea.

I picked up these two gems up at the hardware store today, one is a silo shaped feeder for sunflower seeds, the other is a wire basket that holds a suet cake. I was amazed at how fast the local fauna swooped in! In the past, any time that I've had a new feeder hung up it's taken at least a day or two for the birds to find it and get brave enough to try it. Today, just before I took the picture above there were three birds on the silo feeder. In that picture there, the obvious bright yellow finch is on the feeder, but if you look closely, right on the bottom at the right is a little brown sparrow. The suet feeder is sporting a black capped chickadee. I'm very happy with my purchases, and equally happy that the birds seem happy with them. Perhaps next year if my sunflowers do well I'll be able to save my own seeds to fill the feeder with.

Holy Haystacks!

2013-08-20T17:51:00.001-04:00

Today I borrowed a rake from our neighbour and decided that today was as good a day as any to start tackling our lawn. There were big dead brown patches all over the place, and I thought that this is as dry of a stretch as we're likely to get, so I was hoping to avoid ripping up as much of the sod and soil underneath as I could. My was there a lot of dead material back there. In places it had been so dark for so long that nothing at all was growing underneath the brown. In other places the grass was over a foot long, simply trampled down under the weight of the dead clippings. I worked in little shifts. See, the bugs are getting far better. Good enough to enjoy a nice long walk or read a book in the sunshine. But the moment you get sweaty and start churning things up and uncovering wet, rotting patches of earth, the blackflies and mosquitoes appear as if out of nowhere and attack with a vengeance. So I'd go out and rake until I raised an ungodly swarm, then come back inside, guzzle down a glass of water and stand in front of the fan until the sweat all dried from my skin. I may have forgotten to mention, but so far this is the hottest day this year. Then out I'd go again. I made three trips out, and managed to rake up about a third of the lawn. Not bad. Not fantastic either, but not bad. It's a small lawn. I think I'm done for right now, though if I gets cooler before it starts getting dark I may take another swing at it. If not I'll be back at it tomorrow morning. So far, the dead pile is making quite the impressive hay stack, and I think the lawn will start looking a lot less raggedy after it's next mowing. I figure I'll keep the hay pile in a tidy little corner of the yard, add the fall leaves, and see if we can't end up with a bit of compost out of it in the spring. Or perhaps, when Andrew builds me my garden boxes, I'll heap the organic material right into them, let it break down over the winter and plant directly into it in the spring. Will this work? Is there such a thing as having too rich compost? I think I'll find out. I'm also taking a good hard look at the lawn, and trying to decide if I might just have the space to house a trio of hens out there next year in a chicken tractor. I think if it's not too big of a run, and I move it every day faithfully, there might just be. Of course, plenty of people have stationary coops and I could too, but the goal is to enrich, not ruin the ground under them, and also to make feed bills cheaper by letting them forage for bugs and grass. Hey, if a byproduct is less bugs in the yard, I'm a happy camper.

Anti-antibiotics

2013-08-19T13:42:00.001-04:00

This post will be a TMI kind of post, so if hearing about pee bothers you, stop now.

I went for a prenatal appointment the other day, and was told that my urine sample contained "markers that could indicate a bladder infection". The nurse practitioner went on to explain that she was going to get me a course of antibiotics to clear it right up.

Hold the phone. Could indicate infection. Not "you have a bladder infection", but you might have one. I had no symptoms, no itching, burning, foul smells, nothing! On top of that, I'm allergic to a lot of antibiotics, so I try to be careful with the ones I can take so I don't build up an intolerance to them. I also try to limit the drugs I'm taking in general while I'm carrying my little bean. Not enough is known about the effects of too many things. I asked if there was some way that we could confirm whether I do or do not have an infection. She actually rolled her eyes at me, and then proceeded to try to bully me into taking the drugs saying that if I don't medicate, an infection could make me miscarry. That I was being reckless with my child's life. Could she at least leave a script for the drugs in my file, and then if the testing came back positive for the infection (which could take a whole 24-36 hours she informs me, like that's a big deal), I could stop by the clinic and pick up the script any time, even if there's no doctor there. I eventually agreed to this, I figured what harm does a piece of paper in a file do, if it's going to make her feel better, so be it. Not a pill will cross my lips until I know for sure that I've got some good reason to be taking them!

That was Friday, and I realized today that I had never heard back from the clinic, so I called them up myself. Turns out I'm all clear, no infection, try to drink more water because it appears I was slightly dehydrated. No antibiotics needed.

Now, I'm not against the taking of antibiotics to cure actual infections, but this kind of cavalier tossing about of these drugs like candy is why we have the super bugs we have today. Over medication! Also, in today's day in age when so much medical information is available to the public, and we're so much better informed, why is it that when a mother makes an informed decision that she thinks will be the best course for herself and her fetus, she gets bullied into an outdated, often detrimental protocol because it's something the health staff have gotten comfortable and complacent with. They're our bodies, and they're our choices to make!

Moved In!

2013-08-15T12:07:00.001-04:00

Well, we've got all the major stuff in the new place already. Still have some of our clothing and dishes and a few other assorted odds and ends at the old place, but that'll come with time. That's why we were so happy to keep the old place until the end of the month, so that we would have the time to paint and spruce the place up and then move a our leisure. This pregnancy is really sapping a lot of my energy so I just can't do as much in one day as I used to. Since I took these pictures the kitchen counter has been cleared of it's clutter and we've moved in a few more dishes and things, my hubby thinks we'll be finished by the end of today but I'm not so sure. I think maybe we could stretch it out... take two more days perhaps! Already this place feels very cozy, and in some ways, more like home than the other place ever did.

Sporting New Mama Jewellery

2013-08-12T11:25:00.000-04:00

Before my friend had her daughter a few years ago, I had no idea that the likes of this even existed. It's a belly button ring designed for pregnancy! The barbell is long (and you can get ones even longer than this) and made of soft, flexible plastic, so that even as your belly stretches and contorts and does the weird things it does in pregnancy, you can keep the piercing open without pain or fear or your body pushing the jewellery out. Genius. I love it. And they're just so cute! Look at those little dangly baby feet... squee!! I also got one with a little giraffe charm, and a plain one incase the dangly bits were irritating me. Very very happy that these exist.

Paint!

2013-08-05T20:04:00.001-04:00

I am sure that I will continue to find paint on odd parts of my body for the next week, but I am happy to report that not only have we taken possession of our trailer, but it's had very nearly every nook and cranny painted. Whew! The paint we used is all benjamin moore (not a choice but a lack of options, all there is up here). The main colour is weathersfield moss (the center of the grey-green panel on the bottom) with some accent walls in durango (the brown chip next to it there) and we painted out the backsplash in the kitchen with baby fern (the middle chip on the bright green panel at the top). All in all the place looks lovely and I'm very happy with our choices! I tried to get some pictures today, but believe it or not there was too much gorgeous natural light to get a decent picture. Nearly every space of wall has a window in it! I'll have to try some pics in the evening (or find a decent camera...).
Of course, Andrew and I can't take all the credit, my parents and his mom came up for the weekend to give us a hand. We'd still be cursing and muttering over it if it wasn't for all their help. They just got on the train back south about three hours ago, and I miss them already... doesn't seem to matter how long or short a visit is, you still miss them when it's over.

Drained

2013-07-29T12:50:00.000-04:00

Is how I'm feeling lately! Never underestimate the toll that first trimester takes on a woman. Babysitting the three kids, while it's been a blast, and kept me busy, and given me spending money, and all the lovely reasons I do it, is absolutely exhausting. Poor Andrew, by the time I come home at night I'm seldom in any shape or mood to make dinner. I watch a bit of tv, and am often in bed by 9:30 or 10:00. A few nights we've played a few rounds of phase 10 or some other game, but more often than not, we don't do much of anything. Twin 7 year olds are plenty to contend with on their own (and attached at the hip... if I put one in timeout I pretty much have to put the other in a timeout in a separate area or they end up playing together in the timeout spot. Even when the timeout is for being nasty to one another!), but throw a curious not-quite-two year old into the mix, who just HAS to do everything that sisters are doing... It sure takes it out of me.
Yesterday I felt absolutely horrid... spent most of my day feeding everything I'd eaten to the porcelain god. And then dry heaving when the poor belly finally hit empty. I'm just thanking my lucky stars I'm feeling better today, and also that I've only got two days of babysitting left after today. Then it's on to decorating the trailer, so really, the fun never ends!!
Looks like I'm going to have a second ultrasound done on August 7th (mainly because there is a tech coming to town for a visit, and they like to keep her busy) so I'll get to see another picture of my little bean. Really exciting!! I'll only be 11 weeks, but the kid should start to look a little more human. Less sea monkey. Fun stuff.

Visitors

2013-07-26T12:44:00.001-04:00

Look who dropped by for breakfast today! Oh yay, garbage all over the street. 7 am this morning, I was heading to the dining room to sit down with my toast and tea, and I look out the patio doors and see this fella just going to town on something the neighbours threw out. I raised my mug to him and grumbled out "cheers", then chuckled to myself a little. A minute or two later a taxi drove by, honked, and he ran off, but he came back another two times. He only stopped when the neighbour went out with new bags, cleaned up all the trash and threw it in his garage. Good Ol' Yogi there came back, found the bin empty and lumbered off in a huff. This is what passes for the height of excitement around here folks. Gotta say, I was clutching my whistle when I walked to work a little later on.

24

2013-07-20T19:34:00.000-04:00

Today, I turned 24. Happy Birthday to me.
It's funny though, people keep asking me if I feel older. My answer is not today. I feel much older than I did on this day one year ago, but it's all the big events throughout the year that have made me feel grown up, not the turning of this calendar page. It's been a big one. I married the greatest man on the face of the earth. Then with him, I moved to the ends of the earth. Now together, we're working on bringing a new life to this earth. I'm a very different, or at least more grown up version of who I was the day I turned 23. But it wasn't today that did that. Can't wait to see who I am at 25.

Gut Feeling

2013-07-19T17:28:00.002-04:00

Did any of you have a gut feeling with your pregnancies about the gender? I've been working on this beautiful completely hand pieced and stitched quilt for a few years now, thinking that I'll put it away for when I have a daughter some day. So when I found out I was expecting, I pulled it out and dusted off the tin it lives in, and thought I better start working on it in earnest now, because I may just have a daughter sooner than I planned. I couldn't get into it. Not at all. I felt like there was no rush, because it's the wrong colour. And I immediately started planning out a quilt that's more boy friendly. Strange. I would love to have a girl first, I really want at least one little girl, and I feel like if I have my girl first, then the pressure's off for future kids. No playing the what if game, or the "maybe we should try just one more time" until I've got a house splitting at the seams with boys. Now, I don't have a problem if it is a boy, but I would really like to have my own little girl. But somehow, somewhere deep in my gut, in the very first weeks of my pregnancy, I was convinced I'm carrying a boy. Now I'm not so sure anymore, but my first thought was boy. Can't wait to find out if I'm right!