The Big School Decision

Yesterday the kids and I met with two "family advocates" from the Head Start program. Both women were very kind and LOVED the children, but I can't say I'm convinced yet that we're doing the right thing. The decision to send my kids to public school or to homeschool has been weighing on my mind for years, and there just hasn't seemed to be one of those moments yet where I feel that yes-THIS-is-the-way-things-are-supposed-to-be feeling. There were a lot of factors that went into me finally signing the kids up for the Head Start program:

1. This isn't really school yet. It's preschool. It'll give me a chance to feel out how the kids develop with other kids around, other authority figures, and more structure than they'd get at home (well, maybe not. I'm a diehard fan of the schedule.). Are they really learning more than they do at home?

2. My kids (and I) are very socially isolated. Our closest family members are at least an hour away, and the only friends we have in the neighborhood are our next door neighbors whom we love, but... In fact, the only little boy Airius knows that is his own age is his cousin whom we see only at family functions. I've looked at the homeschool groups in our area, and all of them are, well, Christian. I have a deep respect for Christianity, but our religion doesn't fall into that category. I'd feel like a bit of a fraud.

3. Annie has shown a keen interest in going to school. I've told her that she could stay at home and learn as a family, but the idea kind of bums her out. That bums me out, but this isn't about me. I won't even hope for her to change her mind, promise. Yesterday after our meeting, Annie grabbed the hands of one of the women and said, "can I go to school with you now?" lol Airius was asking the same thing but wasn't quite bold enough to grab their hands. He serenaded them for awhile though. ;)

4. I'm not convinced that a child's success in school or life is dependent upon how or where they were schooled. Maybe I've read Freakonomics one too many times, but I think that if we encourage and support our children through their education, the returns will be great regardless of their schooling.

5. I'm really not at all confident that I could do homeschooling successfully. There I said it. Happy?

Anyway, the book isn't closed on this topic yet, and I plan to do a lot more research throughout this school year, but I wholeheartedly welcome respectful opinions on this subject. Do you homeschool your kids? Why or why not? Any book/website recommendations on the subject?

Book Review: Four-Season Harvest by Eliot Coleman

Four-Season Harvest by Eliot Coleman is one of those books that I just couldn't wait to open. As a zone 5b gardener, it's a constant frustration of mine to have those few months where nothing at all is growing. Even if you are an avid food preserver (I'm still learning), there's a definite allure to having FRESH food in the darkest of winter months, no? So as soon as I got this book home from the library, I devoured it page by page. The gist of the book can be summed up with this quote from page 6: "Whereas the growing season may be chiefly limited to the warmer months, the harvest season has no such limits." Succession planting and crop protection are key.

The beginning of the book was sort of a rehashing of facts that I already had stored away in my brain. If you've grown any organic vegetables before, you probably already have what you need from the first few chapters. The locavores out there will grin at Coleman's Chapter 1 discussion of the merits of variety and seaonality. Chapter 2 gives the author's best tips on creating rich compost and the use of organic soil amendments, though he saves green manures, or cover crops, for Chapter 3. I did think his Chapter 4 tip for using the edge of a board to make furrows was helpful, but the rest was your basic organic gardening.

Chapter 5 is where things got interesting to me. It opens with this:

It is the middle of January on the coast of Maine, and I'm harvesting crops for dinner. Despite the typically frigid New England weather, I can choose from 18 garden-fresh vegetables. I begin by harvesting a salad of mache, curly endive, and claytonia... I will serve the salad with a mustard vinaigrette and raw carrot and kohlrabi slices on the side. Then I gather spinach for a duck-egg souffle, dig some leeks to prepare sauteed with butter, and pick some parsley to garnish the potatoes from the cellar. Planning ahead, I decide to have some sorrel soup; an arugula, radicchio, and sugarloaf salad with fresh scallions; and steamed brussels sprouts in a mornay sauce for tomorrow night. The menu could also include au gratin Swiss chard, braised escarole, a cream of kale and potato soup, or dandelion-hearts tempura. Not bad for fresh garden harvesting in Zone 5. (pg. 63)

Not bad at all, Mr. Coleman! My mouth was absolutely watering after that description, and you can believe that I was googling recipes for awhile after that.

The author makes a clear, concise explanation of how a cold frame works, by limiting plant stress through lessening the effects of fluctuating winter temperatures, the added moisture of cold weather months, and windchill. I can't really comment on the clarity of instructions for building a cold frame since I haven't yet actually attempted it. I'm probably bound to start with something a little less elaborate than Coleman's suggestion and work my way up, but that's just lazy old me. The tables included in Chapter 5 were extremely enlightening and helpful for me. They included not only fall, winter, and spring crop suggestions, but also planting dates (I still have time!) and harvest dates. I'm fully aware that some of these will require some trial and error to perfect in my specific garden, but I'm okay with that.

Next up comes a chapter devoted to tunnels. At first I was a little disappointed in this chapter because the tunnel suggested takes up a heckuva lot of space (14' x 20' is wider than most parts of my irregularly shaped garden and nearly as long), and Coleman suggest moving the tunnel, keeping it in one spot for the benefit of summer heat-loving crops then moving it to another spot for the crops to be harvested in winter but which are sown in summer while the thermophiles are still thriving. But the author does devote some time to the discussion of modifications for smaller gardens and warmer climates. Here he suggests a permanent, "instant" greenhouse. The illustration in the book is promising, with latticed entryways at either end and plants growing up the arbor-like supports. And, of course, Coleman makes sure to give ideas for dealing with snow accumulation. "I don't mean normal snowfalls of 8 to 10 inches..." (pg. 108). :) Yes, he gets it.

Chapter 7 continues the harvest possibilities with root cellars and other "indoor harvesting" techniques. I found the suggestion of walling off a corner of my basement with concrete blocks, complete with a cement-board ceiling and insulation, a little daunting. I suppose it will come to that eventually, though. Thankfully, several simpler options are also discussed. My heart rate can return to normal. There is also a discussion of forcing root crops to sprout. Yes, yes, the obligatory Belgian endive is included. Oh, and drying foods makes an appearance as well.

Chapter 8 is an exploration of garden pests. Again, if you've already done some organic vegetable gardening, this probably won't be anything new to you.

The book ends with the "Cast of Characters," as Coleman refers to his list of crop descriptions. He includes planting distances, crop rotation, growing tips, storage tips, and a list of his favorite varieties for each different plant. I was especially appreciative of the fact that he often gives a reason for his variety selection: "for dependability," "early," "all-around use," "winter storage."

Overall, I thought the book was pretty darn good. My biggest complaint would have to be the lack of actual photographs from the author's garden, partly because I'm nosy, partly because I'm excited by eye-catching images, and partly because I want to see how this all works together in real life. The pencil drawings were well down, though. I had immediate respect for the author because of his shared love for keeping things simple, though I did find the book a bit preachy at times, and I reveled in the use of old-fashioned technologies that are often overlooked nowadays. I'm not sure how helpful the book would be for those of you in Zones 8 and higher, but I would highly recommend this book for any northern zone gardener. It's going to take me quite some time (like, years) to implement all the ideas in this book, so I suppose I'll just have to buy a copy. Oh darn. ;)

A Little Wowed...

First let me give a very warm welcome to all of the readers who have been popping over from Wasted Food. I'm amazed at the number of hits our little homestead got on the 8th! I'd never read Jonathan's blog before, but it started coming across as a referring URL, and I was a bit shocked. He may not completely agree with my post about wasting food for kids crafts, but I'll forgive him. This once. ;) His blog looks quite interesting, so please surf on over and check out his project. And by all means, I hope some of you who are new to this site stick around. Community, community, community. That's what it's all about.

Second, I have to share with y'all my most *ahem* interesting blog referral, just for the fun of it. Apparently someone found BobbleHead Owl by googling... "golden showers." Of course, they came across my Golden Showers Garden Party results. Leave it to Crunchy to bring in the hits...

Third, the picture has nothing to do with anything. I took it on our recent trip to the zoo (wow... you guys got away without seeing a billion zoo pictures? I HAVE been slacking!) and just find it very soothing. So you're stuck with it.

And last, I apologize for the lull in posting here. I won't bog you down with more whining, but I hope to get things started up again soon. I at least have a few book reviews waiting in the wings, promise. I have a birthday coming up soon too (gasp!), so I'll be sharing my first childhood recipe.

I can already feel summer coming to a close. It was only 72 degrees in the house when we woke this morning. The air conditioning hadn't been on all night. The corn is coming in here at the homestead, which means I'm glutting myself on it. God, it's good! Here's hoping everyone has a fun, refreshing weekend.

Independence Days Challenge-- Week 9

It's been a rough week emotionally. The pregnancy hormones are kickin' my ass, especially with some of the changes coming up around here and rabid eBayer's and their ridiculousness. If I'm not having a panic attack, I'm wanting to bawl or put my fist through a wall. Fun times.

1. Planted: Nothing.

2. Harvest something: Raspberry leaves, borage, Kentucky Wonder beans, Scarlett Runner Beans.

3. Preserve something: Dried raspberry leaves for later use.

4. Prep something: Dried the raspberry leaves to use during my pregnancy. Began reading Eliot Coleman's Four-Season Harvest in the hopes that I can still get a little more out of the garden this year.

5. Cook something: Sweet and sour fresh green beans. I wasn't thrilled with it, but pregnancy is doing weird things to my taste buds. I'm having a difficult time getting any veggie down.

6. Manage your reserves: Using up veggies in storage that were beginning to be past their prime.

7. Work on local food systems: Nope.

8. Reduce waste: Nothing beyond the ordinary composting, eBaying, and Freecycling.

9. Learn a new skill: Nothing.

A Good Evening

It's been a long and stressful week, culminating in a trip (an hour each way) to the pediatrician for a 5min. checkup on The Bean this morning. Much earlier than I wanted to wake up too. I was exhausted all day and had no hope of catching a nap.

I've been following the advice of the Shakers and not watering my well established veggies. They've been on their own all summer, and I was about to break down and water the tomatoes at least today because our first green little orb has shown up. Mother Nature is good, though, and we got a nice shower tonight. I don't know if it was enough to even really soak the ground, but we'll see in the morning. Craving some solitude and communion with my plants, I stepped out into the soft shower and started to look around. Lo and behold! Our first Kentucky Wonder beans have come in. I was absolutely shocked for some reason, but I got so excited that I picked the ones in sight and ran in the house hoopin' and hollerin'. That drew Annie from her play, and she joined me in the dank evening to harvest. She tucked a glittering calendula bloom behind her ear and clutched our bean collection in both hands. A proud moment for sure!


Things got even more satisfying when I noticed this bulge amongst our Golden Bantam sweet corn. I was really beginning to doubt that we'd have any corn between the various storms that toppled our stalks early on and the odd spacing (thank you, squirrels!). Here's hoping I can get to this when it's nice and ripe before the city critters move in on it. I may need to do some hand pollination on this crop, but if we get just a few ears of sweet corn this year, it'll all be worth it. So many people don't grow corn because of the space it takes and its notoriety for not pollinating, but I just can't imagine a year without corn.


It wasn't all good news though. This picture shows the remains of a sunflower head in the yard. Someone's been getting to them other than me. Really, I don't mind all that much. Part of the reason I'm growing sunflowers is because they provide such good, rich food for the wildlife, and I'm all about sharing my bounty. But man this was a massacre! I'm not sure what did it or why because it doesn't seem that much was eaten. Maybe the culprit realized that the seeds weren't quite ripe. I don't really know, but hopefully we won't find this waste again. I'll leave you with a wider picture of the garden, showing the buckwheat cover crop in Bed 1 and the Three Sisters bed. You can also see some of the sunflower border that runs along one part of the fence. That's my neighbor's house in the background, not mine.

Don't Play with Your Food!

Have you ever noticed how many crafts for children involve food? I'm not talking about making food. I'm talking about using food for something other than its intended purpose of being eaten. For example, if you went to public school, you probably made "moroccas" filled with rice or dried beans. Did you ever do sugar drawing, where a bunch of white sugar is poured onto a cookie sheet so that kids can drag their fingers or toys through it to make designs? I'm sure most of us have done the obligatory macaroni necklaces or glued macaroni to a piece of construction paper to make a design.

What does this have to do with anything?

Well, it drives me a little batty. On the one hand, I'm all for encouraging the creativity of children and looking at items from a different perspective. After all, the ability to see something for what it could be rather than what it was intended to be is at the heart of the "reduce, reuse, recycle" motto. However, it drives me crazy to think of all the food wasted in these activities. When you're trying to grow your own food and/or live a frugal life, wasting a pound of white sugar so that your kids will be quiet while you try to whip up a batch of soap or hang the clothes on the line just doesn't seem quite right. Many of the food items used are staples as well: dried beans, rice, pasta, sugar and salt. These are items that most of us cannot grow on our own because of space or climate limitations as well, which means we're wasting things which have used lots of dollars and gallons of oil to reach us. Frustrating! Some of the things might be reuseable after our kiddies are done with them, like the dried beans or rice in a toilet paper roll morocca, but many of them are not salvageable. Who wants to eat macaroni with bits of glue stuck to it? And you can bet that sugar from the sugar drawing is filled with snot, slobber, and plenty of unappetizing bacteria.

Therefore, today I offer up just a few alternatives to these ideas in the hopes that one of our most precious resources, our food, will stay on our plates and in our pantries rather than making its way uneaten to the garbage can.

First, we'll tackle the issue of the homemade shakers/moroccas. Rather than using rice or dried beans or another food item, consider loaning your children use of your stash of buttons. (Doesn't every homesteading mom have a jar filled with buttons, you know, just in case?) After the kids are done gettin' their groove on, you can simply reclaim your buttons by pouring them back into the jar. Some other alternatives are beads, washers or nuts of the home repair variety (though I suppose unshelled nuts would be okay because you could still eat them afterwards), bottle caps, shells, or any myriad of small toys. I'm particularly fond of using all those wonderful little plastic Barbie shoes that no child ever seems to keep on their doll's feet.

Up next is the macaroni necklace. Really these aren't all that bad. Because you're really just sticking them on a string, the pasta is reuseable. If, however, you're dying the pasta with food coloring or your kids are like most kids and stick everything in their mouths, all those macaroni elbows will most certainly go to waste. Again, you could replace the macaroni with buttons, beads, washers or nuts (which usually have nice, big holes to make it easy on young children). OR you could use your favorite rolled oats cereal and let your kids snack on it throughout the day. I've done this with my kids before, and they could barely get the cereal strung before they started eating because it was just so cool to them. If your child doesn't eat all of the cereal, you can hang the necklace up on a tree branch and let the birds and squirrels have a go at it as well.

As far as the macaroni paste pictures go, I recommend replacing the macaroni with something non-edible and non-recyclable, like styrofoam peanuts or those little tabs that come on bread products bought from the supermarket. If you're smart enough not to have any of that laying around your house, you can probably find some on your local Freecycle.

The sugar drawing is easy to remedy if you have access to play sand. Pick a bag of it up at your local hardware store and store it in a bucket with a lid. You can scoop out some sand for playing with on your cookie sheet whenever the mood strikes, and it's reuseable for that purpose. Just pour it back in your bucket, and you're good to go. In fact, if you don't do this activity very often (and if you have even a little bit of neat freak in you, you won't) you can use that bucket full of sand to store store carrots over winter. You can't wash sugar, but you can wash sand for this purpose just to be extra sure you're not getting any nasty kid germs in there with your veggies. Just put your sand in a pillowcase and rinse it.

While certainly not an exhaustive list of childrens crafts that include edible components, hopefully this will give my fellow homesteading and frugal parents a few alternatives to these wasteful projects.

What's Blooming in My Garden-- July 28, 2008

Today is my 6th wedding anniversary, so though I had a long, informative post planned, I'm saving it for tomorrow. Nyah nyah! Instead you get...


The sweet blossoms of Rouge Vif D'Etampes squash. What girl can garden without THE Cinderella pumpkin?


A lone Johnny Jump-Up (Viola cornuta) that managed to survive one of my urban homesteader idiotic moments.


Pokeweed (Phytolacca spp.) flowers. When the inky berries form, I'll use them for dye.


Ohhhhhh! *rubs her hands greedily* The (directly seeded, late planted) Brandywine tomatoes (Lycopersicon lycopersicum) are finally setting blossoms. I can't wait to taste those first tomatoes, warmed by the sun...


My poor butterfly bush (Buddleja davidii), which was planted last year and transplanted this year. I have a terrible track record when it comes to transplanting bushes, so I'm uber glad this one managed to stick around.


My Achilles heel, the California poppy (Eschscholzia californica), finally abloom. Sweet, sweet success.