Summer is NOT over yet!!!

Holy crap! I just looked on my kid's school web sites randomly to write down the dates of school starting. I thought I was planning ahead, but it turns out that we have two weeks left. They start on Sept. 8 and9. Good thing I looked. I would have totally sailed past those dates, without a clue that my kids were supposed to be in school. Most parents are school shopping right now, but for me it is Summer. Summer just began, because I spent most of it in school myself. My term just let out, and I don't start again until Sept 27, so I just assumed (incorrectly) that my whole family would follow a similar schedule. I was starting to schedule camping trips and berry picking days and lots of sleep-ins over the next four weeks, until the annoying public school schedule got in my way. I am peeved. I need a break and am not okay with this turn of events, which means lots of early mornings and lunch packings and homework helpings and busy busy meetings... during MY Summer break. There is no relief.
Complaining makes me feel a little better.

Blowing An Egg Through Laughter

I decided to blow one of the first, little, beautiful, green, long-awaited chicken eggs from my small backyard coop, as a keepsake. This method of preservation is great for Springtime egg decorating as well! Here is how you do it:
First, using a sharp needle, carefully poke hard through one end of the egg to make a hole.
Then, do the same on the other end. Once you have a hole on both ends, choose one side to make bigger. I like to do this on the "top" of the egg, so that if I choose to hang it from a string, it goes through that side. (To hang it you would attach a string to a small, broken off twig or toothpick, poke it in through the hole, then turn the stick to block the hole on the inside, and you can hang the string from an egg tree or anywhere, really!)
To make the hole bigger, use the same needle, and carefully pick off tiny chunks of shell.
It should be just big enough to allow the insides to be blown out through it.
Next, use the needle to probe into that bigger hole, and break up the yoke a few times, so that the blowing out process is possible. If the yoke were intact, it would not go through the hole.
Finally, blow. Put your mouth over the smaller hole, and holding the egg over a clean, empty bowl, blow, and blow, and blow.
It is hard- harder than blowing up a balloon, and you might feel light headed.
I do not recommend having your picture taken while doing this unless you are in a laughing mood. If you want to get a side ache from hysterical laughter, which I admit, is really fun, and does not happen nearly enough in my adult life, then definitely have someone get out a camera. I will warn that it is VERY challenging to blow in a serious and non-laughing way, under the eye of a photographer.

A Precious Eggnumber 3 or 4

Two out of three of my chickens are laying! This is really exciting. It has been a five month chapter of anticipation, and finally, I sent Tenar out to clean the duck house last week, and low and behold, he found a small, green egg! Nevermind the odd fact that my hen chose to lay her egg in someone else's house instead of the nesting box built into her coop. At least she is laying. I had planned to take a picture of the first, precious egg, and post it on my blog, and then blow the egg, so that I could keep the shell as a forever memoir. This is real life though, and we all know that in life, things don't go as planned. Tenar brought me the egg. I held it in my hand with all kinds of love and respect, cherishing it's firstness. Then the little girl that lives upstairs asked if she could hold it. I hesitated, and told her how precious it was, and to be careful, then gently layed it in her cupped hand. She smiled, then lost interest and just opened that little cupped hand, allowing the egg to roll off onto the ground, without a thought. She obviously had no idea of the value and importance that I had attempted to convey, because when I sadly lamented and showed her the irreversible crack in my precious egg #1, she looked slightly taken aback, and said "oh", and then trotted off to play. Oh the irritation.
Egg number 2 was found that same day, layed by a hen that seems to need some calcium in her diet. It had no shell. Just soft and squishy, and easily torn. That night we made celebrated use of it and the cracked green egg into some chocolate chip cookie dough, and enjoyed our bounty.
Egg numbers 3 and 4 were also found together, one with a strangely soft shell again, and the other a glorious, perfect green one. This one was my saver. I didn't let a single child touch the precious, little, green number 3 or4 (don't know which one came before the other).
I took my pictures.
I then blew the egg for saving. The tutorial for that will be in the next post. Stay tuned for how to blow an egg, very useful for a first chicken egg to keep forever, or more commonly around Easter and the Spring Equinox to hollow out eggs for decorating and keeping.

Vermicompost Take 2- a photo tutorial (and a tidy chicken coop)

I have been thinking a lot about how to keep an urban chicken coop area tidy, clean and relatively free of flies. I say relatively because during the warm months of the year, it seems that flies will hastily congregate on anything remotely edible, whether it be slightly cooled dinner just off the grill, a pile of animal poo, a plate of freshly sliced fruit, or a dead body. That said, I am taking on the challenge of trying to keep the fly quota low, and my coop fresher than most.

The first task was clear: Find a new home for duck. Duck was of the black Muscovy variety. This made him large, homely and a mass waste producer. Seriously, the guy pumped out about a third of a pound of manure daily. This was a great thing for my garden, as I had loads of freshly dirtied (*ironic*) straw to mulch with, and it washed down and fertilized the plants with each watering. Even so, I just did not have it in me to clean out a duck house every other day, as well as the tasks of cleaning the duck dipping tub that he dirtied every hour or so, and washing away the piles that ended up all over the duck/chicken yard each day. No amount of his excellent foraging for slugs and garden pests, and generous fertilizer production seemed to balance out the ridiculous duties associated with mothering a duck. Additionally, to make things worse, he wasn't even nice. He continually nipped us with his sharp bill and bullied the hens. Henry duck went to a lady named Kathy who answered my craigslist ad. She took him as a pet to live in a pond full of ducks and geese on her one and a half acres of rural property. I think that worked out well! I hope he is happier now. I hardly miss him, though I know my sons do, so I do feel a little bit bad.

Step two toward fly elimination and general tidyness was to do something about the kitchen scraps that I feed to the hens. Most people "throw them to the chickens", and that is how I began feeding them,but this does not suit me, because then there are always a bunch of stems and random old food parts rotting on the ground, which looks awful and draws...yes, flies, you know it. My solution was two-fold. First I went and bought an inexpensive oil pan (for car oil changes) to use as a place to dump the kitchen scraps. It is wide and low, and good for them to peck in and sort the food. It can be seen in use in the above pic.

Next I figured out what to do with the scraps that they declined to eat, because they definitely don't eat everything that I give to them. I tossed around the idea of a compost pile, but I really don't like to or manage to find time to turn it and tend it, and I don't like the fact that mice and rats inevitably get into the pile, as well as raccoon and other wild animals. Again, flies are attracted to compost and it takes forever for the foods to break down. I decided to have another go at vermicomposting. I tried it once before, when I lived in Colorado, and had a larger scale bin. I ended up accidentally cooking the worms, because the bin was black, which attracted too much sun, and it was placed in a sunny location.
Also, I wasn't consistent about opening it for ventilation during the hottest parts of the day. The poor worms crawled up to the top and tried to escape, and most died. This particular worm project of mine can be found on a historical blog here (you have to scroll down a bit).

Having learned from this, I decided to do it simply. I went to my favorite used-anything-you-could-possibly-think-of store, Bring Recycling and found an ugly, old cooler to transform into an easy worm bin pictured here (also pictured in the chicken yard above). The reason why the cooler works well, is because it is insulated, so it doesn't let much heat or cold from the outer environment in. Also, it has a nice fitting lid. I like that it is a good size, and rather portable. I suspect that I may need a second one for the amount of kitchen scraps that my large family produces, but I'd rather have two movable ones than one monster bin that is permanently wherever it is placed. I know I will not live in this place for more than a few years, maximum, so movable is good.
Here is what I did to turn it into a worm home and compost factory:
1)I drilled holes through the bottom for drainage.
2)We tore up newspaper and brown paper sacks, and soaked the strips in bucket of water. This is a very satisfying job for me. I love the feeling and the sound - riiiiip, riiiip, riiiip, in a nice rhythm, as I do one piece after another. Reya seemed to enjoy it too. How often is she allowed to just rip up a bunch of paper?
She actually ended up in a power struggle that ended in a long, screaming time-out because she wanted to rip a different bag that didn't need ripping, not the one I told her she could do. That's how it is with that girl. Rarely a satisfied or grateful moment.
I was fairly surprised that Galen had zero interest in ripping, and found interest instead, in the neighbor's rain boot the whole time. Babies. Go figure.
An irrevelent note- We did this job sitting on a gold couch that my upstairs neighbor has sitting on the shared patio. I haven't had the courage to mention to her that upholstered furniture outside of the home is one of my pet peeves. I did mention off hand that I was concerned it might mold, hoping that would be enough. It wasn't. I think it is trashy looking. To her credit, it is kind of comfortable. We'll see how it holds up in Oregon's rainy winter. It is under a roof area.
3)The wet paper strips got wrung out and were put into the bottom of the cooler.
4)Then, a bucket full of red wigglers were added. They can be mail ordered or purchased from some local worm farms, but I actually found mine for free on craigslist, from a nice man just a few miles down the road.
5)The final step, not shown here, is burying the food scraps in the bin. The worms then eat the bacteria that occurs from the food breaking down. They eliminate in the form of rich worm castings, which is even better fertilizer than poultry manure. Now I have the best of both worlds.
The one thing that I would do different, and I still plan to, actually, is to drill some sizeable holes in the sides for ventilation. It turns out that enough heat is created inside the bin from the food breaking down and all of that bioactivity, that is still getting too hot in there, without any outside temperatures affecting it. I keep having to leave it open during the day to cool it down, or else my worms still crawl to the top to get out of the heat. I think the air holes will solve this, but we will see. I don't like leaving it open because.... flies, you guessed it.

A Toddler Gives Birth

The lighting in this video leaves much to be desired, but still, I wanted to share. Reya and Galen's dad made the trek out to Oregon this Summer to reunite with his beloved kids, and has been hanging out and playing with them a lot. He is really good at getting Reya to feel better, even when she is in one of her incurably grumpy moods. Here they are playing- she is "delivering a baby" with him as "midwife".

Woodland Animals in my backyard

I now live in a beautiful, wooded location in Eugene, Oregon's south hills. I got really lucky with a super-affordable duplex in a great area. This is my third residence in the short 9 months that I have been back in Oregon, and moving is a pain in my behind, for sure, but I have to say that each time I do it, life gets better. I am fine tuning the living arrangements with every adjustment. We are nowhere near unpacked yet, since this move came smack in the middle of Summer term in college, but I pulled it off, and now that school is done for the next month, I have time to organize and get settled. One of my favorite things about my new house is the view out of my living and dining room windows. We have mondo-sized grey squirrels, raccoon families and several dear that hang out just feet from my living space. In these pics from yesterday, a Mama doe and her two fawns have come up to socialize with my Henry duck, in his coop/yard area just outside of the window where I eat breakfast. So sweet.

Homo Erectus

The small boy child is now walking. He spent a week doing four steps at a time, and then he figured out that when taking more steps, it is possible to stand and carry objects, although it is slower and more tedious than his well practiced speed crawling . I now have an upright child at the sweet, capable age of 13 months. Congratulations Galen!

An African Dance Experience: A Life Experience

A certain sadness has settled over me as I begin to write about my short experience of West African Dance. It bears an odd and surreal finality, how I imagine it would be to write a will that precedes a pending death from terminal illness. This dancing that I began with enthusiastic joy, determination and liberation has become quickly and unexpectedly impossible, as one crucial joint and muscle after another has dramatically refused; pleading weakness, injury and pain. I have no choice but to listen and comply with quiet resentment, admitting that being in my upper thirties, after carrying and birthing five babies through some complicated pregnancies and long periods of inactivity and prescribed bed rest, and having foolishly stopped both dance and most regular exercise through it all has rendered me fit for only a slim category of slow, careful, low-impact activities, of which West African dance clearly does not fall into. This is reality, and it is the kind of reality that slaps hard, like the crisis of aging and mid-life. I now understand how someone who thinks that they are young can wake up one day, shocked that they are old, and say, “How did I get here? I wasn’t finished with youth. Time passes far too quickly!” This reality is that from which I write what might in a worst case scenario, serve as a final remembrance of how this art form felt within me, as well as the learning that it brought to me and the personal value and significance that it holds for me. A kite-like object of hope dives and wavers, challenged as it rides on the whipping wind in the sky, far too high above me. I grip the string end tightly, not wanting to lose the vision of a time when injuries will heal, strength will increase, unhealthy post-natal weight will melt, and my muscles and joints will become supple and flexible, so that I might once again sink down into deeply bent knees, and balance my weight forward onto the balls of my feet, heels light, while arching and contracting my head, tail and spine; bouncing, kicking, flapping arms and feeling myself pulse through and through in an extension of the music of the drums, the earthy booming that calls me into motion.

As a person who came into this dance style with a history of ballet, and as someone who generally prefers to walk and not run, speak softly and not yell, keep an orderly space about me, pay attention to detail, strive for near perfection, and take on a whole lot of responsibility in my very full life, African dance immediately posed an opportunity for me to attempt an unprecedented looseness and vibrancy, and in the beginning, I was visibly awkward and out of my element. Additionally, it was my very first attempt at any kind of exercise following the birth of my six-month-old child. I was simultaneously re-entering college after a ten year hiatus, and beginning life as a single mother of my four children. The heavy perspiration, cardiovascular work-out, and enlivening drumming left me with an incredible endorphin release after each class that may have singly saved me from burning-out from demanding academics, a nursing baby, a tantrum-prone toddler, and consistently insufficient, three and four hour sleep nights.

While dance classes were doing wonders for my energy level and were helping to renew my spirit, my body began to complain right away. When my knee began to hurt during the second class, I didn’t worry, thinking it would be fine by the next week after a few days of rest. Instead it worsened, and a few weeks later, I was having difficulty walking and felt really discouraged. It became necessary for me to sit out of class for a while and just watch. I learned that pain is important for me to take seriously. My body gives out signals for me to take notice and stop before the damage gets worse. Pushing on and toughing it out has been my usual tendency, and this has been partially due to my belief that if I don’t keep going, my instructor will lose favor with me. This mental dilemma caused me a lot of stress as I ended up having to sit for quite a while to bring my knee back to danceable health. The pain did get better, and I was able to get back up and rejoin the class for the remainder of the school term. Despite this, I went through some emotional lows, losing confidence in my dancing ability because I felt so uncoordinated and unskilled with this style of dance that was so different than anything that I had tried before. I was reminded with the clarity of a crisp morning, of a pattern that I have seen in myself more than once. I expect the best from myself. I like to feel confident that all work I produce is of the highest caliber, and that I am able to excel at all that I attempt. If I don’t catch on to something immediately, I feel incompetent. Knowing this, and resisting the insanity of it, I picked up the pieces of my discouraged, rubble-pile of self-doubt, and despite my embarrassment about dancing poorly, I decided to attempt a second school term of this dance style, since my endurance was improving noticeably, and I enjoyed the feeling of the dancing.

The next term started wonderfully. I felt much more confident among a class largely full of beginning dancers, and the particular dance that was being taught was fairly low-impact on my joints. Yankadi is a dance of love and flirtation. It has a swinging rhythm that appeals to my love of sexy music with a hint of jazz. The movements are wonderfully feminine, and slow enough to put some serious expression into. I was having fun and getting better at it. I became so enamored with African dance, that I began planning to continue attending classes and even take a Summer trip to Guinea with my instructors in a few years, when my smallest children are a little older. The next dance we began is called Ku Ku, which is a version of the very dance that had caused me discomfort during my initial school term. Much to my dismay, my knees began hurting almost immediately. I danced for a few more classes, while the pain came and went, still stupidly hesitant to stop and admit that I shouldn’t be dancing. We had a week break from school and my knees seemed no better. Additionally, a week later, I inexplicably injured my shoulder, neck and rib. I decided sadly, that I will have to stop taking African dance class for a long time, if not forever. I have discovered that with the rapid pace of the movements, I am unable to pay careful enough attention to the subtleties of my body alignment, and am probably harming knee and shoulder joints by moving through unhealthy positions in my efforts to execute tricky, syncopated step combinations. Also, the tension that I habitually hold in my upper body causes ineffective and subsequently accident-prone posture. My self-observation reveals that when I take a class like ballet, I am able to carefully and intentionally learn healthy positioning along with development of core strength and flexibility. Maybe, with great luck and diligent work, this training will eventually prepare me for another go at African dance. I am not sure if my almost thirty-seven year old body will get that far, but I will continue to hope, because I don’t quite have the heart to end this story with a truly final goodbye to a dance form that I found so much pleasure in. For now I will hold onto that kite string, and watch it out there. I will imagine it to have a beautiful image of a dancing woman on the kite. She is dancing with energy and she is feeling good. She will come down to earth when she is ready... when I am ready. Maybe she is me in another life.