Putting It Up

This time last year I was canning like mad: pears, peaches, prickly pear, plums. The pantry shelf was full and I felt oh-so self-satisfied.  This year,however, I've done practically nothing and last year's jams and preserves are down to a mere handful.

What's the change this time around? Instead of putting up food for us, I'm teaching my middle school outdoor education students the art of canning. With a parent volunteer each student took home 1/2 pint of loganberry jam and today we canned 16 half-pints of prickly pear. I can't exactly call that one jelly, because I'm not convinced it's going to set. It might end up being 16 half-pints of prickly pear syrup. They'll love it just the same.

The Householder's Guide to the Universe comes to mind often these days. Harriet Fasenfest devotes quite a few pages to the notion of working part time, so one can household the rest of the time and I can see why. I've been putting in 10-12 hour days at work and then a few more grading papers at home. It's exhausting and doesn't leave much time for canning or even cooking, for that matter. I'm missing the summer afternoons where I'd start pizza dough at 4 to have for dinner that night and be able to tend to the garden properly. Now I'm just thankful that the tangle of tomatoes are finally ripening and that the volunteer butternut is still chugging along. It's a big mess, with a giant sunflower toppled over into the whole shebang. It has a certain beauty, and the bees and goldfinches love it, but it is a reminder to me of how much I work, how little time I am spending at home, and how I do miss being in the garden and the kitchen on a daily basis.

Don't get  me wrong, I really love what I do. I get to teach middle schoolers about convection currents and ecosystems; pythagorean theorem and variables. It's just that I'm seeking some sort of balance. It'll come but by then we'll be in the dead of winter with only dreams of spring ahead.

Happy harvesting and preserving to those who are in a state of abundance!

Winter Squash in August

I've always found it funny that winter squash is ready to be harvested in summer. I get that its name comes from its ability to be stored through winter and for that I am very grateful. Our volunteer squash are doing very well and the other day I harvested two butternuts and one acorn squash.

The tomatoes appear to be waiting for cooler weather to ripen. Note to self: a glacier tomato is probably better suited to cooler climes.

The sunflowers are really putting on a show as are the cosmos. Things are looking really good here, despite my inattention and downright neglect.

Speaking of neglect, we pretty much forgot we planted two cherry trees a few weeks ago. They were in bad shape by the time we got to them this past weekend. I think they may be able to be resurrected. I see now how permaculture's notion of zones really comes into play. The closer the zone, the more likely you are to visit it to maintain that zone's vitality. Maybe the ditch is just too far for us to have plants we really have to care for. 

In two days our middle school is having a cooking-from-scratch extravaganza. We'll be making pizza, mozzarella, pesto, oven fries and homemade vegannaise. I hope I can get my mozz. technique down tomorrow night because my first attempt was nothing like cheese. I think I need to heat the milk a little higher and maybe more slowly. Keep your fingers crossed! We'll be using convection ovens, conduction stovetops, solar ovens and an horno. This is to prep us to watch What's on Your Plate? a documentary made by two adolescent girls in Manhattan.

Also at school our 45 6th and 7th graders and I built 10 4'x4' tables using power tools and elbow grease. They turned out beautiful and funky and the kids looked great working at them today. They have such confidence and pride in this type of work. My outdoor ed class is also looking forward to building the school chicken coop, which we hope to start next week.

Busy, busy, busy around these parts.

And it's raining!!

What's On My Mind

When I last posted, we had had three good monsoon rains. Since then we have had next to zero precipitation and no rain of any consequence on the horizon according to the weather report.

Humph.

Luckily we have the acequia, but after the fire at Las Conchas, the acequia water was not its usual color. For a day or two it ran very silty, almost a terracotta color, and then it ran a dark, dark brown, which is unusual. This weekend it was back to its usual coloration so we felt like we could irrigate with it. Lane and I were concerned that the added silt would suffocate the plants that get covered in water during flooding. Saturday we gave the yard a good soaking and the plants are perking back up again. The butternut is seriously taking over the yard and most of the sunflowers are in bloom. Pulling up to the house after a day at work has been lovely with all of the yellow blossoms bobbing in the breeze.

Two of the Stella cherries in the guerrilla orchard did not break dormancy so the nice folks at the nursery replaced them with two more Bings. Those were planted yesterday and I am sure feeling it today. I'm really not meant to wield a pick axe.

Speaking of work, middle school starts in two days. Two days!!! I've been frantically preparing my classroom and long range plans to get ready for the Big Day. Our first two days are pretty unique. We're heading to the UNM ropes course and climbing wall for community-building and a whole lot of fun. I've heard that some of the younger students at our school are already talking about doing the ropes course when they are in middle school. I hope we can keep the tradition alive!

Our first two days on campus will also be exciting. The 6th and 7th graders will be building their own tables! Last year's 6th grade built their own desks, but since we'll be switching rooms we thought tables would be better to have that whole community feeling over the, "hey, that's my desk" sort of thing. I'll post some pictures when they finish.

The start of the school year is always stressful for me. I want the first days to be near perfect and to make sure I have all of my routines and procedures down pat. The first day of school is so crucial for establishing boundaries and expectations and I do not want to blow it. No way. This is the first year for MMCS to have a middle school and I want it to go well.

Part of the other planning I'm doing is for our outdoor education elective. This first trimester is called "Working with the Land." We're going to build the school chicken coop, cook in the solar oven, build a solar dehydrator and begin planning the middle school garden. There is also orchard maintenance and native bee research to be done. If anyone out there has relatively easy plans for solar dehydrators, please pass them along in the comments. These kids are handy with all kinds of tools, but any project that requires a pneumatic nail gun may not pass the safety board.

I'm also on the lookout for fruit leather recipes where I can use the solar dehydrator. Prickly pear, apple or quince recipes are top of the list as they will ripen about the time we'll finish up the dehydrator. I hope.  

And, finally, my sister has just had her first child. She's the first (and will be the only) in our immediate family to have kids. Cameron Elizabeth came into this world without too much of a struggle and is doing well at home in Virginia. My sister sends me pictures daily which I very much appreciate.

This time last year I was working part time and a full-time grad student. Time moved more slowly and there always seemed to be opportunities for leisure. Now I'm a full time teacher and the pace of life has picked up a lot. There are many things I had hoped to do over the summer but didn't get to. I haven't planted the fall garden (which is buried under the butternut) and hope I will have time for jamming and putting up all the goodness that comes at the end of summer. The pantry shelf is looking pretty bare.

On the transportation front, my intention is to bike commute every day and I really, really hope I can stick to it. Our house is less than two miles from school, so it would be downright shameful to drive. I even have a bar-mounted coffee cup holder. If that doesn't motivate me, I don't know what will.

So as we get into the new routine, posts may slow down for a while. Be patient. We're still working on the lean-to and cooking delicious things but we may not be able to sneak a moment to tell you about them. We'll get there. Promise.

Enjoy the tail end of summer, I know I am!

Welcome Monsoons!

In what has been an extraordinarily dry summer, we have finally gotten some rain. In the last week we have had 3 good monsoon storms and haven't needed to access the acequia for irrigation. The yard is so happy and the butternut acts as though it is on steroids. It is truly taking over the yard and we have at least 5 squash getting bigger every day with more on the way.

In other news, we are in the process of putting up a block wall on the property line behind our house. We took the rickety wooden fence that was there are returned it to its original home on the east side of the property. I'm looking forward to training some honeysuckle and (hopefully) some berries up that fence. While some may find fences to be too claustrophobic, I find them comforting. They embrace the property and provide a snuggled-in sort of feeling. I'll post pictures as the project progresses.

Keep your fingers crossed, as I am, that the rains will continue. We have a long way to go to break this drought!

Adventures in Solar Cooking

Earlier this week I borrowed a solar oven from school to begin trying it out before I use it to teach my students in the fall. I have to say that so far I am in love with solar cooking. I've made brown rice, baked potatoes, a luscious gingerbread and right now there is a millet-rice dish doing its best under less than-ideal conditions. The afternoon clouds are rolling in. (Please say they'll bring us rain!)

I also tried an 18-hour sourdough from this nifty site, but after the dough was done fermenting, it was too overcast to use the sun oven. I baked it up in the regular oven and it was one of the best loaves I've made in a long time. I think I'll make some more dough tomorrow to try again.

The best thing about using the solar oven is that it keeps the house cooler than it would otherwise. With temperatures in the upper 90s, I'm glad for any reason to keep the interior heat to a minimum. The second best thing, well, maybe it is a tie for first, is that the solar oven doesn't use any nasty fossil fuels! 

I also like that it forces me to think ahead: a pot of brown rice takes two hours (three if I preheat the water in the solar cooker) and the gingerbread took an hour and a half. I get to really think about what we're going to eat and how much time we need. It slows life down a notch. Maybe once school is back in session, this might pose a challenge, but I'd like to see how long we can maintain using the sun oven.

 I'm going to need to work on my timing. At this time of year, rain clouds generally roll in around dinnertime. With the current drought and only one good rain to date, I've forgotten about these regularly scheduled monsoon clouds. When I put out the millet/rice about an hour ago, the clouds were puffy and plenty of blue sky could be found. Now it's very gray and rain just may be in the forecast. I wonder how much longer beyond the 2 hour suggested cooking time it'll have to stay in the cooker.

Add a fourth thing I like about the sun oven--the lack of predictability! I'm not ready for sun-cooked dinner parties yet.

A Burst of Productivity

I'm not sure if it is the influence of coffee, the cool mornings, or Harriet Fasenfest's A Householder's Guide to the Universe, but I had a burst of productivity this morning. I've made yogurt, the laundry's out to dry, the solar cooker is preheating, and pizza dough is rising. It's not even 10 o'clock! Now if only I could maintain this frenzy to get me through a paper about which I've been procrastinating!

Here are some pics of the garden and yard from this morning:

I borrowed this solar cooker to practice before I use it in our environmental ed. elective. It got up to 300 degrees yesterday!

Cosmos in bloom

This sunflower is narrow on top, wide on the bottom. It makes a perfect shade umbrella for the chickens.

One of the sunflowers in front of the house. Bonus points if you can spot the honeybee!

These were supposed to get much taller, but I think I planted too late, or it's just too hot.

I've been watching hummingbirds, goldfinches, native and honeybees work this sunflower from the kitchen window.

The butternut that is taking over the garden. This works well for my lazy gardening style as I didn't plant it in the first place!

Two of the lovely butternuts that are doing well so far. We've avoided the squash bugs as of yet. Thanks to the chickens and the interplanted tomatoes perhaps?

Low-tech Greywater System

Letting all the dishwater just run down the drain is such a waste. It's not hazardous and therefore still has purpose. While you wouldn't want to bathe in it, the fruit trees certainly don't mind being soaked by this greywater. Our county has codes for those folks who wish to put in an intricate system. We, on the other hand, prefer to do things a little more on the low-tech side. Here is our kitchen greywater "system":

Yup, just a bucket under the sink drain. It's that easy! When it fills up, we just walk it out to the yard and deposit the water under the trees. This is a great way to supplement our weekly irrigation and the "waste" water gets used for a good purpose.

Speaking of a good purpose, in the bathroom we have a similar set up. The water from the bathroom sink gets diverted to toilet flushing. With our low-flow toilet, it doesn't take much greywater to do the job.

We're also going to set up a catchment in the shower and put that water to good use. At our house in Austin we ran a hose from a sump pump out the exterior wall. Any water that was still sitting around at the end of the day got pumped out to the pecan trees. You don't want your greywater to sit around for more than a day, then it gets septic (and really stinky). We're not ready to drill another hole in the wall, so a tub in the shower will have to do.

In Austin we also hooked up our washing machine to a 50 gal trash can and put a spigot in the bottom. A hose was attached to the spigot and it ran out of the garage and to the large shade trees in the front yard. We would move the hose around after each load to make sure the trees were getting equal access to the water.

When we used this system before, it really brought to light just how much water we were using on a daily basis. When you're hauling out a five-gallon bucket sloshing-full of dishwater a few times a day, in all types of weather, you can't ignore your usage. As a family of 2, we don't use much, but greywater recycling was a great way to see how we could reduce our use even further.

It almost seems criminal given our drought conditions to just let this stuff head off to the water treatment plant after just one use. We need to stretch our water as far as it can go and this is one small way to accomplish that goal.