The Guest that Keeps on Giving!

Tags

Cutting Wood, Friends, Harn, Helpers, Splitting Wood

So happy always to have people come share our space here at the HARN. This past few days has been especially lovely… and productive!! …with our latest guests.

Eoin and LJ have been quiet visitors with LJ enjoying loads of porch time with me. And we all enjoyed the porch in the evening for dinner and… we were lucky to hear many of Eoin’s latest pieces as he ran through a song list one evening!!

We have been eating some good food, as neighbor Stacey seredipitously gave us casseroles the day they arrived!! Lasagna/pasta (one gluten-y good… and one GF and tasty too!) along with roasted veggies!! We made delicious hash with potatoes, kohlrabi, onions, and eggs this morning (well about noon… as it was after I was down to visit Misi-ziibi).

We got serious after our mid-day breakfast and headed out to check out the wood shed situation. There was an 8′ x 8′ wall of wood ready to be split into burnable size. Now… Eoin wasn’t aware this would be quite the job he thought initially, as the Rocket Mass Heater burns TINY wood. We split to about 2″ x 2″ and like things small as possible as our feed tube into the stove is only 7″ x 7″. So he had to split over and over again! And he was AMAZING at making tiny wood with his big axe.

A little view of the HARN wood processing station on 7/24/22.

Meanwhile Dan was splitting the weird stuff on the electric splitter and I was stacking. [LJ was supervising.] All in all, we got 75% of the wood for winter split and stacked in the garage. And… I was just thinking in recent days about how behind we were with wood processing!! No more!! Though, yes, we still have loads of wood to process… Gotta fill the shed for coming years so that wood has time to cure.

We hope you all are having a wonderful week, living big, getting prepared for what is coming next, and enjoying nature as much as you can.

Blessed be!!

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Spring Cleaning and Crafting at the HARN!

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Cleaning, Crafts, Spring

With recent travel to Indiana, we were blessed to have a wonderful caretaker here at the HARN to watch out for Gaazhii while we were away. In addition to home and cat care, she blessed our space and cleaned it up, pulling us to continue towards more cleaning and organizing as we got settled back at home.

This week we have gathered wood – after a walk with Gaazhii on his new leash – one of those pull ones that dogs use to go further away. He’s gonna have to build up his muscles to pull it, though, so far, we’re doing ok with it. Also got him some flea/tick oil for his neck as we found a first tick this weekend. Ugh.

And… (major, years overdue job…) cleaned out the fridge!! [(not pictured) Also did loads of laundry!!]

All the ice from the freezer… and it’s like a NEW Fridge! Got rid of the old jars of hmmmm too!

It’s still cool here in the woods so we’ll be focusing on wood cutting and gathering to prepare for summer fires and winter warmth later this year. Meanwhile, I found some time for crafting!! Always good to get some creative juices flowing. Just finished (almost*) reading Good Life, Good Death as you can see pictured here. HIGHLY Recommend this book. [*Found the last few pages cut from the book… oddly.]

The Rocket Mass Heater will need some work this summer/fall as we prepare for another season and hope for a finishing of the mass additions. Gardens are greening and await news of who will come. So far lettuce and onion are the most prolific visitors, besides – already GIGANTIC – rhubarb.

Oriole came through for a brief visit over the weekend! Robin (opichi) is often seen foraging in the yard.

We have new friends popping up all around… daffodil, hepatica, gooseberry, raspberry, rhubarb, fern, iris, peony, cone-flower, and circles of chives! We listen to the frogs croaking each evening and the sandhills chortling as crow makes an occasional pass through forest. Haven’t seen makwa (bear) of late… yet chickadee guards the meat scraps he finds! The wind and rain continue to bring messages of warning and love. Turkey… gichi-bine… maintains a presence on the porch.

We hope you too are looking forward to a fun spring of growing and enjoying time with all your relatives.

Harn Update First Winter 2019

Tags

Annie Humphrey, David Huckfelt, Jeremy Ylvisaker, Naabek Liberty

I can’t recall if I’ve explained Minnesota Seasons a la Danny in this blog so we’re going to start with that. Minnesota’s new year starts with Spring in May-June. This is followed by Summer (July-August), Fall (September-October), and then First, Second and Third Winters (November-December, January-February, & March-April, respectively).

So this will be our First Winter update and I will tell you it feels like Spring. I don’t know whether to be happy our wood supply will be lasting us longer than expected, or sad because I wonder what it means for our changing climate.

We’ve taken advantage of the springlike weather to get some things accomplished that would have been much harsher had they been done in the below freezing weather. Like putting some added insulation onto Anne’s trailer. I think she’s calling it her House of Doors now… and I believe there will be some artwork installations in the spring! 😀

Dan with the completed east side – hoping for more warmth for Anne this winter.

We were also able to make it to Annie Humphrey’s Eat What You Kill album release. WOW, we love this new album. The title track asks us to each be accountable. There’s a fun track about the way life happens, And an encouraging track about what to do when life brings things we feel are too heavy. It talks about overcoming hardship in so many ways and how our roots are what will serve us best. The songs recognize the importance of our ancestors and gives hope to our descendants. And they remind us how we all get through this thing called life… together.

It was a real treat to see Annie Humphrey perform these songs accompanied by David Huckfelt, Jeremy Ylvisaker, and Adrian Naabek Liberty. David warmed us up with his own new album songs, many of which Dan and I have come to love since seeing him perform in July (especially You Get Got & As Below, So Above). Jeremy’s guitar work gave the most extraordinary stretch to the sounds and Naabek’s powerful but gentle drumming techniques were uplifting. This new album has songs from the life of this amazing woman, focused around her family, and full of power about how to bravely face life with full accountability. This album summary says it all:

Siibikwe summarizes this album beautifully.

And you have another opportunity to see this fantastic artist perform her new album THIS FRIDAY at Rail River Folk School in Bemidji. You will see video footage of, “life according to Annie”, that accompanies these new songs and, as you watch, you will be tickled, informed, touched, horrified, strengthened, and inspired. These are videos of real life, as it has happened for this family in the last year. They are honest and funny, heartbreaking and beautiful, and they remind us all of the importance of treating each other kindly and remembering to take care of all our families.

And, following Annie’s advice… we helped friends Jeff & Angie of Split Oak Farm Eat What Jeff Killed. We spent a couple days processing deer and I’m happy to say, “I eat Roadkill Deer”. This meat processing is a thing I mainly get to do with Jeff and Angie locally. I’ve butchered chickens with them in the past and Jeff taught me to butcher a deer two years ago when he got one while hunting with Dan. I am glad to do this work as it makes me accountable for my food. I have yet to kill my own deer but I have taken the lives of a two chickens and I recognize this is a huge responsibility. I see helping to preserve the harvest of this deer as a way to honor the animal’s sacrifice and to enjoy and enrich the friendship we have with friends. In addition, we get to learn useful skills that will serve us well.

Jami & Angie trim fat while Dan vacuum seals (and documents) and Jeff cuts roasts and such outside.

We have also been celebrating the lives of loved ones lost and supporting our friends who are losing loved ones… some to violence, some to sickness, all to mortality. We are all dying, a bit every day. And I feel I am truly realizing the LIFE of each day as I appreciate my own pending death. As frequent readers will know, I am a big fan of death. I love talking about all aspects of death and so with these deaths also come more opportunity to figure out life. In understanding our frailty, we find ways to be kind. In understanding our limited time, we find ways to cherish even brief moments with loved ones. And in facing death, we sometimes find the many words spoken in a brief glance, a quiet time of silence, or a simple squeeze of the hand. Death unites us in that we will all die… and we have all lost and will continue to lose those we love to death. Why do we not talk of it more? Why do we fear it so? I’ve found that the more I talk with others of their experiences, the better I understand death. And life, and the important things in life, which aren’t typically things.

As we near mid-First Winter I tend to start to think of death. As the trees lose the last of their leaves and snow begins to accumulate, life finally gives up the green and we head toward the dead of winter (which is apparently also now a game). This year, I continue to think about life as the green stays and the world feels too much like Spring. The snow was melting off with our 40-degree day. Which, appropriately, brings me back to thinking about death. Or more clearly, the way we are changing this planet with what appears to include, as an end result, the possible extinction of the human race. [Which is fine in my book as I don’t think we humans are smart enough to save ourselves from ourselves. Well, some are but maybe not enough of us. And most of us aren’t willing to do what it might take to get us there. And a few of us continue to work to destroy the planet as fast as possible. We, as a species, need to fix our disability to deal with discomfort. Or we’re going to find life more and more uncomfortable.]

So, here at the Harn we continue to try to live as simply and sustainably as we can. And now is the time of year that we get to enjoy the frozen and canned goodies from the summer and fall. We’ve been enjoying lots of home cooking including Cabbage Roll Hot Dish made from local foods.

Cabbage Roll Hot Dish

I make this in a large crock pot starting with some chopped green peppers and a pound or a bit more of pork burger (from Merry Gardens Farm). Sometimes I add some chopped onion and garlic (and if I do, they too are from MGF). Then I add a quart of tomatoes (that Connie and I canned – these too were from MGF). Then I add some salt and pepper and fill the rest of the crock pot with chopped cabbage (from Horse Hill Gardens). Then I cook on low until it’s done to the tenderness I prefer. Note – if you add more cabbage after a few hours of cooking, this will make a better ratio of cabbage to meat in the mix. There is no crock pot big enough for the needed cabbage. One must wait for it to cook down… I usually love to make this ahead so it can marinate overnight and then be warmed up, thus deepening the flavor. I serve it over well-salted rice.

So I made two big crocks of that in the last couple weeks. That one cabbage from Doug and Kathy made two huge crockpots of Cabbage Roll Hot Dish. It was as big as a basketball!

And besides cooking dinner, I’ve been baking more cookies. Still not the weekly batches that I hoped to provide for Dan (and certainly not the daily that he heard me say), but we’ve had multiple batches of cookies in the last month. I started with Peanut Butter (1 c. PB, 1 c. sugar, 1 egg) and they are easy and wonderful so I changed the size of the cookies, ending up really liking the dime sized cookies I got from a tiny little ball of dough. [I also added a bit of vanilla and salt as they are easy additions that kick up flavor a bit. Maybe I’ll try a little butter addition and see what that does… maybe that’s my next batch!]

Of late I’ve moved on to bar cookies. These are preferable as they are not tough to mix up and once pressed in the pan, you’re all done but for the waiting. (Definitely let these cool, too. Don’t burn your tongue.) This is good for not many dishes to clean as well. Here’s the ones I made last:

White Chocolate Walnut Bars

1 c. butter, 1 c. brown sugar, 1/2 c. sugar mixed. Add 2 eggs, mixing in each one by one, then add 2 t. vanilla, 1 c. flaked coconut and then dry mixed ingredients (2 c. flour, 1 t. baking soda, 1 t. baking powder, 1/2 t. salt). Then fold in 1/2 c. chopped walnuts and 1 c. white chocolate chips.

Press into 2 8×8 greased pans and bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes until golden brown and cooked through. I personally like these a bit underdone so they are gooey inside and crispy on top. The coconut keeps them really moist and adds a bit of sweetness so cut the sugar a bit if you prefer.

So Dan is happy that cookies are happening at the Harn. I do enjoy them too. And we’ve shared several of the batches with friends. Connie and I baked cookies at her place a few weeks ago and those were some good batches! Need to make some more for Thursday.

Hope you are enjoying First Winter wherever you are.

Lucky’s Funeral

Tags

Cremation, Death Ritual, Lucky 13, Pet Cremation

Well, we finally cremated the cat.

Oh, fair warning, this blog will include some bluntly worded descriptions and I will not be sugar coating the details of this story. So be prepared for reading some things that might take a moment to digest, or may disrupt digestion should you happen to be eating while reading it. Consider yourself fairly warned.

Warning! We’re giving it BEFORE the icky bits… 😉

Someone asked me why it was important to do this, now that the ground is unfrozen and we could have simply buried him. I am not sure of all the complexities behind our reasoning. In part, since he left this plane the day after Christmas, when the ground was frozen and the snow was deep, it was the initial decision. We’d planned to burn him at the Spring Equinox but the snow was still so deep and heavy, we couldn’t shovel a space around the covered fire pit to safely perform this task. And then, we had a vacation to visit family, and time for the cremation kept getting pushed out. Meanwhile, Lucky remained fine in the pump room. [Initially he’d stayed in the arctic entrance through the freezing months, where he was a catsicle. When the weather broke, we moved him to the pump room where he again, remained largely unchanged, until the very end.] I believe it was a combination of many factors but mostly, curiosity about whether we could pull it off without trouble.

We had what turned out to be perfect conditions for this to go successfully.

Last fall before Lucky began to really deteriorate and seem like we might be losing him soon (this cat had SO MANY times in his life where we thought it was game over for him and then he’d bounce back!), we had done some wood processing. Many of the bark sections which seemed less desirable for burning in the Rocket Mass Heater were stacked in the outdoor fire pit. And, when the fire season seemed at its end, we covered the pit with a tarp knowing we might have a mid-winter fire to send Lucky off to his Valhalla.

This turned out to be a perfect place to support Lucky’s “throne”, an old wicker chair from Grandma’s set bequeathed to me, and, besides the table, the only remaining piece still in our possession. We had decided to use this piece to send him off in style and it ended up being a beautiful burn with the structure of the chair burning away, leaving the frame beautifully intact as the fire carried Lucky to his final end.

Before the ceremony, we placed his throne atop the wood pile, stuffed fire starters (toilet tissue rolls stuffed with dryer lint – upcycling is our thing!) around the base of the throne, and then added longer wood branches around the chair to draw up the flames. Then we put Lucky, in the little box in which he’d spent the last half-year, covered by his old blanket (actually an old baby blanket of Tommy’s, handmade by his Gramma) alongside his favorite toys, atop the throne. We assured that he was looking out toward the woods, as he did do often from the porch.

Then we burned sage, said prayers and remembrances and just sat for an hour or more talking about what a joy he’d been in our lives. We remembered all the hard work of hand feeding him and knew we had done much to make his life easier. We noted that his best years were probably the two and a half he spent being spoiled by Gramma Ruth who fed him soft food every day, multiple times a day, to be sure he was never hungry. We thought back to when he first arrived in our care and the way he sat behind the french doors in the office of our old house in Indiana as Kinya hissed at this newcomer. We reminisced about how he was originally Tommy’s cat (Lucky slept or hung with Tommy throughout his childhood) and then he became ours when Tom left for college. We reveled in the fact that he FINALLY became a lap cat late in life and all the snuggling that we enjoyed, especially in those last few days when he was held almost non-stop. We recalled how he would visit us at night to “tuck us into bed” before hopping down ten minutes later to yowl through the house trying to locate Kinya, who now ruffed him up on a daily, even though he was almost twice her size. We finally smiled as we thought of all the times he meowed us out of bed for his morning feeding. [Mom created this habit with her endless dedication to his every need while he lived at Gramma’s house, and he never quite outgrew it.] And we comforted ourselves thinking of the hours of sleeping three across in our big king-size bed, all of us under the covers with our heads out the top of the sheet, unless Lucky decided it was cold enough to just curl up completely undercover, soaking in our warmth between the sheets.

About 9 PM Dan thought it was time. The was still light in the sky which would help in case we had a crashing pyre. It was a daunting setup but I hoped it would go well. This was a dense fire base and we were a bit worried whether it would take off with enough ferocity to consume his body. But I’d done prayers ahead of time asking for all the help any entity available could bring to assure we sent this little man completely into bone. Let me tell you, it burned so hot, we couldn’t get closer than 5′ at times! I truly felt as if we had a surge of energy taking the fire to maximum heat.

Harn Theory YouTube Channel

As the fire took off, we continued to talk about our little friend, though we spent much time in silence simply watching the beautiful process.

One of the factors I hadn’t considered when contemplating this process was that, to get to “cremated cat”, one must pass through “roast cat”. While his body had mummified in part in the dry storage over the previous months, it still contained much moisture. It was a bit sickening, but not wholely unpleasant, to hear him sizzle as the fire burned down destroying the throne and putting his body into the fire itself. The fire as built was largely enough to consume him but as his body burned, we could see we would need to move him (used a shovel) to a hot spot in the coals that would support his final processing . We added a few more logs to the fire to assure a complete consumption and then we simply watched the fire burn down. About 11:30 PM, we headed inside and let the remaining fire burn itself to coals.

Grandma’s wicker chair carrying Lucky to Valhalla.

I will always remember seeing the frame of the chair as it was consumed with flame and how beautifully it framed our old friend. Today I remember the brilliant red of the fire, the patterns making new art forms through time. I enjoyed every moment of that fire. From the building of the pyre, the placement of Lucky’s body, the heat and glow of the burning, and even the removal of the bones from the cold fire a couple days later, it all felt like part of honoring the great gift that he was to our lives.

We still have not given him a final resting place. I’d hoped to retain his skull but it was so very fragile in the coals and an added piece of wood broke the jaw bone from the cranial cavity. There is still a small round head – very interesting to see the insides of a cat’s structure – which I will likely leave intact after I crush the smaller bones. We will also keep a few of his spinal bones which are largely intact, as we find a small container for his final pieces. I wonder now if he will be buried with one of us or if Tommy will have any interest in retaining his old kitty on the shelf as an old man.

I am very glad we took a chance and tried this new way of sending off our friend. I believe it has prepared me for the future in a way I could not have foreseen.

In the end, I am not sure I have ever a more beautiful, perfectly burning, and entrancing fire.

Happy Earth Day!!

Tags

Camp Wapo, MN350, MN350 Action, Rec Lab

This Earth Day is a bit bittersweet as we face an ever-present danger of losing our planet due to global inaction on the climate crisis but as we see increasing numbers of people recognizing the issue and acknowledging the science. Globally, millions are marching, writing legislators, or even turning valves to work to stop the growing crisis. For these I am grateful. Yet the misleading smear campaign of the fossil fuel industry continues.

This made me think about what I have been doing for our Earth and perhaps more crucial, to plan for personally succeeding in this changing world. Most recently, Dan and I helped a team prepare the high tunnel we began building last year (which was quickly interrupted by a snowfall one month earlier than last fall) at Merry Gardens Farm. We pulled posts up that were too low, pounded posts in that were too high, put in the posts and beam on the north end that will frame the doorway, put in the posts on the south end, and got everything level. This week will bring the framing work around the perimeter and the top truss framing, and THEN we can cover it and fill it with food plants. I am excited about this project because with changing and more erratic weather, this high tunnel will give us better control over temperature, moisture and pests. I fear that the future gardens will all be housed in this kind of framework. For a good fictional dystopian novel on these ideas, I recommend Michael Perry’s The Scavengers.

While I missed Water Action Day this year, I have continued my work for MN350 with pipeline resistance by helping with an article for Make MN magazine and I look forward to seeing the final piece, my first magazine work. Following our 2019 Goals work, I created a tracking sheet for the work being done by the organization which I believe will help track our progress and hopefully keep us motivated and on target. As of today, I have 380 hours in for MN350 in 2019. It feels good to be part of a team so dedicated to climate justice. After fighting the pipeline on my own since 2014, I feel much better informed and engaged with the work. If you would like to donate to support me in this very important work, please do so by clicking here.

I continue to write LTEs, most recently on EV (electric vehicle) charging station installation in Greater MN and the Bagley Town Hall last week – that should appear in this week’s Farmers Independent. (It will be on the blog soon.) Little did I know I was sitting right next to the Editor of the paper at that meeting! I’ve been writing for him for a few years now but haven’t really ever talked with him face-to-face. I have put on the To Do list: Meet with Tom Burford! He is really good to me in that he pretty much publishes everything I send, even though I believe he is in disagreement with most everything I write! 🙂

We have not done much around the homestead yet as the water continues to linger. We still even have a bit of snow in the forest though most has melted with a heavy rain early the other morning. I am hopeful that Dan will be hauling some poop from the neighbors horse fields to nourish our garden beds while I am gone next week at Rec Lab. I was able to dump the one poop bucket I had from the other neighbor’s cows on the rhubarb closest to the Harn, always the first bed to be ready – well, if you don’t include the tomato and grape area on the south side of the garage just outside the front door. While this location doesn’t get quite as much sun, it still has a nice microclimate. The grapes already appear to be growing! And, as this is just outside the door, it has gotten plenty of nitrogen and phos over the last winter.

So next week I take a much needed break from all the activism and focus solely (I hope!) on crafting. The 2019 Northland Recreation Laboratory brings together people from all over the region to learn and share skills. This will be (I think) our 85th year and my last year on the Board, for which I am very grateful. It has been a rich experience but not a painless one. But, no pain, no gain, eh? I have really grown a lot through my work but it’s been a struggle for much of it. It will be nice to simply enjoy lab this year as my responsibility is only to assure the setting up and execution of the Art Show at the end of the week. That is one of my favorite parts, seeing everyone’s amazing creativity and celebrating the “failures” that turn out pretty good anyway. The beauty and skill we see is truly remarkable.

The people are what really make Rec Lab special. This year we will be missing one of the people I loved most – Roxanne Weeks. I will head to the Cities from Camp Wapogasset Thursday to pick up Dorothy as Roxanne was her usual ride. It will be a fun trip though also bittersweet. It is never easy losing a friend and especially not when that person has been such an amazing example and support to you. I will carry her spirit with me this week as I navigate the tough spots. I will try to remember that she, as always, has my back.

See you in a couple weeks!!! Happy Spring!!

Harn Update Summer 2018

Tags

Divest from Chase, Garden Club, Line 3

I realized that it’s been a while since I’ve given a Harn Update and I’m just too overwhelmed still to write about the PUC decision on Line 3 so this week’s blog will be on happier things.  And an uh-oh situation.

We sure have been busy this summer.  Got Mom and Tom moved from their gigantor house on the lake to a small condo on a smaller lake and they seem to be happier than clams in their new abode.  It was a long couple days getting the last minute things packed up and cleaning the entire house to prepare it for the new owners but we did it.  And Mom has been unpacking like a fiend so they are almost all settled in the new place.

A result of the downsizing was that we “inherited” a LOAD of boxes of stuff.  We were like the Beverly Hillbillies all packed up from the big move.   So now we’re going through all the things and dividing them among friends.  Angie got a bunch of clothes and shoes and the toaster oven.  Jill and Randy got the wreaths, the hose attachment, and the food covers for farm meals – which we will enjoy often!  Connie has the Krumkake iron so we can make that at her place this fall.  There are still many boxes to sort.  And we have some new quilts, blankets, books, graters, fabrics for crafts, clothes, and many family heirlooms from the last couple generations.

This past week, we spent time clearing out the garage to hopefully get the car back in someday.  We also found a little uh-oh situation in the wood shed. 

 

 

 

Seems the top portion of the two west stacks is bowing out for some reason, so we decided we’d go ahead and prepare for winter and stack that wood in the garage wood pile rather than re-stacking it in place and THEN moving it to the garage storage in another month or so.  [We’re already seeing the cooling with lovely cool evenings, so fire time will be here before we know it.] We still have cords of wood to cut but we have enough for this winter already we’re pretty sure – that is, if we get the Rocket Mass Heater built out!

That’s another of the tasks that has gotten pushed to a back burner – we’re just so busy – or our friends are busy – so we’re hoping to find a couple weekends in August/September for the cob building workshops to get that finished.  We did dig out all the sand for the project from the tarp where it’s been sitting the last 2 and a half years since we started the major cob work.  We have about 11 buckets left and think that will get us through the most of the build.  The more mass you have on the heater, the more heat you store in the house with each burn.  So the more mass, the warmer we stay and the less we have to burn fires so the less wood we use.

The first winter I was here, 2016, I burnt through a bit more than 3 cords of wood but the stove at that point had cob only over the bottom layer of exhaust ducting and little else.  I was losing a TON of heat through the chimney!  I held as much heat as I could in blankets over the top exhaust ductwork, but that was not optimal. Last year, after getting a bit more cob in place and covering almost all the ductwork, we went through a bit over 2 cords of wood.  It was a bitter cold winter with a couple LONG spells of cold, rather than the couple 35+ below days I had in 2016.  Both winters we supplemented with electric heat to make it through the worst and assure our wood lasted the season.  This year we’re hoping to minimize the electric heat and only use the RMH for warmth.  And we hope to burn under 2 cords of wood as well.  We’ll see how the experiment continues…

As a part of our clean out the garage/bucket the sand/prep for wood move day, I also got some of my gardens cleaned up.  What with all our volunteering and working on farms and gardens off-site, it seems that we never have time for our own gardens – which are quite unproductive anyway due to the lack of sun in our Harn clearing.  I have managed to harvest quite a bit of rhubarb and even pickled some – which turned out to be a bit too spicy for me.  I’m gonna try to tweak the recipe to something a bit less clove-y and make another batch sometime soon.  Meanwhile, I’ve been sharing the first batch with friends and finding some really like the cloveyness.  I have noted that Minnesotans use more clove than I do in pickling so the first batch will find homes!  Took a couple jars to Bruce and Budd’s and a couple to Garden Club this week.

We also picked raspberries at Merry Garden Farms and I made a few half-pints of jelly.  Well, I hoped for jelly but, though raspberries have a higher than normal pectin content, I got syrup.  Actually, I almost prefer syrup since it means less maple surple we need to purchase for our pancakes!  We made a few batches last season of the crabapple ginger cardamom that didn’t gel and it is lovely on pancakes.  Or ice cream.  YUM.

And the raspberriy canes that Char gave me for Mother’s Day are producing too!!  I was tickled to eat a few ripe berries this past week as we mowed the front garden area in preparation for the Shevlin Garden Club coming for a visit.  Connie and I are hosting the July Garden Club meeting as we live close together and we’ll be sharing our gardens with the club.  Hers are much more developed and beautiful than mine but mine are unique in their own way with their hugelkulture and other crazy methods.  For example, I plant potatoes in old tires, stacking them up as the plants grow taller in hopes of more production along the vines.  And I have a new asparagus bed to show off, thanks to Connie’s abundance.  We also pulled out the old stove drawer we salvaged from someone’s loss on the highway and put it next to the asparagus bed as I hope to plant some mints in it for next year.  That gets it out of the way in the garage.

We are needing work space in the garage to finish the build on our canning table.  Dan and I got a 3-burner propane stovetop that we’re building a base for so I can use it for canning this year.  We found an old table at the dump and are converting it into a canning station.  We also realized this summer that moving the toaster oven to the porch helps keep the house cool while still allowing me to bake banana bread and such – I got a whole bag of day-olds for 99 cents!  We had originally planned to build an outdoor kitchen on the east end of the house but now we’re thinking we’ll just house the outdoor kitchen on the attached screened porch.  Hopefully this will be a workable and simpler solution.  It’s kind of interesting to see how things fall into place here at the Harn… it’s not always as we plan.

Speaking of plans, while we planned to eat all the potatoes we helped harvest at Merry Gardens Farm last fall, we’re still working through them.  We ate all the ones stored in the burlap bag and I’ve gone through the ones stored in peat moss in the garbage can and pulled some with very long eyes! (PIC) These potatoes are still sturdy and delicious so we’re still eating them.  I did plant a few of these guys to see how a Harn potato crop will do this year – last year we were inundated with slugs and only got a handful of potatoes.  I see the slugs this year too but have also frequently seen the snakes out in our garden so hopefully they are helping us.

We’ve been weeding weekly at Merry Gardens Farm and bringing home delicious veggies now that things are really in production.  Cuckes, Kohlrabi, Lettuce, Sungold tomatoes, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Cabbage – lots of yummy stuff that we’ve eaten and shared at potlucks.  Just this past week we finally made it to Bruce and Budd’s for a Monday Potluck and took a big pot of venison (thanks, Jeff Ness) vegetable soup that was a big hit.  FULL of meat!!  We’d made a ham roast a few days earlier and I’d wondered how I’d like the flavor.  I’ve told myself that I’d have to adjust to the flavor of venison with its gaminess. But I was amazed to find it very beef-like in flavor.  I LOVE it.  In fact, it’s even better than beef as it has a richness that brings almost a livery quality.  So yummy.

In addition to the Farm work, we’ve begun volunteering at the Farm by the Lake Garden Club, newly created by Connie Nunemaker, our wise and fearless leader.  She is about the best person you could hope to have when you’re working to restore gardens to a vision held by a plant collector and gardening enthusiast.  She knows plants, knows how to transplant and split them to maximize color and avoid overcrowding.  Richard Davids donated the land for the Farm by the Lake to exist and when it was donated, it was lush with flora from all over the world. In the intervening years, there has been intermittent care of the beds and now we’re working to restore the original vision.  And weed and kill poison ivy and nightshade along the way!  So far, we’re trending well with one volunteer (Rebecca Monley) joining us at the first meeting and two (Avis Sundbom & Adam Ams) at the second.  Hope to keep growing in numbers as we work.  This is not quick fix but our first project, the Peony Bed – which we’d discovered as we walked the grounds early on – has now been uncovered and de-weeded and is looking pretty good.  You can see a peony to the right of our group in the second photo, along with several to my left and one behind Connie.  There are peony seedlings everywhere!

We’ve had some fun this past month for sure – spending 4^th of July and that weekend meeting more hippie friends up here in the Northwoods.  We got to meet new friends from Not Your Average Family Band at both shin-digs and spent a lovely hour in the Lake Bemidji State Park listening to them play last Sunday. I hoe to post  a video soon.

We’ve also really been enjoying the wildlife this summer.  I love the snakes and frogs best I think.  But we also enjoy watching the hummingbirds who come to our feeder.  We have two brilliant boys and a smattering of girls, though of late they are not as frequent visitors.  We hear a grouse close but haven’t seen them since finding the momma on the nest earlier this spring.  We have a robin family with a nest in the pine tree just outside the porch – convenient for them as they love to hunt in our clearing.  Happily the squirrels have moved off to their summer homes and we have not seen any chipmunks or mice, which can be destructive or invasive, near the Harn.  And no bunnies to eat our lettuce and radish!  The deer have been quite scarce this summer too though we often jump them in the winter when we go out to pee. We’ve had a couple BIG spiders, one in the house and a couple on the porch but for the most part, we and the spiders co-exist peaceably. Unlike the one raccoon I chased out of the yard a month or so back – he has not returned so my cursing appears to have worked.

We seem to always be very busy but also always have time for some porch sitting and relaxation so this life seems to be working out pretty well so far.  We talked with our financial adviser and things look good on that front too so we’re not feeling too worried.  We continue to watch spending but we also still spend more than we ought at times.  Though the longer we’re here, the less we seem to need and the more we seem to do cheaply.  I made another batch of laundry soap – the second since our move to the Harn in 2016.  It cost less than $2.25 to make a batch and it lasts for quite a while.  I also recently made a new batch of deodorant for about $2 – should last me through until winter.

We have watched a few things of late that have been fun. Had Bill and Connie over for venison stew and a movie – Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them – as we’re all JK Rowling fans.  We also spend a bit of time on Netflix and have seen some good movies, lots of funny comedians, and a couple good food series; we especially like Somebody Feed Phil.  The best comedians of late have been Hannah Gadsby – she will change how you see the world , Ali Wong – she is so “wong”, and Chris Rock. We occasionally watch classics from our DVD collection. If you haven’t seen Idiocracy lately, you might want to check it out as it’s a bit relevant in today’s political climate.  And we’re getting the last two films of the Hunger Games Trilogy, which became a 4-movie deal, from the Bagley Library this week.  That should be interesting to watch as well as we prepare for Revolution.  Perhaps we will learn skills for taking on the Empire.  The Rebels need all the help they can get at present and I’m hopeful we’ll take the resistance to a whole new level this fall.  Time will tell.

And so, we keep up the Pipeline fight.  We plan to continue supporting the protests against Line 3 and also to support the Valve Turners when that trial finally makes its way to the Clearwater County Courthouse.  I may yet get that bucket list item checked to Be Arrested for Activism.  Happily, some recent Duluth Water Protectors were given the right to use the Necessity Defense, giving me hope that we are seeing a turn toward common sense when it comes to saving our planet from the greed of corporations… not to mention keeping it livable for our grandchildren.  And there is a planned Youth Climate March on July 21st in Washington, D.C. that I pray is a tipping point that wakes the public to the crisis our children face as we continue destroying the planet.

The latest in my exploits was a trip to Camp Turtle Island for a Day of Resistance. What an amazing day. full of prayer, music, good food, community, and encouragement. I met some lovely people in the “Besistance” (being resistance – I love it!).  And the next day Dan and I headed to Duluth for the Honor the Earth fundraiser concert. Next week I hope to share more about that.  We also met some Water Protectors who shared their home with us.  I love the community in my life.

If you want to help in the pipeline fight, please read the recent MN350 statement on the MN PUC decision and take a pledge to help resist Enbridge’s New Line 3.   And please end all relations with JP Morgan Chase, the #1 Wall Street funder of Tar Sands oil.    You can send a message to CEO Jamie Dimon today right here.  Wells Fargo too needs to be abandoned (not just for tar sands pipeline support but also for their discriminatory lending practices and funding for the gun industry and private prisons).  Divestment is the only language these banks seem to comprehend.

Thanks for your support.

 

Gardening Fun

Tags

DIY, Helping others

I have been having lots of fun playing in the dirt… some for the Harn Homestead and lots more volunteering to help others.

After such a slow coming spring, I worried that our gardens would not have enough time to finish.  But, as Char assures me, even if you don’t plant until July 4^th, the garden WILL make it (apparently one year they had a really late planting but still had a good harvest).  And it now feels like mid-summer with all the HOT weather.  Sometimes I’m amazed it’s just barely June!  We just never really got much of a Spring…  But things are growing, and fast!

Part of the process is cleaning up the past year’s growth.  Connie and I have recently spent time at our 89-year-old neighbor’s place working on cleaning up gardens.  And then we spent some time at Farm by the Lake, a local venue for shows, weddings, readings, and overnights.  Their garden beds were in need of cleanup and, because they do so much to bring culture to our little rural community, we were glad to help with a bit of gardening.  The property, on Lake Lomond in Bagley, was gifted by Bagley native Richard C. Davids, a naturalist, author, editor and teacher who wanted Farm By The Lake to provide a space where “we can find renewal with the land, with another, and with God.”  I’ve attended music shows, storytelling events, a writing workshop, and their annual craft fair, which also features lots of musicians.  It’s a lovely space currently being cared for by friends Dawn and Marty.

Before:

 

After:

 

You see, in the last photo, Connie “inspecting” my work, finding it acceptable. 😀

As a member of Shevlin Garden Club, Connie and I also recently did a Sunflower planting event where we helped children plant seeds at the Clearwater County History Center (CCHC).  From their website:

The museum is located in the former Shevlin School, a two-story brick structure built in 1911. The school closed in 1991 and the historical society “History Center” opened in 1996. The grounds also include several historic buildings: the first log school built in the county in the late 1880s, a school built in 1936 by the local WPA crew, the Ebro Depot (a small transportable depot- the size of a box car), and The Halvorson cabin (a two story log cabin from 1904). Two additional buildings on site house larger tools, machinery and miscellany. Exhibits are changed on a 12 to 18 month schedule, with different themes and topics covered each year.

We ended up having a wonderful day, even with a cold rainy morning.  The CCHC hosted a dairy event in the morning where kids made butter and ice cream and, just as they finished up their sundaes, the rain let up so we could plant the sunflower seeds!  Connie Nunemaker and Nancy Ames showed the kids how to turn up the soil and then hoe trenches for the seeds.  Then Connie explained spacing and the kids planted all five rows.  The outside rows feature Teddy Bear Sunflowers, a shorter variety, while the inside row is Sunburst, a very tall sunflower variety.  In between, we planted Ruby Moon and Autumn Beauty sunflowers, some of which present with red coloring.

Why do we do it?

First it’s nice to know we’re helping plants look their best by removing tall grasses and old growth.  Maybe it’s something to do with my apparently-increasingly-more-prevalent-each-year-OCD, but I am liking more order than chaos.  [Perhaps to combat the ‘chaos’ of not being able to control my aging??]  I like seeing the plants without all the grass encroachment.  And while I admit I do NOT have much issue pulling out grasses, I still struggle with the cultural idea of the ugliness of dandelions!  They are much harder to pull…

Another benefit we can bring is to relocate some of the bird-dropped seeds to more appropriate places and this allow more space and better proliferation in new locations.  Connie collected a spruce and a couple little pines to relocate.  Would they be fine without us?  Well, surely they would all duke out a co-existence.  But in a few years, that large oak growing among the flowers might bust through the concrete barrier poured years ago to contain the bed. We have one of these to relocate too – but that will be another day.

We are hopeful to help Dawn as she works to bring the flower beds back to what Richard Davids intended at Farm by the Lake.  It will be a multi-year project but will be fun to watch as things transform.   It will be extra fun and a bit easier if we can find more community support for the project. So far, Dan has committed himself and I’ll be recruiting soon!

Plus it feels good to be with the plant nation! They are lovely and if you listen close, you might hear them saying hello.  And, did you know?  Dirt has some kind of Prozac-type effect on people?  It apparently has some kind of component that makes us feel happy.  It’s just anecdotal for me so far but there might be something to it!  [And I much prefer the natural way to the idea of popping pills.  Who knows what else those might be doing!?!]

And speaking of anecdotal, it seems that the friends I have that talk with their plants, giving them love and attention, really seem to have better luck with abundance and growth.  I believe these plant beings hear us and appreciate us when we help and love them.  As such, I’ve been talking to the Sungold and Grapes just outside our front door every day. And I head out to see the Raspberries several times a week to tell them how big they are getting!  Hopefully they will soon be joined by the squash, beans, argula, beets, peppers and such that I seeded last week.

 

And of course there is the satisfaction of seeing the final result. The Sunflower event at the CCHC included a Sunflower growth chart where several kids marked their heights.  It will be fun at the end of the summer to see how the sunflowers surpass the kids in annual growth!

 

Plus, helping to clean up a couple of my neighbor’s flower beds resulted in a delicious lunch!  Can’t beat that!

 

Gardening is the gift that keeps on giving.  Seeing the plants thrive, enjoying the beautiful flowers, watching pollinators enjoy the food, and harvesting the veggies throughout the season.  I’m looking forward to great rewards for all my garden work.

Harn Happenings Spring 2018

Well, I guess it’s time for an update from the Harn for the twelve of you who care.

It’s been a busy and full spring this year but we still feel like we’re always behind.  One reason is that we seemed to go from winter to summer overnight this spring.  No cool transition days just clouds and freezing to 75-degree sunshine!!  Winter coats to T-shirts.  Winter boots to Vans.  Another reason was the traveling that started our spring – just had to get down to Indy for some parties – we miss so many people from Indiana days.  Oh, and we both lost a week to “vacation” separately, so that was like losing 4 weeks.

But we’ve still managed to do quite a bit:

• Planted peas, arugula, radish, turnip, rhubarb (a new variety), a dozen raspberry canes, 5 grape vines, 20 trees, peas again, lilacs, primrose, ground cherries, tomatoes, onions, dahlias, native pollinator plants (indigo and prairie smoke), potatoes, and a Sungold tomato.  And that’s just at our place…
• We planted a couple thousand onions (bulbs and starts) at Merry Gardens Farm, rows of herbs, and 1000′ of brassicas ~ cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage.  Plus we diversified the farm this year broadcasting amaranth and dill and planting more flowers to bring good predator insects and pollinators. They have CSAs now!
• Created a Shutterfly book of our first year (really 18 months… from November 2016 to March 2018) at the Harn, full of stories and details.
• Did taxes and completed a seminar on grant writing at Leech Lake Tribal College.
• Figured out how to make flower bombs with Connie and made them with the Rec Lab crew.
• Played a few games of Drain the Swamp.
• Vacuumed about 10,000 Asian beetles – Terrorists!! – from the windows, walls, and ceilings. [We think they are all gone now…  OOPS!  Except in the pump room!! Got them too!]
• Saw Corey Medina and the Brothers a couple times.
• The first robins showed up while I was at Rec Lab and we’ve finally got dandelions in full bloom.  Day lilies are up, and even some Siberian iris.
• Fixed the screen door and gave the porch a thorough sweeping to prepare for more outdoor time there – our favorite room in the house!
• Fixed our garage door.
• Helped with the Shevlin Garden Club Annual Plant Sale and helped pull off the 12th District bi-annual meeting.
• Squeezed in a show at the Quad A / Andria in Alex – Nunsense!
• Dan road tripped back to his dad’s home state for an architectural adventure [best food of the trip was there, as were some cool art and beautiful trails].
• Had Italian International Dinner Night at David’s.
• Cut some firewood for the upcoming years.  Thanks to Randy of Merry Gardens Farm for the loan of the monster chainsaw!
• Played with polymer clay a bit, though I lost some things to the dreaded oven…
• Dumped 13 Humi buckets.  Whew!  We were down by a bucket or two, even considering the weeks off-site this spring.  Once again, an easy job with the system we have in place – see photo here.
• Visited Mom and Tom and sent a BUNCH of cards out to friends and family.
• Read Noble, Ghost Fleet, Blue Nights, Tao Te Ching, Pirate, and Lights Out (watch for an upcoming review).
• Fighting the Highway Department for our trees along the road out front.  Looks like a losing battle…  Such a fucked up country where roads and cars are more important than nature and trees.  I wish we’d start changing things in a big way towards LESS fossil fuel focus.  In the end, I think we’re gonna see that we wasted a lot of money as we collapsed in on the end of the fossil fuel era.
• Watching our friend Ann Marie Ackerman make history with her new book, Death of an Assassin [Ann starts at about 4:30 and, yes, you can hear my friend Jacqueline, her sister, laughing out loud as the video ends, which made me laugh out loud too.  Miss that girl…].
• Read the Swedish War Preparation Manual and feel even less hopeful for our survival here in America.  I mean, we don’t have an emergency preparedness plan/system/website…  FEMA says DHS knows, DHS says DoD knows, DoD says FEMA knows.  Looks like we’re pretty much on our own here.  Go Rugged Individualism!!

But, our rhubarb’s looking good so life is bearable.

So Lucky in Our Life

Tags

DIY, fun, local

So many blessings in the last couple months!  I don’t even know where to begin and I’m sure I will leave out several of the most wonderful things…  But I am starting to believe that some of the wonderfulness is because of our gratitude.  We are continually saying, “How lucky are we?!?”  It’s like good things just keep coming our way.  And I will keep giving thanks for it all, and hope it keeps delivering.

One of the first signs of spring are baby lambs and goats.  Our friends at Split Oak Farm have both.  Their lambs were rescued triplets from a local farm that keeps the best two of a litter and these sweeties are so small!  I never knew a lamb could be as little as a cat!  And this is at some days old.  I happened to be going for a visit with friend Connie who was helping Angie make an apron from an old linen tablecloth.  That tablecloth never looked so good as when they were finished.  A beautiful upcycle.  Anyhow, the lambs had arrived earlier that week and they were so adorable.  A few days later, Connie and I had a trip to town and so we stopped by the Farm on our way home.  Good thing!  Angie was just bringing out milk for the little lambs and we got to help!  We also got to see baby goats – four of them at the time – two new born and two a few days old, all adorbz!  Connie and I got to play farmer as we helped move two ewes to a birthing pen and relocate a momma and baby that had gotten into a wrong space.  Those goats are sneaky little devils!  All in all, I’m glad we don’t have livestock at our homestead… but I’m sure glad to have lots of farmer friends who do. 🙂

Another farmer couple, Jill & Randy at Merry Gardens Farm, are remodeling their kitchen and we (mostly Dan) are helping with the project.  They pay us good… in food!!  Every time we visit, we end up having a meal and it’s always, in part and sometimes almost in whole, harvest from their land.  We’ve had pork liver and onions, roasted potatoes, beets, and Brussels sprouts, pork chops, and Thai cabbage salad.  Yes, Thai food!!  Jill is an amazing cook and on a recent visit we had both the Thai cabbage salad and Thai noodles.  It was like a dream in rural Minnesota where most of the food tends toward the white and bland.  Her recipes for the two sauces were very similar – a mix of Liquid Aminos (GF soy sauce), garlic, peanut butter, chili sauce, oil and honey – but just different enough to give a nice contrast.  Oh, just yummy!!  And she also makes several varieties of mean tapioca pudding – my favorite.  We never leave their place hungry.

Winter at Merry Gardens is quiet in the fields but we also get to see baby piglets.  These Red Wattles are SO SWEET!! I just love their sleek ruddy coats and their sturdy little frames.  They are really manageable for the first couple weeks and then they are past the cuddle stage.  But they are still fun.  Their market pigs were cracking me up as they ran through the fields rearing up and taking off for no apparent reason.  And even the older sows and boars are wonderful.  Most of them are talkers and they are like little dogs the way they play with Jill when she steps into their pen.  They have some Mangalitsas which are like a velcro pig.  When they are little piglets, they look like sheep in their white fuzzy coats.  And maybe my favorite is Moses, the big boar who, when I call his name, comes running out to meet me like a big kid.  He has the best smile.  And he knows when I call his name I usually have food!  But his real buddy is Randy, as this video shows.  I don’t know who is cuter, Moses or Randy.  Merry Gardens Farm really love their pigs.

But it’s not all fun and games.  The market pigs require castration to prevent “boar taint”, an unfavorable smell or taste caused by the sex hormones testosterone and androstenone.  Though Randy had asked me to help last season, daughter Molly ended up being available.  But this season I got my chance to help.  It was a not difficult process and Randy made it very quick.  I had Danny film us and hope to eventually get a video posted for informational purposes.  Though it may take me a while because I realized it is much harder to watch (a requirement for video editing) than to do the actual castration.  In the moment, I was focused on trying to assure the pig was still for Randy’s process and comforted… as best I could.  Randy says it’s the hardest part of raising these guys.

Crafting has been magically happening in my life as well.  Neighbor Connie and I took a Craft Day to attend the Creative Spirit Fiber Festival and visit Anderson Fabric Outlet.  It was a wonderful event followed by a huge sale.  SO MUCH Creativity and Imagination!! My favorite gal at the fair was Lisa Jordan of Lil Fish Studio. You should check her out. She’s super fun. https://m.facebook.com/profile.php?id=193090157396798&ref=content_filter

And all that fiber watching ended up being a good inspiration for a project that came about due to Connie mentioning “making puppets”.  Turns out my friend Steph’s son Rook LOVES Boss Baby and I had the crazy idea that I would make him a puppet for one of the characters from the movie.  Steph said Tim was his favorite character but I knew I would have to also make a Boss Baby puppet too.  And we did!

How does the Fiber Festival factor in?  Well, when it came to hands and shoes, I decided felted wool might be the easiest option.  And it sure was… with Char’s help.  Char (of Char’s Yarn Basket just down the road from me) is an amazing artist and I knew she’d be able to help me with my project.  Sure enough, we got it done.  I believe my favorite parts of Tim are the jeans and shoes.  And his head is the best of the two puppets (Connie did the paper mache work on it).

All in all, we are truly blessed.  Even the icky stuff that seems to happen ends up having a positive impact – lessons learned, relationships strengthened.  I hope that you are feeling blessed in your life too!

C&C with C&A

Tags

DIY, fun

What a week of fun!!  Cooking and Crafting with Connie and Angie.

I am feeling so lucky in many of the new friends we have up here in the North Woods and two of the best are Connie and Angie.  Luckily for me, Connie lives close enough that we’re talking about biking to each other’s homes… once summer comes ’round again!  And even though Angie is farther away, she has cute bunnies and goats and the best cat ever, Helga, so I get there too.  Both of these ladies have something that I do not… a real kitchen with stoves, ovens, running water that doesn’t go into a bucket. 😀

But the other thing they have is a love of crafts.  We started the crafting venture with Wire-wrapped Pendants and now we’re on to Driftwood Art, which uses some of the same techniques.  While Connie focused more on the bead creations aspect, Angie and I both made a Driftwood piece.  And we all chatted and chillaxed and created.  Here’s our work: Angie’s, mine and two for Connie.

So much fun!  I am loving this creative outlet.  It is amazing to see where it all goes as it’s a natural process and came sometimes turn out different than you expect.

So this was the second day this week for creation at Connie’s as she and I had done cooking too.  We worked on a few Gluten Free (GF) recipes and had good luck with all though we thought we’d only had luck with about half.  So, we started with a GF Beet Chocolate Cake… I KNOW!  It sounds weird.  But it’s really good.  I wasn’t sure but I really ended up liking it a lot.  Even Danny liked it!  So.  One success.

We had some weirdness along the way like a hard boiled egg in with the regular ones.  But we tried three different cracker recipes with mixed results.  The Sesame Seed crackers were the best of the three – nice and flaky, crunchy and tasty.  The Corn Puffs did not really puff – and while these were the third favorite, they were too salty.  This lead to several ideas on how we could improve on the recipe and we plan to implement three of those ideas by making a few more batches for the Super Bowl Feast.  The least workable was an Almond Flour Flax Seed cracker which we didn’t use Almond Flour to make.  Yeah, maybe most of the problem.  The substitution flours were likely too absorbant and we ended up with a VERY crisp cracker.  Too dry.  But the spice blend was good and Dan declared them “good”.  So, we can claim 4 victories… of sorts!

We’ve got lots of crafting and cooking plans so I’ll keep you posted if we have more fantastic adventures to share with you all.  Hope you are having your own successful creative endeavors as well.