Farm Tour

This past Saturday we hosted a farm tour at moonCatlife. Jerome showed everyone around our beginning food forest and I took a turn showing building and retrofit projects. Phoenix showed everyone the kittens. I enjoyed making some new friends in the area. 

I have been hoping to project some movies in the barn and one of our visitors just so happened to have an old screen lying around. After connecting with a belly dancing instructor I am hoping to get some lessons going here along with yoga and meditation.                                   

We walked on our new paths that Darrell spent so much time mulching and looked at the new apple trees. The apple area also has a mix of herbs and some transplanted gooseberry bushes and wild grapes. I wanted to try a couple of hardier pecan and almond trees in this area as well so we planted them here.

The apples were planted next to a group of trees that grew over a large strawberry patch. There are mulberries, more wild grapes, rye, and some asparagus as well as other wild edibles of the area such as wood sorrel, lambs quarters, and milk weed (pods).  Clover and medic are growing throughout fixing nitrogen, drawing bees, and smelling wonderful.

This year Jerome has added a couple of pigs to our permaculture system and they are clearing the land for planting in our "pig tractor".  I added some swales for redirecting rain water.  We planted larger willows to boarder the farm that should have more stamina than smaller starts from the past. A path is in progress next to the willows now.

We enjoyed sharing knowledge and learning more tid bits about wild edibles and other natural ways of living from those who came.

 Here's to friends, nature, and innumerable possibilities.

The Farm

When I took my cob course in Tennessee this past October I noticed that an eco-village training center I had seen online was a close drive.  We had one day off in the middle of our course and a couple of my fellow eco-geek girls came along to check out The Farm with me.

Now, as much as I am interested in intentional community and eco-villages I get a little uncomfortable with words like commune and fascism. Though, realistically if you dive into philosophy of fascism versus what has actually played out it really is full on interesting concepts, and really, what was Marx actually saying? Fun debates.

 I want to live somewhere that people share because they choose to, where independence is valued, but community flows freely as choice.  Somewhere that people are valued and supported to realize their full creative potential by rising above the rat race and ensuring basic needs are met; these are the strengths I see in a sharing community. These are things I have gained from intentional communities in the past, though I have never been a member of a common purse. And while I'm on a role, I think that it is more important to realize my own equality and see what flows from there than to assume "the man" owes me equality.  I do, however, have respect for those that strive for equality and create communes that work and create conscious change, but have seen a lack of individual "ownership" transfer to a lack of respect for property, and sometimes scarcity. This is where my mind flows when I think of "communes".

 Stained glass dome at The Farm

 


I am intrigued by the story of The Farm as it morphed from commune, to intentional community to become self-supporting. Googling for more precise definitions I found this fun link to explore the definitions at planetfriendly.net

The eco-village training center at The Farm has a number of natural building projects going. I bumped into Jason "the green resourcerer" and he explained one of the eco-village projects to me that included fun building techniques I am interested in like straw slip, in-floor heating, more cob, bamboo, cordwood, and sawdust for insulation.  They were using cordwood to tie together two layers of cob with a space in the middle filled with sawdust for insulation.

Lion sculpted out of cob

The Farm has so much interesting history to share with anyone interested in different forms of sharing economies from co-housing to full blown communes. Now it has a midwifery center (that I did not get to visit yet) and the visitor's center is full of interesting resources . . . I just wanted to take pictures of the bookshelves and start googling subjects & authors . . .and a bookstore where I got one of my new favorite books Ecocities, rebuilding cities in balance with nature by Richard Register. 

 Slip straw I have been told works well as insulation

Cob sculpted fireplace 

Compost toilets & solar shower with Dawn

I would love to go back and experience more of their eco-village training center, natural building, vehicle conversion, and midwifery clinic.

tiling in retrofit

This past summer we had someone come to visit who is interested in intentional community. She stayed with us for a couple of weeks and we discussed community and our experiences with it and shared knowledge. While she was here Sarah Haas shared her tiling knowledge with us.

Sarah is a dancer who decided that she wanted to build her own home and performance structure that could go with her as she traveled the states.  When she told me she had interned with Dan Phillips I was excited to pick her brain because I had found his TED talk very inspiring. Dan Phillips gave a talk on building creatively with reclaimed materials in Texas.  While there Sarah gained a foundation of tiling knowledge and then expanded her knowledge to do some tiling professionally.

The first project we worked on was a small table. Sarah cut cement backer board and we used Versabond thin set mortar to set the prearranged (largely by Phoenix) scrap tile pieces in place. I know that when working with plasters and cement the right mix means lasting work. Knowing this is a good brand and how particular Sarah is about work that will last I will probably stick with this unless I hear otherwise.

The line of blue dragons' tears down the center Phoenix collected somewhere random.

Once the mortar had been given enough time to set (about a day or check label) we squished in a reddish grout. Sarah was a little nervous about staining the tile with a darker grout but Phoenix picked red and we decided to go with it. Once applied we sponged it off the tile within 2-3 minutes and then wiped any remaining grout off the tiles with a cleanish rag. There was very little staining. A couple of the white tiles had the tiniest amount of color change.  After grouting we used a water sealant, and quickly scrubbed it off the tiles before it could dry on them and make them look foggy. 

I showed a friend later how to tile a coffee table. It was much easier to grout when we were able to keep the tile pieces level by varying the amount of mortar on the individual pieces of tile. When using scrap tile the pieces have different thickness and keeping the pieces level not only makes grouting easier but minimizes sharp edges that could stick out. 

The table turned out amazing! Second project: stairs. We have a few stairs leading down to the kitchen that are made of wood. Each stair had a small lip that stuck out. Jerome said that this is because of a visual effect and how our brains interpret depth. People are more likely to trip without that extra lip, but it would be really hard to tile. So I got out the sawzall and butchered the stairs as I cut off the lip. Then we laid cement backer board to support the tile and create and even surface to prevent future cracking. 

The tile we used came partially from what Sarah brought that people had given her as scrap and what a friend had given us from someone else's left over tile. I decided I wanted to get creative and use our collection of bottle caps that Phoenix had claimed. This was fun but did take a little longer to lay the bottle caps. We cut tile for the step edges to that there would be not sharp edges.  This was the first time I actually used my tile saw for tile. Previously I had used it to cut glass for bottle bricks. 

 I took the most time on the top stair. At first I really got intricate and took my time . . . then I decided the stairs needed to get finished more quickly because they were being walked on and pieces were getting knocked off and sideways. . . so a number of people chipped in to make our small community stair mosaic.

 Phoenix designed the center that looks like a ship anchor/bird and Jerome finished it by grouting her creation. Before she left Sarah designed the golden cap portion near at the right that looks like a sun and the trees on the side. Phoenix and our WWOOFer Sam from Utah designed the sides of the top two stairs. A WWOOFer couple from Ohio helped to grout and water seal a couple of the stairs. Our neighbor Donna contributed clear marbles left over from tiling her coffee table (I love how these feel on my bare feet).

When applying the water sealant I used two different brands. The brand "Miracle" that Sarah recommended seemed to soak into the grout much better. The cheap brand kind of rolled around on the surface a lot and needed a lot more work to apply. 

I love sharing knowledge and stories. It is fun to read the stories in our mosaic. The point beer caps are from every time Jerome's family visits from Wisconsin. The bird tile is a hot pad I found at a local thrift store and grabbed because I wanted to copy the bird for a sketch. Gluten free cider caps tell their own story. Some of the scrap tile came from a CSA member who snatched up a bunch of tile a friend was going to throw away and shared with us.  Jerome probably knows more about the other beer caps, and maybe which WOOFers drank each. . . or maybe not, but I really like the bottle caps and would like to do more with them. 

I can claim that the tiling fits in with sustainability because we are repurposing scraps and "trash".  Done right tile can last a long time, which also is a form of sustainability.  A lot of floors include poly something or other, and maybe some of my materials do;  I think it is minimized.  There is a bit of a trade-off in the use of mortar and grout with embodied energy, but creating a creative and lasting mosaic is worth it to me.

Tile can also be laid in an earthen plaster, but our home is in the midwest and partially in the ground so I want to avoid possible moisture issues by going with more traditional tile methods on the existing cement floor.  

to be a woman

What is it to be a woman? I continue to cut my hair shorter and shorter. I am amazed at the reactions I get that somehow I have become masculine. This from young children all the way to adult men and women. Now there are a number of reasons why I like my hair short. The first is practicality, the second is, ummm, practicality, the third is that it is easy, the fourth is that it makes me look like the pixie I am. On the positive side, I also hear that it makes my eyes stand out.

Someone close to me cut my hair for me recently. I was surprised to hear her say that despite how woodsy I am she knew that I still like to wear make-up and look feminine from time to time. I continued to counter that no, I was not going to style my hair every day and yes, I think that I look attractive when I am healthy. After the conversation I was surprised at how flustered I felt. Side note: I can and have cut my hair by myself but unfortunately seem to have lost my touch to cut my own hair symmetrically as a friend pointed out 2 weeks after the last time I tried . . .

What if attractive meant healthy? What if beautiful meant strong? What if lovely meant kind? What if fashion meant personal style and artistic expression? What if sexy meant in touch with the sacred feminine? What if we were all strong enough to stand by our own definitions of what it means to be a woman . . .and supported each other in that instead of comparing and criticizing. Oooh, what if women around the world stopped spending so much time trying to adhere to someone else's standard of beauty and used that time to focus on something deeper?

Now, I know that I stand among these women. I have been in that place in life were I wore makeup on a regular basis. I will admit that when my skin breaks out it can be hard to find myself attractive and I try to cover and protect my "red dots", as Phoenix calls them. There are days that wearing mascara, a dress, and eating chocolate make me feel attractive (and of course this greatly depends on location and lifestyle). I am accepting of the contradictions in my life . . .but what if we all took small steps to redefine femininity with acceptance of ourselves? Change takes time, but its time to start building bridges of understanding. I think that cutting down on unnecessary consumption of products from the beauty industry is a step towards sustainability (I'm sure there are eco-friendly beauty products, so choose your place on the spectrum): but maybe the first step is toward a healthier self.

At Eartheart Yoga community men and women each day would meditate together and do yoga. Then, those of us doing work-trade all worked together on cabins or to build Maya's house. One night we had a women's night. Only women allowed. Each woman dressed in a way that made her feel feminine, beautiful, or sexy. This ranged from me with my braided multicolored (blue and green yarn) hair let down my back in a light blue dress to Kaylie in a fish-net hose with a short skirt and her own fashionized-cut-up-tied-t-shirt. Oh, and I can't forget to mention 3 month old Phoenix in her diaper, lace hat, and belly-dancing-coin-scarf/skirt. Then we sat around a fire and sang and drummed. Being around these wild, free, hard-working women helped me to find acceptance and love for myself. I think that I have never felt more like a woman.

(Top 3 pictures are of artwork in Costa Rica. The bottom one is of a flower that a man at a shop in the mountains of Costa Rica gave to me. He handed it to me and said that I was a beautiful woman--despite the fact that I had short hair and was wearing shorts that I've had for 11 years, long socks, and very dirty cotton slip-on flats :)

communal, independent, religious, spiritual, collective

Today, about 20 minutes ago actually, we ran across Jonathan Haidt's TED talk on

Religion, evolution, and the ecstasy of self-transcendence

This talk is so amazing that I have to share it. This topic has special relevance to my life. Through high school and then a couple of years into college my life revolved around my religion. I even studied Biblical Studies for a couple of years at a private university and took Biblical Greek and Hebrew at the seminary there. The best classes there were on the Old Testament story and poetic structure offered by a professor from India. That man made the books of culturally misunderstood prophets beautiful.

Since that time I have stopped believing that anyone has the right to require someone to agree to one doctrine, one perspective and I ended up where many of the religiously transitioning/communally minded do, the Unitarian Universalist (UU) Society (in Cedar Falls, IA). Through this journey I have lived at an intentional christian community, and a yoga community as well as started a small community with another UU couple who studied shamanic arts. I have been a part of a secularist meetup group where we shared religious disillusionment experiences and attended a buddhist meditation group where we chanted and meditated by candlelight (at the same time period, but different days of the week). I got to hear the Dalai Lama speak on education and secularism. I think that I have gained a lot from all of these amazing people and all of these amazing experiences. . .but catch me on a grumpy day and I will tell you that I never want to have anything to do with a religious community.

I like that this TED talk covers religion, the group collective, and free-riders (when he discusses free-riders and group collective my mind immediately jumps to Ayn Rand novels). I love working with a group of people who share a vision and an intent. It makes me feel really alive. I want this type of community . . .but I also want my independence. I love that my particular modge-podge of spirituality makes me feel grounded and focused, but sometimes a few glasses of wine and some trance music (or Ella Fitzgerald) help me let loose as well. I think the ultimate goal of a spirituality is to have a life that lives ones beliefs, a life that is not split, but one. Whether one sees the world through a religious scope or just sees life in everything it is about connection and gratefulness, growing and journeying, balancing as we learn. Perhaps it is a pastor who is understanding and accepting of differences, or an atheist living a life devoted to caring for animals, a hippie that renounces the rat race to nurture plants, or a mother who loves her daughter, it is about integrating the best version of each of us to the rest of our lives and expanding that to show others this part.

We are looking at having community here, but ultimately what we want are independent, resourceful people who share a common vision. On that note I am very excited to share that next week we have our first possible member coming to stay for a bit and check us out. . . more on this later. I would like separate living spaces on this property (though one transitory shared living space). The type of community that I experienced that was the healthiest for me was during my internship at Earthships in Taos, New Mexico. At Earthships there are independent, hard-working people with open minds who know how to relax and have fun--and they are making a big difference in the world.

Intentional community doesn't have to mean "commune" or "socialism" (though it can if that works for you). I think that perhaps many people who live in unintentional communities aren't aware of how greatly their life, identity, and happiness are influenced by the existing social rules of that society or area. People working together toward a common goal (here sustainability) can be very powerful, but individual physical space seems to be a good buffer for acceptance of differences.