garden progress

I'm making progress so keep those bottles coming!!!

worms eat my garbage

A very long time ago we heard the term VERMICULTURE and we fell in love... It is raising worms. We bought the book Worms Eat My Garbage and since we have been dreaming of starting worm composting in our home. What a great homeschooling experiment of raising worms. So, we have finally taken that plunge and we now have worms in our kitchen - on purpose! We built the bin out of a 10 gallon rubbermaid container. Jason cut holes in the sides for ventilation, but he put screens over the holes so that flies can't get in and the worms (in theory) can't get out. We've already had a few escapees, but we figure we just haven't created the perfect environment for our little red wigglers yet and that it will take time for us to get it right. It was the same with the compost outside. It took a while for us to learn how to keep it making compost and stay hot and when to add what and so forth, so the worm bin will be a whole new experiment to get right. As we venture into this and in the spring we are getting chickens (hoping to start on a chicken coop in the next couple of weeks) almost all of our food waste will either be fed to worms, chickens, or dogs and hopefully we will produce even less waste in the trash can than we already do. Well, anyhow, here are some pictures of Jason and I putting the stuff into the bin to kick off feeding the worms! (the kids weren't here, but they were plenty excited when they got home to check out the worms) Wish us luck and offer any advice you might have on raising worms and worm composting for those of you who are experienced in vermiculture. For those of you who are totally grossed out, sorry...

The Bin

adding the shredded paper

getting the paper wet

adding the worms

watching them wiggle down

Lastly, the food scraps... we buried the food and put on the lid and the worms are good to eat our garbage!

September Trail Keepers

So, on Tuesday last week (I know, I am super behind) we went and did this months Trail Keepers. This time the trail was busy with lots of folks with the weather cooling down people are eager to get back outside. The Cooks didn't make it this time, and there weren't a lot of interesting things happening on the trail other than all the folks walking, running, and biking...

Here is Kalib and Jason Bray climbing the rocks to get a plastic bag that was stuck up the hill. If more people used reusable bags when shopping, there would be so many fewer plastic bags on the roads and in the landfill. One simple step to remember your bags when you go to the store. It is empowering to have your own bags and walk out of a store without plastic bags and it does make a difference!

Stream Bank Restoration

Jason has been working on this cool project at work. They are restoring an old stream that runs by East Campus Road. They are rerouting it away from the street and turning the area into a bog so the wildlife that lives in the water will thrive. They are only allowed to work in small sections to help make sure they do minimal damage to the wildlife living in there. It is a lot of back breaking work, but when they are all through, a very small unnoticed natural habitat will be restored and it will be one more thing Jason can be proud of being a part of. I'm glad to see the University taking more and more steps to be more environmentally conscience. I was told recently that all the buildings will be cleaned with all green products soon. It is encouraging. Further proof that the message is being spread and more and more people are waking up to what needs to become our reality. (small soap box - I just can't help myself.) I'll post more pictures as the project comes along and keep everyone up to date on it, so you can go see it when they finish. Jason now has a camera he takes with him. Hopefully, he will keep taking pictures.

Here is a picture of a barrel Jason is using to catch the condensation off an air conditioner at work. It produces enough water for them to use in the greenhouse there. He took a workshop recently about water catchment systems and it has inspired him. We hope to put some gutters on our roof somewhere in the future and build our own water catchment and rain gardens around here. Our next project here is to reroute our air conditioner condensation into a small pool for our dogs to drink out of. Right now it goes to where our raspberries were, but we had to move the raspberries to make more room for the 1/2 pipe.

Trail Keepers

Our first official day out to the Greenway with the FRIENDS to do our trail pick up. Who knew picking up trash could be so much fun. We found lots of broken glass, lots of empty beer cans and a few surprises like a tennis ball with roots (sorry about the behind shot). We pushed half a mouse off the trail (we figured a hawk got it) and I found a small bird that was enjoyed by something and all that was left were its feathers (we pushed it over off the edge too). The kids really all got into it and did a great job and stayed focused. You know, I think it is important to be involved in things like this. I found myself wanting to pick up trash every where else we went after this. It worries me the amount of trash on our streets and sidewalks. We don't take as much pride in things and WE as a species seem to leave our imprint everywhere we go - even when we don't mean to. My hope is that we will be inspired and make more of an effort to be the change and inspire others to be the change we want. I want MY imprint to be minimal. I want the things we consume to be able to be reused or recycled or composted. I want to have very little garbage in my life and more than anything I want my species to take pride in what we do and be conscience of our impact and take a look as we walk and really see the impact we are having on this planet. Trash is everywhere you go. We can't escape it or CAN WE?? We can make our consumption mindful, we can pick up trash when we see it, we can recycle, we CAN make a difference with very little cost to our lives and with minimal effort. It takes more effort to constantly consume and deal with the reprecussions of that, than by simply being mindful of what we are taking in and what it's impact is going to be. Be inspired by our kids, be their role models. They are our future. Do we want to leave them with a nasty planet to deal with - assuming she doesn't kick us off first - or do we want to give them the tools to be better stewards of this amazing place we call home? All right, enough soap box... I'm proud of my kids for wanting to be part of this and being excited to get up and get going and really working hard to make a difference at such a young age. Maybe they can be your inspiration and your role models... In the words of Jack Johnson - 3... is a magic #...REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE!!!!