Preserving 2011

PRESERVATION 2010

• Apple Dehydrated 2 quarts
• Apple sauce 10 quarts
• Beans frozen, 9 quarts
• Beans, Dilly 14 quarts 2 pints
• Blackberries, wild, frozen 1 quart
• Blueberries frozen 7 quarts
• Blueberry syrup 6 half pints
• Broccoli frozen 36 quarts
• Carrots Pickled 4 quarts
• chive blossom vinegar 4 pint
• Corn frozen 3 quarts
• Dandelion greens dehydrated 1 pint
• Dandelion/Peach wine 1 gallon
• Garlic Heads 84
• Garlic Scapes dehydrated 1 pint
• Maple Syrup 1 gallon, 3 quart, 3 pints
• onions, dehydrated, 2 quarts
• Oregano dehydrated 1 quart 1 pint
• Peach Salsa 9 pints
• Peas, shelled, frozen 19 quarts
• Raspberries cultivated, frozen 4 quarts
• Raspberries wild, frozen 1 quart
• Raspberry jam 3 pints 1 half pint
• Raspberry wine 1 gallon
• Rhubarb salsa 6 pints
• Rhubarb Syrup 5 half pints
• Spinach dehydrated 2 quart
• Spinach frozen 13 quarts
• Strawberries, frozen, 4 quarts
• Strawberry jam 6 pints
• strawberry wine 1 gallon
• Tomato puree 9 quarts
• Tomato Salsa 13 pints
• Tomatoes, roasted,5 pints
• yarrow tincture 1 quart

I am taking care of a little blog house work today. This is last years preserve tally. With the sugaring season in full swing it is time to keep a record of this years preserving efforts.

We interrupt this program....

I am posting an a repeat post today. We are inundated with maple sap today, apple trees need to be pruned and there are more seeds to be potted. Once I get some of this sap boiled down I will share with you our rather primitive sapping set up. Enjoy the day!

Traveling Through Space and Time

Some days I feel like a visitor from another planet.

I come to this strange place from the planet Frugalturnia. I traveled to this place in my second hand space suit found at the planet of Goodwill. My mode of transportation was in a spaceship pool and we all traveled in the slow lane. Our spaceship gets 40,ooo light years to one ounce of renewable shoe leather.

Where I come from we speak in a language of use it up, wear it out, make do or do without. It is a hard language to translate in this place of APR financing, plastic money and robotic hamsters.

My home planet is verdant with gardens and everyone has enough and no more than that. So you can imagine my surprise ,as I coasted over your planet, to see hunger, strife, great abundance and gluttony. This is not to say that we don't struggle with our own challenges. Sometimes we can't always have what we want, sometimes we have desires that can not be met immediately or if ever. But when we have this itch, we scratch it with a walk through our gardens or gather with friends and family and share a meal.

We have no gods such as your Credit Card , no temples such as your malls, no priests such as your Bankers. We have our spades and hoes, we have our rich soil, we have our family, we have music.

When I landed on this planet and shared stories of my home, I received many strange looks, like I had a third eye on my forehead. Few, tried to understand the allure of fresh food grown with your own hand, when there was so many boxes, and jars filled with GMO foods and this odd additive high fructose corn syrup. Some how the joy of making something with your own lands was lost in translation and folks thought I was asking where the nearest big box store was.

I am homesick and will wait at this spaceship stop for the next commuter rocket; grateful to be home in my house in the woods, where I will run straight to my garden and watch a ladybug climb a sunflower petal.

Radical Sharing

Mark and I celebrated the meeting of a goal yesterday. For about, just under a year we have been purchasing many of our hardware needs from The Farmington Farmers Union. It is a local hardware, farm supply store. Each time we made a purchase we diligently saved our receipts. Small purchases, like the denatured alcohol for a our little camp stove when we first moved in, and larger purchases, like the new pressure tank we needed back in October, accounted for some of the 500.00 we needed to spend in a year to purchase a share at the Farmers Union.

Our local Farmers Union is a non- profit cooperative. Each year the board of directors gets together to see how much money the Union made. Then they determine a percentage that each member will receive. Last year each member received a check that was 10% of the total amount of money they spent at the Union.

In this "capitalist" economic system the idea of a cooperative system seems like a pretty radical idea. Almost, dare I say, socialist. The very idea that members and not a lone entity should share in the profit sorta dispels the idea that a business is only in business for one reason , the bottom line. As a member if the company does not do well, my share will be less. So it serves my own interests, my own bottom line, to spend my dollars as the Farmer's Union than the local big box hardware store that "might" have a lower price.

My own bottom line may include the check that I will receive at the reckoning every year. But my bottom line also includes the social capital of a healthy downtown, the money spent staying in my own community. Because the Farmers Union is located downtown it contributes to the vitality of the downtown. Whereas the large retail hardware store is along a highway. Not an easy location to walk to if you only need a handful of nails. My bottom line includes the better quality of tools and service that I find at the Farmers Union.

We belong to another cooperative already. It is our credit union. I have belonged to buying clubs for food and yarn as well, these are other forms of coops. Some of these coops have storefronts and some extend no further than a friend's kitchen table and a catalog. But both weave a fabric of interdependence that creates community, financial savings and community resilience.

Self-sufficient syrup

I am a bit of an autodidact. I think if I was not one, I probably would not be living the lifestyle that I live. I have taught myself to use my treadle sewing machine, knit, preserve food, garden, make sourdough, make yogurt. Each year I learn something new.

Not always intentionally.

There was the year when the lamb came head first when it should have come out hooves first. Mark's hand would not fit to pull it out. My hands would fit. So it was up to me. In matters of birth and death on a farm this was a big lesson. We have not tried for farm babies since. But we do hope to join a friend when their sheep lamb this year and learn a bit more about this.

More often or not the lessons come out of necessity or a sense that with a little problem solving I can find a better solution. I learned this lesson recently when I wanted to make something that needed mayonaise. But we didn't have any. More often than not I ask myself what did folks do before there were grocery stores? I was able to find a recipe in a couple of my cookbooks. Egg, vinegar, oil and a little mustard powder. The texture is not the same as store bought mayo but for what I needed that day it was just right.

Often the lessons end up saving me money in the long run. Organic store bought yogurt costs about 4.00 a quart. If I make the yogurt myself it costs about 1.75 a quart including cultures. And I can be assured that the milk is from a local farm.

The recent cold that has resided in our home presented a chance to learn something new. Last year we started using elderberry syrup. I was able to buy it through Associated Buyers last year. It was about 7.00 a bottle and a little more affordable than at the local healthfoods store. I was not able to take it because it had echinacea in it. MS does not react well to echinacea. I have a couple of elderberry plants but they are not mature enough to produce enough berries to do much with. Well, when we started getting sick I went to the healthfood store to find some syrup for my guys. They did not have any syrup but they did have lozenges. Pricey. 15.00. But they also had dehydrated elderberries for 3.43.

Why couldn't I make my own syrup? I found this recipe for elderberry syrup. So instead of 7.00 or 15.00 I spent 4.00 and the quantity was much greater than the amount of syrup that was in the purchased bottle. Also, because I can make it without echinacea, I can take it too. Hopefully I will have some elderberry from my plants this year. If I do then I will only have to buy the honey.

For me, this is what being self-sufficient means. I will never be able to provide everything for my family. But in large ways, like my garden, and small ways, like with mayonaise, I provide better quality than store bought. I am saving my family money. And I am learning something new.

Pretty cool.

Slow Living

Life has put the brakes on our family. My recent injury is just one of the few things that has had us rearrange schedules. Mark, who never admits to being sick enough to stay home from work. came home early last Thursday with a nasty bug. I was next inline to share this wonder of biology. Tristan seems to be a little under the weather today. More than likely Evan's immune system will benefit from the virtues of this virus as well.

Speaking of weather, Mark has another snow day this Monday. It is the second Monday in a row.

It would be easy to grouse about all this; you know, places to go, people to see. But really, I am sorta reveling in it. Oh sure a little pain is not pleasant and no one wants to feel sick. But today, for now, at least, everyone is okay and we are enjoying a quiet day at home.

It has been nice to just lay about and read. I am reading the Fellowship of the Ring by Tolkein again.The copy of this book has been read many times by Mark, Tristan and myself and is beginning to show its wear. But a good tale of the hero's journey. Evan and I are enjoying a little Matilda by Roald Dahl. We have read most of his books that have been illustrated by Quentin Blake. Evan and Mark are enjoying Roverandom by Tolkein and Tristan has been studying for his driver's permit.

I do not have a knitting project right now. When I find myself in between projects I pick up a garter stitch scrap blanket. I love to play with the color. Each row brings back a memory of the initial project the yarn belonged to. It is an easy no thinking kinda project. It is meditation. Mark has learned how to knit and I have seen him working on his "ice fishing scarf". A garter stitch scarf knit from a few odd balls of yarn I had around. It is his first project.

Meals have been simple and we have all taken our turns at making sure that we are fed. A favorite snack, popcorn with nutritional yeast, has been a staple during these past few days. And our cups are never empty of herbal teas.

Mark and I joked that a snow day means that we are not using gas; which last I knew was 3.51 when I was in town on Saturday; it is probably higher today. Sure he will have to make up the day at the end of the school year. But he is planning to ride his bike to school once Spring arrives and the roads are in better shape.

Evan, my almost 5 year old, really needs a day outside. But today it rains so he has played with playdough we made yesterday. A box and some of his smaller baby blankets have become a "house". He patiently waits for the paint to dry on an oatmeal box that he plans to make into a "truck".

Life is going to get busy again. Tristan starts his welding class again. Mark's concert season begins soon. Sugaring season is slow to start but we will be busy with it soon. And the garden will have to planted soon enough. Adaptations to our schedule; because we have one car and gas is getting expensive, means that we will spend a little more time away from home to minimize the trips we make in and out of town.

So for today, I sit with a cuppa tea enjoying the rhythm of my home and celebrate the small sprout of swiss chard that has poked through the soil.

This moment..

On the disabled list

I am sitting in a comfortable chair and enjoying a warm cuppa mint tea. I need a quiet moment with my feet up. Today is the first day that I have been out of the house this week and I am pooped.

Last week I slipped on the ice, landed on the edge of a step. The result was a pulled muscle in my lower back that pulled a small piece of bone from a lumbar vertebrae. Ouch.

Most of the inflammation of the area has diminished. For now it is just a matter of rest and healing. Unfortunately, we also had a big snow storm and the trail to the car is not yet packed down and easy to walk on. We drive a standard car and this is not very comfortable either. Sugaring season is starting slowly so I will not have to worry too much about hauling sap out of the woods. There is a teenager that will have to take on that job this year. A good month of so and my back should be ready for gardening season. But I am a pretty active person and anything that takes me off my feet makes me grumpy.

This makes me think about this lifestyle for the long term.

I know a woman who has lived off-grid for well over 30 years. She has a mile hike into her home. Each spring she plants her garden. Her husband is in his early 60's and he still puts up the many cords of wood they use every year for cooking and heating. Recently, one of their children gave them a cell phone, just in case. My friend has had some hip issues as a result of the hard physical work that her homesteading life has wrought on her body. A couple of years ago friends gathered to help her plant her garden. The garden is really their grocery store so not being able to plant a garden is not an option.

I have another friend whose parents have lived in the country since the early 70's. When I met her parents 20 years ago they planted a large garden every year. Her dad would ride his bike 20+ miles, up and down some very big hills, to run errands in the nearest large town. About 10 years ago they sold their old farm house and some land they owned. The built a new smaller house that would be easier to care for. It was just up the road from their old home. My friend just shared that her parents, now 70 and 82, had a hard winter. Plowing and snow removal are difficult. The isolation is hard too. Most of their kids live a fair distance away so it is hard for them to come over when the weather is bad and give their parents help. So they have decided that they need to find a different situation.

Old New England farmhouses, known as capes, were built with big houses, middle houses and small houses. As the aging parents grew older, they moved into the smaller parts of the home allowing the younger and growing family to live in the larger part of the home. This allowed the whole family to live and work the farm. Each member of the family was valued and their presence helped in the general economy of the home.

I will be back on my feet pretty soon and able to get to the work of our home again. But I better start thinking about an earth-bermed little house.