Food Inc.

I've been on a documentary kick since we enrolled in Netflix. I finally watched Food Inc. and it was really moving. I nearly cried listening to the seed cleaning guy have to turn in his customers and friends while on trial with Monsanto (GRRRRR! I have NO love for that company). So many disturbing things about that video and a few things that some people would find disturbing that I didn't. (I also watched King Corn so if I confuse the 2 sorry )
The corn subsidy, the folks who complained about the price of medicine but bought crappy food, the GM foods, the prevalence of E coli in beef and elsewhere all bothered me. Oh and the ammonia laced beef additive---ewwww! I'm so glad I don't eat beef!

6 more weeks of winter

I have my seeds, mulch and starting medium and I've been busy potting up seeds for the spring. So far I have 8 cold set tomatoes, 8 plum dandy tom, 8 variety slicers (rutgers, marmande, cavern, etc) and 8 cherry tom (golden current, swt. baby girl, reisentraube, etc), 6 red skinned potato (out of my pantry..lol), 8 dusky aubergine, 8 variety aubergine, 8 hot peppers and 8 bell peppers. tonight I think I may start my cabbage, cauliflower, broccolis and whatever other ones I need to start early like amaranth (don't have many seeds). I lost my packet of amish paste tom seeds so I'll look for some at a nearby store.

This is looking like the start of a busy season.

The Business of Being Born

So I decided to watch this documentary Ricki Lake put out called The Business of Being Born; I think I may have even seen it at least in part before. Also right now in Indymoms there are some discussion threads about home births and their values, risks etc and the posters like to refer to this movie as pro-home birth. Anyhow mostly this movie is pro but at the end the filmmaker who was pregnant during filming and planning a home birth ended up having a c-section at a local hospital and delivered a teeny tiny growth restricted baby...something that probably would have been caught had she been monitored by an OB rather than a midwife and had she had a homebirth as she had planned she probably would have lost her baby. seems like they defeated their intent.

Planning for critters

I'm thinking positive today. I believe that sometime this year we will sell our house OR we will obtain the house at the front of our property...either way its a good thing. So for critters out there here are the zone rules we must follow:
concept of Farm Animal Unit has been created to balance the impact of large and small animals.
FA-01: This Farm Animal Standards section applies to the following districts:
AP AG CR R1 R2 GC HC LI GI
A. Exemptions: All lots shall be permitted up to and including 0.4 animal units for the purpose of
facilitating participation in 4-H and other educational opportunities. All lots which include 0.4 or
fewer animal units shall be exempt from the setback requirements of this section.
B. Farm Animal Defined: Nothing in this section shall be interpreted as regulating the keeping of
household pets. For the purpose of this section, farm animals shall be defined as those which are
raised and maintained for, or in support of, the production of food or other products.
C. Lot Size: The minimum lot size on which farm animals are permitted shall be 4 acres.
D. Animal Units Permitted: There shall be 2 animal units permitted per acre as determined based
on the following table. The Planning Director shall have the discretion to determine the minimum
acreage for any farm animals not listed.
Animal Type Units:
Large Animals (horses, cattle, buffalo, camels,
donkeys) 1.5
Medium Animals (llamas, emu, ostrich, alpacas,
sheep, goats) 1
Small Animals (pigs, turkeys, geese) 0.5
Very Small Animals (chickens, rabbits, ducks) 0.1

so any 2 goats or sheep per acre, any 4 pigs, turkey or geese per and any 20 chickens, rabbits or ducks. I think my ideal situation would be a 3-4 diary goats (staggered lactations - kids for meat or sale), a sow (to breed yearly-piglets for meat or sale), 8 layers, 20 fryers, 10 turkeys and rabbits ...this would give us meat, dairy and egg self-sufficiency. we have just enough room :D

that and a 1 acre garden(eventually) and our orchard (planted just needs to mature), leave an acre for the house and yard...should be fantastic! Boy, I hope this is our year.

New Year, New Goals

I'm not even going to try to call this a resolution. Its more like goals or ideas.

1. I going to continue my deconstructive phase; that is taking convenience items and breaking them back down into their simpler origins.
2. I would like to lose some weight. I figure I'm about 70lbs beyond where I should be...if I could lose half of that I would be a lot healthier.
3. I would love to find myself pregnant again sometime in the late part of 2010. I know that could be contradictory to my 2nd goal but a girl can dream (and if I lost the weight it would make my pregnancy easier on my back)
4. Plant a productive garden and actually use the produce that comes out of it.
5. Stick to our budget and begin to save money toward an emergency fund.
6. Learn to thrift shop- might need some help with that one from a few friends...I'm no good at shopping at Goodwill.
7 Actively search for an independent work from home business. Might be selling produce or sewing or jewelry but I really think this is something I should be aiming for.

A little garden experiment

So I think this year along with my fancy schmancy seeds I would like to plant a "grocery store" garden using seeds you can locate in a grocery store. Perfect examples would be black beans or celery seed (which is usually salsify). I know one year I had planted whole mustard seed out of my pickling spice mix and it not only grew but it produced seed and then that seed grew. Very cool! So as an experiment I will run germination tests over the next couple of weeks and just see how viable all that seed you get in the grocery section really is. I also plan to use store bought potatoes and garlic. Who knows I might find a new favorite.

Yule Log

I made a yule log today using a recipe from online with a few alterations
here is the original:
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Chocolate-Decadence-Yule-Log/Detail.aspx
now I mixed all the dry together first, in a separate bowl I put the eggs and oil, water. blended wet, added to dry and baked.
I also adjusted the recipe for 18 since my pan was 12x18, used cocoa and oil instead of unsweetened chocolate (which removed the melting step for the cake), used 7 eggs instead of 7 1/2, used 3 TBS water + a single serve instant coffee packet instead of coffee liquor.
The icing was mostly to recipe except since I needed more of it I added 8 oz of heavy cream whipped up to extend it and again left out the coffee liquor.

I just hope it makes it to church tomorrow in one piece and its enjoyed :D