Ghostly Reminders

A Ghost Bike has been placed at the site of the fatal bicycle crash here in Eugene that killed David Minor. The bike is surrounded by flowers and hung with photos and messages. The ghost bike program draws attention to the place where a fatal car-bike collision has occurred, thus hopefully keeping it in the consciousness of the drivers and cyclists who move past that spot on a daily basis. They also remind us of the humans whose lives ended on that particular spot, that they were more than just a blurb in the daily newspaper, but a person with a life and history, friends and family.

When I saw my first ghost bikes, outside of Forest Grove, Oregon where I had gone for a triathlon, I had no idea what they were. I pulled over and read the signs, discovering that in that particular location in May of 2006 Darrel and Sheryl McDaniel, a retired couple from Hillsboro, were killed when a motorist drifted onto the shoulder of the road and struck them. If I never have to see another new Ghost Bike, it would be a good thing. As more and more cyclists take to the roads (I recently read that it's approaching a 100% increase in cyclists nationwide), we can only hope that there will be an increase in safety as well. I have talked to more people recently who started riding their bikes again, and I think that can only increase their awareness of bikes on the roads when they themselves are riding. On the other hand, I've also been hearing around the bicycling grapevine that aggression from motorists towards cyclists is up, possibly because of the large numbers of cycling newcomers and possibly because of general frustration and tension from high gas prices. Probably us cyclists will experience a little of both - increased awareness and increased tensions, so more than ever I am alert when I'm out there biking somewhere.

A Day in My Life

This is one of those rare blog posts that goes on all three of my blogs. This one's relevant to all because it's just a snapshot of my everyday existence. On a parenting list I'm on, we did this last year too: we each took photos throughout an entire day, and that way you get to see the average day in each person's life - what their dinner plates look like and where they go and what kind of slippers they wear, that kind of thing. So if you want to see all the nitty gritty of my life, you can check out A Day in My Life, 2008. And if you're really all that interested, my Day from 2007 is also still up. I found the similarities between the two of them a bit eerie. I have some routines that are pretty engraved in stone. I drink from the same tea mug, hang my laundry out at the same time, and make pizza for the kids once a week. But many things are different, too. The freaky snake in the high chair has been replaced by a cuddly teddy, that's a big improvement at least.

Worming Their Way In

So, there's not many things in life better than picking ripe black-red cherries right off the tree and popping them into your mouth, still warm from the sunshine. For years, our neighbors have let us pick off of their massive and abundant cherry tree, and it has become something to look forward to in the early weeks of the summer as we watch the cherries ripen.

Last year, the house was sold and the new owners had the tree trimmed right in the middle of summer, by just a gardener who obviously knew nothing about tree trimming. I thought at the time that the outcome was probably not going to be good. For one thing, the tree looked leggier after the trimming, and it wasn't a good shape, especially for a fruit tree. For another, the season for trimming is not while the sap is running strong during the fruit-bearing season.

Sure enough, this year the damage has appeared. Unpleasantly, we only discovered after eating many cherries from the tree (eewwwwww!) that nearly all of them have worms. So cherry processing this year took a lot more time and energy as I had to pit each cherry and remove worms instead of just using the cherry pitter on them. Also sadly, the tree only produced about a third of what it usually does. Now of course it's not our tree, so I'm definitely not looking a gift horse in the mouth here. But it's sad when something that has been a regular producer not just for the owners but for several families in the neighborhood is mangled just via someone's non-knowledge of managing a fruit-bearing tree. Several other fruit trees in the neighborhood underwent a similar fate this summer as owners with no knowledge of proper pruning and maintenance hacked away at them. As food prices grow, one can only hope that people begin to appreciate and cherish the treasure that a good producing fruit tree can be!

Things My Kids Must Never Ever See

My kids do not need to know that someone out there on the internet makes and sells chicken diapers. As it is, I have to tell Asa all the time that kissing chickens is a bad idea, and I have to discourage the friendlier ones from just inviting themselves into the house. We would soon have ten more housepets (on top of the four cats and two guinea pigs) if the kids could manage to get chicken diapers on our chickens. Then again, if they actually had to clean the chicken diapers, it might not be such an exciting proposition!

There is actually a lady in the movie Natural History of the Chicken (highly recommended by our chicken loving family) that keeps her chicken as a pet, even going so far as to take it in her swimming pool and to the store! She is obviously a proponent of chicken diapers, LOL.

I Miss Biking Already

Since Mackenzie broke his arm on Friday, I am already feeling the additional pain of not being able to bike places with the kids. I know a lot of folks feel like biking is maybe a difficult way to get around town (especially with kids), but once you get used to it, you start taking for granted that you won't have to find parking, pay for parking, get caught in traffic, and that you'll be out in the fresh air and sunshine having fun along the way. I personally find driving kind of stressful.

On Sunday, we wanted to go to the library, but of course we can't bike, and the bus that runs to our end of town doesn't even run on Sunday (all of a sudden, I also can really sympathize with those not mobile enough to ride a bike who use the bus system for transport). I also would've liked to go down to the Olympic Trials in town, but was counting again on biking there with the kids. You can't find parking within a million miles, and it's a huge hassle to try to drive there.

While I'll still be able to ride myself to wherever I need to go personally, I will really miss biking with the kids this summer. And I know Mackenzie will miss both biking and swimming, it's a bummer of a time to break one's arm.

More Front-Yard Gardens Sprouting Everywhere

Time magazine has this story on "Edible Estates", discussing the return of gardens to front yards, and how it builds community. I know in my town, vegetables are sprouting up all over the place, and I think it's time I take out my camera and post a new edition of last year's "Grow Don't Mow" photo essay from my neighborhood.

In our own front yard, the cherry tree we planted with our dog Sabre's ashes last February is bearing beautiful fruit this year, and we've been enjoying "Sabre cherries" all week. All of my new evergreen blueberries fruited too so we'll be looking forward to tasting those soon! We went strawberry picking last week and got a flat of just gorgeous berries. It's amazing that many people may never know what real, fresh-picked strawberries actually taste like. Side by side with those overblown tasteless things they sell in the supermarket, there's just no comparison. I made up a big pan of shortcake, and we haven't gotten tired of it yet!

Garden Rearrangement. Urg.

Some small animal obviously rearranged the seeds in my new garden plot. So chard is growing in between rows, carrots are growing from the path, and cucumbers are sprouting from the bottoms of their mounds while nothing sprouts from the tops. What a mess! But the good news is that everything's growing! Next year we'll be able to get stuff in earlier, too, and I think this new garden plot will work out great.

With Chickens And Gardens For All

Among other things gaining in popularity lately due to the surge in gas and food prices, backyard chickens and front yard gardens are becoming more commonplace in my town. Several people lately have come over to look at our chicken setup, and we have been loaning our chicken tractor out as more folks get chicks. As it turns out, two of the people read about our chickens on this blog, although I also had real-life connections to them as well. I love it when the internet proves itself not just to be a means of connecting distant people, but providing local connections as well.

In our local weekly paper this week was an article on Victory Gardens and the local folks who are aiming at creating 10,000 new gardens in our city this year. Just down the street, a team of folks descended on a neighbor's house to help turn a portion of their yard into a food-producing garden. This nationwide movement to revive the Victory Garden "for victory over global warming" is gaining steam all across the U.S. Standing to benefit the most are people with limited access to fresh vegetables due to the deterioration of local grocery stores and public transportation. If you don't have a food-producing garden yet, start a Victory Garden team in your own neighborhood. Gardening always goes better when people work together and help each other out.

1-2-3-4- What the Hell Are We Fighting For?

Let's all spell it now: O-I-L!

Ya know, it was pretty transparent when we went into Iraq what our intentions were. We really didn't care that much about deposing an evil dictator - if we did, then why would we be ignoring or even propping up comparable regimes in other parts of the world? And we all know about those non-existant WMD's. But just in case Americans haven't figured out yet why our troops and our economy are dying over there, here's a paragraph for you:

"Four Western oil companies are in the final stages of negotiations this month on contracts that will return them to Iraq, 36 years after losing their oil concession to nationalization as Saddam Hussein rose to power. "

The rest of the NYTimes article is here.

Here's a couple of telling quotes:

"A total of 46 companies, including the leading oil companies of China, India and Russia, had memorandums of understanding with the Oil Ministry, yet were not awarded contracts. "

“These are not actually service contracts,” Ms. Benali said. “They were designed to circumvent the legislative stalemate” and bring Western companies with experience managing large projects into Iraq before the passage of the oil law." (italics mine)

and finally:

"In an interview with Newsweek last fall, the former chief executive of Exxon, Lee Raymond, praised Iraq’s potential as an oil-producing country and added that Exxon was in a position to know. “There is an enormous amount of oil in Iraq,” Mr. Raymond said. “We were part of the consortium, the four companies that were there when Saddam Hussein threw us out, and we basically had the whole country.”

...and now they will have it again. And probably bring Iraq's big oil fields back online, temporarily offsetting the high cost of gas to American consumers and setting back the fragile and temporary changes that people are finally (and necessarily) starting to make in their lifestyles! After all, Americans FINALLY drove 1.4 billion fewer highway miles in April than they did in April 2007, which is WAY up from the 400 million fewer highway miles from March 2007 to March 2008. The change that needs to happen is happening, but meanwhile the chessmasters elsewhere are moving the bishops and rooks around.

Pretty Red Things I Don't Really Need

Nope, there's no way I need it. We have 12 bikes in our garage already! But I met a gal riding a gorgeous red Hawaiin Electra town bike today and she said it makes her feel 12 years old again and I believe her. Aren't these pretty? I'm pretty sure that Mackenzie's going to move up to my around-town bike this year as he's rapidly outgrowing his kids' bike, and Asa has outgrown hers and has recently taken to riding his whenever she can get away with it. And I'm also pretty sure that I'll be replacing mine with a Bike Friday like my hubby's, which I know I will love. And I also know that these cruiser bikes only come with three gears, which isn't exactly all that handy given that I live on a big hill, but.....

....but, but, but I just see a bike like this and I want one anyways. For no other reason than to just cruise around town on it and be able to wear what I want and not worry about it getting caught in the chain, with my cute strappy leather sandals on my feet, and feel like I did bombing around this town in college on my gorgeous little red cruiser, bought for $25 at a garage sale.

DIY Yogurt

Speaking of making foods yourself, I made yogurt for the first time. We buy all of our milk raw from a local person with a few goats. It's really great goat's milk, miles better than what you can get in the store (very little of that goaty flavor, for one thing). And since the kids love yogurt, I thought I'd try my hand at making some from the goat's milk. I used the directions on this site: http://www.makeyourownyogurt.com/ and it worked out very well. I think I'll let the next batch go about half an hour longer though, just for a little more thickness.

The great thing is, my mom had this yogurt maker from sometime in the 1970s, and she brought it up to me and it works great! It's easier than leaving the yogurt on a hot pad or other warming methods, because it keeps it at a constant temperature that's just right. And since strawberry season it upon us, it's just the perfect time to get my yogurt-making underway.

Replacing Convenience Foods

As all parents know, sometimes getting kids to try new dishes can be challenging. Especially for my kids, any kind of combined food seems to put their sensors on high alert. Now they eat a ton of fresh raw veggies and fruits and good proteins, so there's no nutritional concern on my part. But sometimes it's nice to sit down to a family meal where, say, we all eat the same thing!

So there have been a couple of occasions where the kids have tried a sample of a combined food at a place like Trader Joe's or Costco and actually liked it, and then asked to buy it. This leaves me in a bit of a quandary, since these prepackaged combined foods are usually lower in nutrition, higher in undesirable ingredients like corn syrup and soy products, and also come at a much higher cost to the environment with their packaging and shipping figured into the equation, as well as to our pocketbook.

So I've developed the following standard response, which seems to have worked out very well so far: "I'll buy this one package, and then we can figure out how to make it." Recently, this happened with the Teriyaki Rice Bowls available from Costco (horrifyingly, they each come in their own disposable plastic bowl!) I bought a box, and vowed that we would experiment until we could produce a reasonable fascimile, and voila! This week we had the "Mom-aki Rice Bowls" for dinner, which were really great.

So, rather than take my kids' request as an opportunity to lecture on environmental responsibility and deny their newfound tastebud venturing, instead we made it into an occasion where I could demonstrate to them our ability to experiment and discover how to create such things ourselves. We looked through the ingredients, bought fresh veggies from our local area, and created a really yummy family dinner that we'll look forward to having again.

Our Mom-aki Rice Bowls have:

Teriyaki sauce (either prepackaged or make your own with soy sauce, pineapple juice, ginger, and garlic)

Sauteed in the sauce are:
diced onions
minced garlic
sliced carrots
red peppers
broccoli florets
sliced celery

The adults added chicken, pre-soaked in Teriyaki sauce and cooked separately. Serve over rice.

This Is Our Moment

We just got done watching Obama's speech. I told the kids they would probably remember this moment for their whole lives. History in the making.

And the kids reactions to Obama's speech:

"He's sure being a good sport" (during the bits about Hillary)

"Wow, he's not pulling any punches!" (during the bits about McCain)

And... 16 minutes into it: "Was that a pick or a scratch?" (yes, we just watched that Seinfeld episode this week). I was totally ROTFLOL at that one.

I was struck again with what a brilliant and yet humble and honorable person he is. I will feel really good to have him sitting in the White House. I was happy to hear him address again our need to have good energy policies in place. Interestingly, I contrasted that with Hillary's speech from tonight where her only concession to energy was getting Detroit to make more fuel-efficient cars. Hello, the time for that was 30 years ago when Carter did that. We need more. Now. I'm glad that Obama realizes that, and I am hoping to see him follow up on it in a big way.

National Politics and Bicycle Advocacy

I couldn't make the Obama rally in Portland a couple of weeks ago, it was my mom's birthday and we spent a lovely day kayaking and hiking with her. But I've heard from several friends that were there that the bicycling presence was huge. Bikes were racked along every conceivable stretch of railing, every pole, rack, tree, and parking meter. I've heard estimates ranging from 6,000 - 15,000 bikes there, a very visible presence.

BikePortland.org has an article up with photos, and even a soundbite of Obama's speech, referencing Portland's mass transit and bikeability as a model for the rest of America:

“If we are going to solve our energy problems we’ve got to think long term. It’s time for us to be serious about investing in alternative energy. It’s time for us to get serious about raising fuel efficiency standards on cars. It’s time that the entire country learned from what’s happening right here in Portland with mass transit and bicycle lanes and funding alternative means of transportation.

That’s the kind of solution that we need for America. That’s the kind of truth-telling that we are going to do in this campaign and when I am President of the United States of America.”

I don't think we can understate at this point the importance of each individual doing their part. The people who already know how to bike commute right now are in an ideal position to help people who, because of rising fuel costs maybe, are just now starting to give it a try. The more visible we are, the more national politicians will pay attention to the needs of cyclists. I'm hoping that Obama's words are more than just campaign-trail promises and that a new future of better bikeability is on the horizon for all of the U.S.

Even Bees Need a Break

What do you do when you're tired of buzzing around flowers all day? Why sit yourself down on a petal and take a little load off of your six legs. Put your feet up and relax. Don't worry, Bee Happy!

Garden Magic

It's no wonder that ancient peoples celebrated this season with ritual, song, and dance. There's something very magical about everything sprouting up from the earth, fresh and green (unless it's one of the ten million weeds in my garden, the magic wears off slightly when I contemplate them.)

This week we've eaten the first leaves of lettuce from our garden in sandwiches and salads, and nothing is better than that. And all of our newly-planted seeds are enjoying the combination of rain and sunshine that our days have been alternating between, so everything is growing wildly in our garden beds. Each day brings a new seed sprouting, and soon it will be time to have what the kids call our "garden feast"!
In one fell swoop, I finished weeding our new fenced garden and planted it all. Corn, cucumbers, beets, spinach, pole beans, peppers, tomatoes, basil, cilantro, melons and pumpkins - now that's an exciting menu! It's nice to have the space to do the bigger things like pumpkins that are harder in the raised beds. Can't wait to see the little sprouts... On the downside, hubby accidentally threw away my baggies of "old plant pods" (i.e. the seeds I saved from last year's beans, peas, and edameme) so I can't see how my first seed-saving project went. I'll have to try again this year and do a better job of labeling my baggy.

A cop might do a double-take at our pantry as well, with several baggies full of fresh herb on the shelves. But that would be Asa's tea project. She's harvesting our spearmint, peppermint, and the lemon-balm that grows wild around here and making her own tea. It makes a very tasty cup, especially in the evening hours.

Thoughtful Words from a Former Soldier

My tableside book for the past couple of weeks has been Farley Mowat's And No Birds Sang. If you're not familiar with Farley Mowat's writing, you may have seen some of the movies made from his works, like Never Cry Wolf and The Snow Walker, and if you haven't read any of his books, head straight to the bookstore or library and get thy hands on a copy (or two, or three) because he's simply wonderful.

In stark contrast to his lovely nature prose, And No Birds Sang is a testament to his experiences in the depths of the hell of war (in this case, World War II). By turns funny and heart-wrenching, he shows all aspects of a young man's experiences with going to war. But what really moved me was the last page, and because it is so very relevant to what is going on today, I want to type it all in here:

Let it be said then that I wrote this book in the absolute conviction that there never has been, nor ever can be a "good" or worthwhile war. Mine was one of the better ones (as such calamities are measured), but still, a bloody awful thing it was. So awful that through three decades I kept the deeper agonies of it wrapped in the cotton-wool of protective forgetfulness, and would have been well content to leave them buried so forever...but could not, because the Old Lie — temporarily discredited by the Vietnam debacle — is once more gaining credence; a whisper which soon may become another strident shout urging us on to mayhem

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori!

Spawned in Hell long before Homer sanctified it, and goading men to madness and destruction ever since, that Old Lie has to be put down!

If there must be a specific purpose to such a book as mine...let this be it.

Speaking of Sunflowers, Here's A Great Project

Firstly, I am beyond thrilled that author Sharon Lovejoy stopped by to visit my blog, and commented on the Sunflower House post. She has written a book called Sunflower Houses, and is the author of one of the greatest books on gardening with kids: ROOTS, SHOOTS, BUCKETS &BOOTS. We've enjoyed this book as a family, and it contains all kinds of fun and whimsical gardening projects to do with your kids. It looks like she has a whole lot of other great books out that I'll need to check out as well!

Also check out The Great Sunflower Project, which will send you free sunflower seeds in return for your help in counting bees. Since bees are not only important pollinators but also struggling right now with various environmental interferences and the Colony Collapse Disorder, anything we can do to help them out (like planting beneficial flowers and tracking them) is a good thing. We've already signed up and gotten our bee-observer data sheets. The kids are excited to be helping keep an eye on our little pollinating friends.

Häagen-Dazs is also contributing to doing good things for honeybees, since many of their ingredients are honeybee dependent. So if you're looking for a good excuse to eat Häagen-Dazs ice cream, go visit their Help the Honeybees site

I also got a couple packages of Territorial Seed's Honey Bee Flower Mix seeds and I'm planting those all around the outside of our new vegetable garden space in the hopes of attracting even more bees to our garden area. I was happy to note that my lavender is being visited regularly by good numbers of honeybees and these cute orange-bottomed bumblebees. We used to have a beekeeper in our neighborhood and once we saw a whole swarm that had left his hive come over our house. I figure they settled somewhere in the woods near us, so we probably have a good concentration of honeybees in the area, for which I'm very grateful!

Fun With Sunflowers

I've always wanted to build a sunflower house with the kids, but with so little flat land in our yard (actually no flat land whatsoever), it hasn't seemed very feasible. But this year we cleared out this little area way up in the corner of our yard and it's pretty flat up there, so I marked out an area and we planted a sunflower house! You can find instructions to make one at several places on the internet, but here's one article. We decided to alternate taller and shorter varieties of sunflower, with the tall ones being the kind with good eating seeds, and the shorter ones being the pretty crimson ones. We planted vining sweet peas around the edges, and we can make trellises out of string across the top for a roof if they climb high enough up the sunflowers. I'll hopefully have more photos to share as it grows!

I also spent most of today getting that entire new garden spot trowelled into rows and mounds and planted pole beans, tomatoes, chard, beets, pumpkins, melons, and a small herb garden there! All of the seeds we planted in the back in the last week or so are sprouting already, so I can't wait for the new front garden to take root as well! We ate our first salad from our garden tonight, since one of the lettuces survived being uprooted by the cats and is quite large and lovely. Yummm! Here's to a summer of even more fresh veggies, and a shady sunflower house to enjoy them in.

New Garden Space!!

My hubby fenced off this great new garden space up front. We've had the raised beds in the backyard since he built them last year, and they gave us a great veggie garden last summer. But this new space will be easier to do the big stuff in, like corn, pumpkins, cucumbers, melons, etc. I just planted the first row - pole beans along the fence so they can climb. Exciting!