Food Inc.

I'm not a huge movie buff, but I love a good documentary, and last night Josh and I went to the Moxie and saw Food Inc. This movie features three of my favorite authors, Michael Pollan, Eric Schlosser, and Joel Salatin, speaking about the problems of our current food supply. Here are some fascinating tidbits I took away from the film: Almost all of our food supply comes from five major corporations and almost all of our food supply contains corn and / or soy. Diversity and choice are hard to find in a local grocery store, even though it appears otherwise. The film refers to this as "the veil" between the public and where our food actually comes from.

The argument that "I ate fast food as a kid and have continued over the past 27 years and I'm fine," no longer applies. Food has changed so much in that amount of time. Factory produced food is less safe than it was 30 years ago because the FDA has become so intertwined with the mass food production industry that there are far fewer safety inspections. Modern methods of meat processing allow for massive amounts of bacteria to enter our food. Consider how many food contamination recalls we see each year.

The most heart wrenching part of the movie involved a mother discussing the death of her two year old son after eating a fast food hamburger that contained e-coli bacteria. After seeing that, it will be so hard for me to give Ben a fast food hamburger, most of which contain beef from at least a thousand cows.

So what are we to do? The film suggests shopping locally, visiting farmers markets, growing your own garden, and shopping wisely. In buying food, we are voting for what the companies will create more of. If we buy food that does not contain hormones, or if we buy organically produced items, then stores will begin carrying more of those items. As the film stated, "We vote three times a day." The website, Eat Well Everywhere, asks you to enter your zip code and they will list sustainable and healthy sources of food where you live.

We are still working on making better food choices. The Ozark farmer's market on the square has been a great resource for fresh, local food. We are also considering buying hogs and calves next year in order to produce our own meat, in addition to the chickens. Josh has even more ambitious plans for our garden next year, and this film strengthened our goals of sustainable farming even more.

Flower Bed

We finally mulched and tended to the flower bed in front of our house. This is a project I started over a month ago, mentioned here. If we would have done it then it would have been so much easier! Our flowerbed extends the full length of the house and was such the selling point when we first purchased our home. Little did we know what it would look like untended, one year later. After many, many hours of work, stacks of newspaper, 28 bags of mulch, and transplanting and moving several of the overcrowded plants, here is our finished project:



I'm still sewing, sewing, sewing (learning). Lately lots of sandwich wraps, a new type of rag rug, drawstring bags, and more wipes and burp cloths - all from recycled clothing and items from around our house. I'm thinking of splurging and buying some new fabric tomorrow with some of my birthday money.

Blackberry picking is also steadily increasing. We've gathered 2-3 cups a day for 4 days now, and we've eaten our way (or made soda with) all of them. I'm going to look into canning preserves later this week or next.

A new Missouri farm blog friend has introduced me to Picasa, so expect to see many more photo collages on the blog. Thanks Tammy!

With my new photo collage abilities, I added a synopsis of Ben's (almost) first 4 months.

Wool Dryer Balls

Continuing with my green crafty phase, I decided to try making wool dryer balls. They are incredibly easy, practical, and inexpensive. I used old wool yarn from my mother-in-law's attic and I've seen other people use wool scraps or even unravel old wool sweaters.

Benefits of wool dryer balls:
- Wool is hypoallergenic
- Wool is resistant to mold, bacteria and mildew
- As opposed to dryer sheets, wool dryer balls are organic and chemical free
- Naturally fire retardant - wool self extinguishes when lit
- Made from renewable resources
- Can be made from recycled wool
- The natural lanolin in wool is what softens your clothes
- Saves you money -

The average person can shorten about 1/4 (some say 1/2) of their dry time using dryer balls. For large loads the average US price to run a dryer for 90 minutes (the average dryer cycle time) is $1.02, that means dryer balls save you $.26 per 90 minutes of dry time on large loads. That doesn't really seem like a lot, but when I think about our family - we do about 6 loads of laundry a week. That's $1.56 per week or $81.21 per year - just in energy costs. If I figured in not spending any money on fabric softener it would be even more.

*I didn't include the fact that I try to line dry clothes quite a bit during the summer. So our savings would be a little less than that. However, I still "machine finish" everything so it's soft and completely dry.*

Here's how you make them:
1. Gather wool yarn (not superwash - it needs to felt as it washes), old pantyhose, rubber bands, crochet hook, scissors, very small fabric scrap

2. Wad the fabric scrap as tightly as you can and begin winding the yarn around it. Essentially, you're just making a ball of yarn but much more tightly than you would normally.


3. Once the ball is about the size of a golf ball, cut the yarn and use the crochet hook to pull the string into the ball to keep it from unwinding.


4. Put the ball in the pantyhose and use the rubber band to close off the end. If you do not put them in the pantyhose they will come unraveled and you will have a huge mess. This also happens if the rubber band isn't tight enough.



5. Wash the dryer ball / panty hose with your regular laundry and then throw in the dryer. Run it through with several regular loads (washing and drying both) without taking it out of the pantyhose, to make sure it felts completely.


6. Once the dryer balls seem adequately felted, start again with wrapping in wool yarn. I tried experimenting with using different colors at the same time and came up with a few patterns. I'm not sure if I could explain exactly how to do it, but it was fun to experiment. When the ball is the size you want, use the crochet hook to pull the last bit of string into the depths of the ball.


7. When you think your dryer ball is big enough (I've heard anywhere from a 7-10 inch circumference is standard; mine are all different because I didn't measure), repeat the felting process by putting them in the pantyhose and washing and drying several times. Washing on hot makes this process quicker. Again, skimping on this step will result in a giant rat's nest of yarn - promise.


8. That's it! Take them out of the pantyhose and they're ready for the dryer. They may pill some over time, depending on your yarn. You can fix that with a sweater shaver or ignore it. Either way.


8a. (Other things to consider): I've heard of people using a scented sachet in the middle or using essential oils to scent the dryer balls. I'm not really into my laundry smelling like anything, so I don't plan on trying that. I know nothing about the color bleeding or leaching on your clothes. So far, none of the bright colors I've used have bled at all, but I can't promise that on all types of yarn. They will shrink a little in the felting process, so if you want a ball that's 9 inches in circumference then I would make it a little bigger.

You can use anywhere from 2 - 8 in their dryer and have amazing results. So far I've used 2-4 and I love them. Our clothes are static free and super soft!

I am attempting to teach myself to sew. Josh dressed Ben in sheep pajamas with his refurbished sheep burp rag - my first sewing project.


Garrett came over today and rode the donkey. I'll have those pictures up in the next post with more about the donkeys!

How To Turn 5 T-Shirts Into a Rug

While researching ideas of what to do with old t-shirts, I came across several websites suggesting rag rugs. I combined a few methods to try to come up with the easiest (not necessarily the prettiest) way to make one. In italics is what I learned through trial and error with my first rug.

1. Cut a t-shirt under one arm and cut off the sleeves and collar.


2. Tear t-shirts into 2-4 inch strips. You can use the sleeves for shorter pieces if you want. You may also want to cut around the print on the front of the t-shirt. I didn't and you can see the color difference in a few places, but I mixed gray and white t-shirts so it blends in for the most part. Consistency helps with making a less lumpy rug. The thicker the strips, the sloppier it looks, thicker the rug, and quicker it is to get done.


3. Knot (or sew for a neater look) three strips together and anchor somehow. (I shut that part in the coffee table drawer to hold it. The rug weighs the braid down later. It helps if the three pieces are different lengths.)


4. Begin braiding. When you have about 5 inches left of t-shirt, lay in another piece of t-shirt. T-shirt material, when ripped, will curl into a tube naturally. When braided together the next piece of t-shirt will hold itself in place. This is why the three pieces need to be different lengths, so you don't try to start three new pieces at the same time. Another option would be to sew the ends of the strips together (about 3 at a time) to keep ends from sticking up here and there.


5. After a few yards are braided you can start sewing the rug together. I used a large blunt yarn needle so the needle would thread through the braid and not through the fabric. I also used two layers of crochet thread. I would recommend something stronger if it were going to be in a main living area.


6. Lay out the braid and then fold over the end to make a sharper corner, then sew together. I started off sewing it to loosely, then went back and pulled everything and got it too tight. It takes a little experimenting to get the rug to lay flat.



7. Continue to fold over the edges until the braid will lay flat when curved around the edges. It is important to lay the rug flat on the floor or table while sewing it together so you can tell if it is truly laying flat.


8. Continue tearing, braiding, adding strips of fabric, and sewing onto the rug until it is the size you want. I could only add one or two yards of thread at a time so it wouldn't be too difficult to manage.


9. When your rug is the size you want, weave the ends into the pattern and sew around it. Tie the string off on the back. I found a loose loop and tied it off onto it so it wouldn't show on the top.


10. All done! It fits perfectly below the sink in Josh's bathroom where it seems to always be wet when I want to brush my teeth. I hope it washes well. It didn't up laying as flat as I'd like, but it is good enough for our bathroom. We really need to redo our bathroom cabinets.


There are certain ways to sew it where it could be reversible. Mine is definitely not. There are strings and knots across the back and places where I doubled back and redid sections. In future rugs, I might try one that is reversible, but I was pleased with a rug that looked satisfactory from at least one side. I also think the higher contrasting gray looks better than the light gray I started with, but it's not bad for a first try.

Ben is truly back to his old self. He needed a little Tylenol today but without the scar there is no way you would guess he had brain surgery less than a week ago.

In Search Of...

I am starting to think crafty now that summer is starting and the days are longer. I have been thinking more and more about re-purposing and minimal sewing, inspired by my friend Katy. I would like to try making cloth baby wipes, unpaper towels, embellishing / repairing our tattered burp rags, and maybe even making a rag rug. My main goal is to be able to do all of this through recycling fabric (specifically re-purposing old clothes). So for my family members saving junk for me like I was living in the great depression, here's what I'm in search of...

- egg cartons (for our host of eggs we will have at the end of summer)
- empty paper towel rolls
- rags / tattered towels / washcloths, even those with stains are ok (for unpaper towels)
- old flannel receiving blankets (for baby wipes)
- torn up blankets, sheets or quilts (for potholders)
- newspaper (for the garden)
- old t-shirts and cotton clothes on their way to Goodwill, including those torn up or stained (for rag rugs or possibly some of the above)
- empty plastic wipes containers
- old fencing, lumber, and sheet metal (as per Josh's request)

I'm going to experiment with different fabrics in making wipes and unpaper towels. I am currently thinking for the baby wipes, that terry cloth on one side and flannel on the other would be the best. As for the unpaper towels, I'm not sure. I am looking at getting a snap press and using terry cloth on one side and flour sacks on the other.

I took my sewing machine to a man who may be the oldest man in Ozark today. He wasn't sure if he could get her running again (it's my grandma's and hasn't been turned on in at least 15 years). I'm borrowing a sewing machine table from my mother-in-law and the Serger from my mom for a little while, so I hope to have a re-purposing factory taking place soon.

*The unpaper towels I'm talking about are kitchen towels that you can wrap around a paper towel holder and snap together. As opposed to using paper, these can be thrown in the wash and reused.

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Ben is doing better. He's going without any hairnet now, and the swelling around his scar has really gone down. We still aren't allowed to wash his hair yet, so he still has some surgery gunk in his hair.

Garden Preparation

What a perfect day! Our mower has been in the shop for three weeks now, so we borrowed Tim's and the yard looks great. We were worried moles had destroyed quite a bit of it, but it didn't look too bad. I re-potted all of the houseplants and hosed off the dust. I also opened the windows and doors to air out the house. It seems we skipped spring and went straight to summer, but I am so glad to have warm weather again.

I took an inventory of our plants to transplant into the garden. Many we are going to start straight from seeds once we get it tilled this week. The fractions below are successful starts /seeds we attempted to plant, if that makes sense. So far we have the following:
17/18 spinach
15/18 onions
11/18 celery
16/18 parsley
17/18 big beef tomatoes
1/9 thyme (planted more seeds in a container today)
7/9 rosemary (planted more seeds in a container today)
13/18 beans
14/18 marigolds
17/18 sugar snap peas
18/18 snow peas
4/18 great lakes head lettuce
11/18 jalapeno peppers
5/18 cayenne peppers
3/18 mixed greens leaf lettuce (planted more seeds in a container today)
0/18 basil, after 2 attempts, I think we're going to buy some started plants instead
13/18 okra

We're going to plant carrots, pumpkins, watermelon, corn, sunflowers, and cantaloupe directly into the ground. My grandfather might also be bringing some seed potatoes by this Friday. The garden is 50' x 20' and after much debate, we've decided to plant in rows instead of raised beds this year. We may still change our minds between now and the time we plant.

I bought this bench at a yard sale for $8 and painted it today. It's still a little rough, but once I find or make some kind of cushion for it, it will be just fine.


I brought all of the plant starts outside to the porch for some wind exposure.



My hands were so swollen after all of the yard work (from allergies), I couldn't even get my ring to turn.


Mom and dad came over for dinner and we saw a red fox near the corral. She was awesome to see, but I'm a little concerned about our chicken and duck plans for the coming weeks.



Ben in his Sunday best.

Save the Earth

We aren't the greenest family, but we have made a few changes over the past couple of years to help reduce our impact on the planet.

20 things we do to save the planet and money:

1. Change out light bulbs to compact florescent.
2. Unplug what we aren't using (we're working on that).
3. Stop buying individually wrapped products.
4. Use low flow shower heads.
5. Switch to cloth napkins instead of paper towels.
6. Cook more and dine out less.
7. Switch to reusable shopping bags.
8. Our house is curtain-free to make the most of natural light during the day.
9. Put weather stripping around doors and windows.
10. Burn wood for heat in the winter.
11. Compost our lawn and food garbage.
12. Donate what we don't need instead of throwing it away.
13. Lower our thermostat in the winter and open windows in the spring and fall.
14. Bought a Prius.
15. Use the library instead of buying new books (or buy used if it's something Josh HAS to have).
16. Go paperless on bills and banking.
17. Only run full loads of laundry and always rinse in cold water.
18. Use bath towels more than once between washes.
19. Run several errands in one trip to keep from driving to and from town so often.
20. Print on both sides of computer paper.

20 goals I have for us to continue to improve our habits:
1. Recycle more of our trash.
2. Put an insulation blanket around our water heater.
3. Have the well, furnace and water heater serviced.
4. Replace furnace filter.
5. Make our own cleaning products.
6. Grow our own food without using chemicals. (A $60 garden produces an average of $200 in produce!)
7. Buy a faucet aerator for the kitchen sink.
8. Buy used whenever possible. (our clothes, cars, etc.)
9. Line dry our clothes again. (we need a new location for the line)
10. Buy cows, pigs, and chickens for meat and eggs.
11. Buy less.
12. Get off junk mail lists. (You can go here along with several other websites to do the same.)
13. Shop locally and at the farmer's market more often.
14. Plant fruit trees and bushes.
15. Stop using a blow dryer to dry my hair (at least some of the time.)
16. Build a rainwater cistern to water the garden.
17. We would love to buy solar panels and/or a wind turbine but I'm not sure how realistic that is.
18. Switch to rechargeable batteries.
19. Pick up the trash piles that were on our property when we moved here.
20. Buy higher quality products so they don't have to be replaced often.

The bottom line is, I believe food, buying, waste, and transportation choices create a huge impact on our planet and wallets. *See this post for more on that belief.

Think about what we eat and where it comes from.
"If everyone in the US skipped meat one day a week, that would be the equivalent of taking 20 million mid-sized sedans off the road, regarding the environmental impact."
Michael Pollan

Avoid food waste whenever possible.
Americans throw away 43,000 tons of food per day.

Consider packaging and what we throw away.
The average family of three will produce about half a million pounds of garbage in our lifetime.

Remember your reusable shopping bags by keeping some in your car.

Plastic bags consumed this year:


* counter from here.

We are also collecting old newspapers to use under the mulch in our flowerbed and vegetable garden.

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We had a stay at home day and took a long walk around the farm. The pond looks better than it has in a long time due to the recent rain, but I'm sure there is a leak because it won't look like this in the summer.


Rosebud tree near the barn


Ben slept well last night and he's back to normal today. I am experimenting with video from my cell phone. He was cracking me up just before this, but I could only record ten seconds at a time.



Ben not napping in his crib:

Homemade Wrap!

Milestone update - Ben rolled over for the first time today! He rolled over twice, then decided he was done with tummy time for the day.

I am so excited because I made my own baby wrap today. I use the word "made" loosely as I just bought five yards of clearance rack fabric ($10 total!) and cut it in half long-ways. Because of that I now have two identical wraps. (Which is probably a good thing since Ben spit up all over the first one within a few minutes of putting it on.) The fabric is a thin cotton blend of some kind and I spent forever going through and finding the right kind of not too stretchy and not too thick fabric to experiment with. I watched at least five videos on You Tube about how to put it on. After I feel more comfortable with him on the front, I want to try some of the other ways to carry him with the wrap. This video was my favorite. I am so happy with the result.




This is WAY more comfortable and breathable than the ring sling I have. I haven't left the house in it yet. The advice I've read suggests putting it on at home, then putting the baby in once you're at the store or wherever. I can't wait to use it tomorrow in town. I don't plan on buying any of the other wraps I talked about yesterday, until I decide to splurge and buy the Beco Butterfly.

Cutting Back

After five or six solid weeks of couponing, we're full. Our pantry, fridge and freezer are full and we're well stocked with toiletries and cleaning supplies for at least the coming year. I'm now cutting back on my couponing. If it's something we truly need, I'll definitely look for a coupon first, but I'm not going to dedicate nearly as much time to the process as I have been. A new LLL friend has a great blog that keeps up with local Walgreen's, Price Cutter and Dillon's deals, and I'm sure there will still be the occasional irresistible bargain, but I'm not going to make a point to go each week anymore. I feel I have used my time wisely and if we run out of supplies, I'll probably go on another month-long coupon binge once again.

Ben and I went to La Leche League this morning. He spent the afternoon fussy and on a feeding frenzy. It hasn't really slowed down since.



Josh read to Ben about dogs and added some parts to the story, about why the people selling puppies in Wal-Mart parking lots should be stopped and how purebred dogs are overrated.

Cloth Napkins and Baby Comparing

I love using cloth napkins. Josh and I have for as long as we've been together and we go through very few paper towels thanks to the eight cloth napkins I bought two years ago. By this point, they're a little tattered and at least half have disappeared thanks to to dogs, so I bought replacements today at the Help Give Hope garage sale. The sale is on North Kansas Expressway in Springfield, in the Town and Country shopping center. It was dimly lit, unorganized, and somewhat picked over, but I'm sure if you had a lot of time, then you could probably find something you need. It's going on next week too. Click on the link for dates and times. I bought 17 cloth napkins at a dime each:


Ben and I had lunch at the Smoothie Cafe with Karen and coffee with my McGregor friends at the Mudhouse. (The Mud Lounge is temporarily closed due to problems with their liquor license.)

While there, another friend of mine brought her baby, one week younger than Ben. And so it starts... baby comparing. I want so badly to not compare Ben to any other baby, but at the same time it's fun to compare and discuss what we're going through right now. Her son has been sleeping in his crib, in his own room since he was four weeks old. He sleeps 6-8 hours most nights and has a routine and schedule. Wow, I was impressed.

Ben has no kind of schedule. I couldn't tell you how many times he nurses or how many diapers he goes through. I tried to keep track but kept forgetting and usually made it up at the end of the day on my chart. He slept through the night once, in our room. Although I said horrible things about cosleeping before I had Ben, he now sleeps in the bed at least half of the time and in the Pack N Play next to the bed otherwise. We don't really have normal bedtimes or wake-up times and I'm worried my pediatrician is going to recommend we get on a schedule at our two month appointment on Monday.


Although my friend's structure is impressive, it really doesn't fit where we are right now. By the time I go back to work this fall, I'll need to have something a little better figured out. But I can't imagine trying to make Ben eat at certain times or not letting him eat other times. When my friend Katy wrote a post about her child's schedule, or lack thereof, I didn't even consider that anyone with a baby under three months could even consider being on a schedule.


The bottom line is - as long as the kid is healthy and safe, everyone should feel free to parent how they choose and not worry about what they "should" or "should not" be doing. I've got my goals of eventually getting Ben to sleep in his own room, when the time's right for him. In my teaching experience I have worked with about 200 kids, and by the time they are pre-teens, you can't tell whose parents carried them hours each day, let them cry it out in the crib, or ground organic flour for their teething biscuits. It all evens out in the end, and I'm not going to feel bad about anything I'm doing. I'm just going to do what's best for our family and our situation.