18 Inches of Snow      29 degrees     Bright but overcast sky

You can support our family business by ordering all natural, handcrafted personal care products from www.songcroftnaturals.com. Thank you!

It has been interesting reading about all the events around the Puget Sound region. People have posted pictures of the weather and told tales of their lives as things slowed or for some, stopped.

There were trees down all over my area. We had well over a foot of snow with two-foot drifts in areas. Our power was out for the better part of six days and we were snowed in.

What did that mean for us? It meant that the first day that we thought the storm was headed our way, we got the headlamps, batteries, lanterns and emergency candles all ready. We filled 5-gallon buckets of water, filled the bathtub, cooking pots and jugs too. We moved patio furniture away from the eaves where snow might later fall and crush them and we made extra provisions for our livestock. We made sure our pantry was full and there were extra snack foods for the kids as comfort and last resorts if all heck broke loose as well as a large stack of library books. We cooked in the woodstove, buried the contents of the freezer in bins in the snow, brought in fire wood and pulled out all of the poly-pro and polar fleece. After that was done, we played in the snow, enjoyed the sleds, had snowball fights, made maple syrup candy and I taught my youngest how to use a knitting nancy. We played games, told stories and when we got tired looked out the windows which framed beautiful pictures of the weather.

On SongCroft, things were a bit more of a challenge but they were not a struggle. After having the power off for as much as 16 days, we have a system and can live life pretty easily but as a friend, pointed out, even without electricity life can be sufficiently sufficient or wonderful. I love our days of being snowed in and will cherish them forever as slow days with my family.

Here are some pictures of the weather for you to enjoy.

Please post some pictures of the weather in your area too!

High 34            Low 26    Bright and sunny in the afternoon, thick fog in the morning and night.

Whew, I made it. It’s been a busy holiday season. Even though I have worked a lot, I can truly say it’s been a Happy Holiday season. I have worked most every weekend selling our farms “value-added” items. SongCroft Naturals is expanding it’s all-natural skin, body and hair care from Farmers Markets, to Holiday Fairs and now in to retail establishments. This is exciting news. We now have products and gift baskets in the Yogalife Studio at Greenlake as well as the Natural Clothing Company on First Street in historic Snohomish. We are happy to partner with both owners who are wonderful people that support other small local businesses.

Now that the business events are over, I am taking the next two weeks off to just hang out with my family. We will go ice skating, make a gingerbread house, bake cookies, make name tags, watch classic holiday movies, wrap presents, play board games and create memories that can only be created through true connection and love. This is what Happy Holidays are made of.

My side of the family will join us on Christmas eve for a dinner of smoked chickens, roasted vegetables, baked quinoa, salad and pumpkin pies. A great deal of the ingredients will be from our land. We are still harvesting cabbages, collards, kale, carrots, turnips, beets, onions, spinach and parsnips. We have squash set aside from local farms (those who had extra sent some our way after our ducks made chop suey out of the vines).

We will exchange gifts, play some games and I think the younger generation will be playing with nerf guns and magic cards. (neither of which are something that I can relate to). The rest of us will likely be making jewelry, talking and laughing at life through stories and memories.

I especially value this Christmas as one where I can enjoy both my own family (as my children are still young and at least one still enjoys toys) and my mother who is starting to show her age. I find myself cherishing every moment that I get with her. How fortunate I am to be able to experience this before she leaves this world. A Happy Holiday for her is to have her girls together with their families.

To update you on what is happening on the farm, as mentioned, we are still harvesting the aforementioned vegetables and we also have a lot of herbs. We put up a few hundred pounds or apples and potatoes for the winter so we are enjoying them. Our “Liberty” apple and “Spartan” produced well for their first time. Next year I will likely have to thin them a bit to get bigger fruit. Our medlar gave plenty of fruit. They are palatable but not especially juicy. While they would be helpful in a time of scarcity, they are not proving to be a family favorite.

The hens and rooster , Iris, are doing well. They have a very nice dry space thanks to Brian’s work this past Spring as well as the recent coop improvements made this past week. There are now added roosts inside the coop and tomorrow morning I plan to staple a layer of greenhouse plastic across the top of the walls to lower the ceiling in hope of it holding more heat in. The plastic is clear so light will still come through the rigid clear poly-carb roof and the air trapped between the two should create insulations. We have not added a light.

The turkeys are doing well. I added a nesting box today so we will see if we get some eggs. There is a hen that is squatting every time I walk past her. This is a good sign that she wants to hatch some eggs. I will get a leg band for her and over the next couple of weeks, I will band three hens to save for breeding. Midget Whites are good breeders so no artificial inseminations is needed.

The goats are still not bred and just like last year, they are not showing strong signs of wanting to be. There has been no one calling out, flagging her tail or anything else. I thought for sure they would go in to ester on the full moon but instead they got totally silent and pretended to be statues because coyotes came to visit. Maybe the coyotes scared the hormones right out of them (kidding)

I sold six rabbits this past month.  Lots of people have been interested in our rabbits. They are a good bunch and easy for people in the city to raise. They produce great manure that is highly valuable. I have been able to use it to barter with. I love raising rabbits!

Our ducks are still quacking about. They are not interesting in going in to their pen at night and are hard to catch. I am hoping ot catch them soon before a coyote or bobcat gets them first.

Well, that is the skinny on what is happening down-on-the-farm. How are things up your way?

Happy Holidays!

  Things are really getting cold. It is down to the mid-twenties and the fog is so thick that it is hard to see across the land in the mornings. It reminds me of living on the coast but the taste of salt in the air is missing.

It is the perfect weather for staying indoors to play chess.

Btw, I was lucky to get a call from Ashley this afternoon. She was one of our WWOOF’ers that stayed here this summer. She is doing well with a new job at REI and her studies. It was nice to catch up, hear her voice and stay connected.

We have had several inquiries about WWOOF’ing here this winter but are not accepting new folks at this time. We are going dormant and curling up in front of the fire with board games and hot cocoa. Our son love is when we play chess with him. This is a great time to focus on our just being with our family.

This is not to say that there aren’t chores to be done but for now, we will be doing on our own. I’ll write about them later. For now, I am off for my daily practice in humility, I am about to play chess by my son who will undoubtably beat me again.

Please don’t forget to check out our all-natural skin, body and hair care products at www.songcroftnaturals.com

Last week I spent four days at the NW Herbal Faire. I arrived at midnight after running my farmers market booth. This meant packing up and working all day at the market, returning home to off-load and re-load new product and merchandise as well as all of our camping gear and then driving to Mount Vernon, Washington. All of this included my two children whom I have to say are quite the troopers.

Please bear with me as I am not a NW Herbal Faire employee  but believe that letting folks know about the event and why we should all attend and support it is a valuable service.

(Btw, the event is ran by Michael Pilarski and lots and lots of volunteers. If it weren’t for their vision and hard work, this resource wouldn’t happen! Thank you!)

NW Herbal Faire was from Thursday August  19 to Monday August 22^nd. In attendance were herbalists from all over the country. These herbalists ranged from the formally trained to those who grew up with gathering wild plants as a family tradition. There were professional practitioners, instructors as well as those who just want to be able to provide support to their family and community.

Workshops were offered by top-notch presenters such as Ryan Drum, Michael Pilarski and Heidi Bohan. There were over 100 workshops ranging from ayurvedic herbs to farming herbs and localism. The brain cells present could have lit up the entire state for a month is we had only thought to plug them in!

As far as I am aware, this is the only event like this in the entire country. There are a few conferences but while they are great resources for learning, they are rather dry and certainly not the family oriented, community building event this was.

We ate meals together, volunteered to make things run smoothly, camped out, danced under the stars and even sang songs.

One might wonder why it would make any difference to gather in the summer where there is a lake to swim and a stage that plays live music. The difference is the value of the conversations, the joy, and the heart-felt connections we make as we celebrate life as a community of healers. This is where the real healing begins because it’s the joy in life and what we do that gives us the energy to give more love and care to others.

Oh, and let’s not forget the support these young ones of herbalists and permaculturists need as they often live in an alternate world of electronics and fast food. It is a special time for children who live “outside” the mainstream to commune with other young ones who eat dried sea veggies for snacks, slather plantain salves on their “owies” and understand that Marshmallow is a plant. These young people need time to connect with their tribe too.

So whether you are an professional herbalist or someone interested in learning about how to care for your family, consider coming to the NW Herbal Faire in 2012. I know I will!

WWOOF’ing on SongCroft allows for time to connect with nature and yourself!

To support our family farm, you can purchase products through www.songcroftnaturals.com Thank you!

Summer has been a little different for us this year on SongCroft. The sun has only shown itself enough to make us remember what we’ve all been longing for, the rain barrels were only empty for a day or two, local hay has not been able to be harvested because of the weather and I have experienced the worst seasonal allergies of my life.  Climate change is no friend of mine.

After a lot of discomfort, I am finally able to function at an almost normal level but have spent much of the past month trying not to let my face swell up. I wont go in to the gory details but lets just say that I was so swollen and red that even local folks didn’t recognize me.

On the upside, we have had the most wonderful experience with WWOOF’ers.  Our little farm has been blessed with three young people who have come to share their enthusiasm, energy and talents with us. It has been a blessing have these folks join our family, share our meals and be a part of our life here on SongCroft.

We have room for more until Sept. 15th.

We take turns with many things including meals, animal care, garden work and cleaning up. We are all committed to living light. This is more of a relief than one might imagine as it can be really hard to find folks who will commit to using a clothes line, looking to the gardens for food before the pantry and who can work together towards goals like getting everything in for a productive Fall and Winter harvest.

The interns sleep in tents that are out on the land and use the cabin for showers and a community space. They are welcome in the house but can use the cabin for their own quiet space as well. This creates a great balance as one intern is currently studying for a class at Evergreen State College. The cabin also provides space for daily yoga, mediation and an occasional movie.

Our family thrives on the presence of community in our lives. We enjoy cooperative living and we love WWOOF’ers!

High 33   Low 20

Snowing with high winds!!!Whoohoo!

(If you want to learn even a little of what you are reading here, our apprenticeship program starts Jan. 15th. Last call for registration!)

http://songcroft.com/index.php/the-songcroft-school-of-self-sufficiency/

Folks email me all the time saying they get tired reading the list of things we do. Well, you might want to grab yourself a cup o’ tea and kick your feet up ‘cuz this is going to be a long one because I’m going to give a summary of 2010!

All in all, it was a good year in many aspects. We accomplished some of our goals and completely failed on others. Okay, failed is pretty harsh. We just didn’t get everything we wanted to get done done. I am sure we got more accomplished than the average bear since both Brian and I are ‘Type A’ Capricorns.

Our apprenticeship program filled up and we had 3 teens all year!

We had a successful Fish Camp here in conjunction with Wolf Camp.

We took a few camping trips as well as went to our favorite seasonal gathering.

The things we didn’t get done were due to a matter of lack of weather, money, time or energy. The early part of Spring was very wet.

When we went on a camping trip, the chickens got out and scratch up much of our garden beds. I replanted and got things under control, so I thought, and one of the kids didn’t latch the gate so the chickens rearranged everything again. It is amazing what they can do with my tidy little rows in an hour! Of course, they left the forest garden alone since it would’ve taken more effort to walk over there.

We lost part of our duck flock, we think to neighbor dogs, so we are down to just three. Our son was heartbroken when he found his pet duck “Blackfoot” dead in the field.

We sold lots and lots of eggs all Spring and Summer. That was a nice supplement to the family budget.

We also sold a few goat kids too. We got a lot of milk and enjoyed the cheese.

Brians workshop was built and we will finish it in the Spring.

Our cabin was transformed in to a classroom and manufacturing facility for our SongCroft Naturals Personal Care product line. (The ingredients are so safe I can use them on my babies!)

We grew a good garden that is still providing us with fresh vegetables. We had tomatoes until early December and ground cherries too!

I “put up” lots of canned meat, fruit and vegetables, pickles, kim chi, as well as dried fruits, herbs and vegetables too.

I caught two bee swarms and hived them.

We put in the forest garden in April and it’s looking good.

We are one year closer to harvesting asparagas!

So, to the coming year. What are our goals? Well this is what I have settled on:

1. Finish Brian’s shop!
2. Enjoy our apprentices
3. Launch SongCroft Naturals our all natural Personal Care Products and have a Farmers Market booth.
4. Grow a bountiful garden that is well and truly chicken proofed!!!
5. Have more of the family’s help with harvesting more often so our production stays up and our waste in minimal.
6. Preserve more foods and herbs than last year.
7. Learn to smoke different meats.
8. Clear the spot behind the cabin so I can plant new beds. I haven’t decided what to plant there yet though.
9. Plant an evergreen edible hedge on top of a berm to create privacy as well as more perennial food.
10. Plant an evergreen privacy screen near the road.
11. Make more soap than last year. We ran out and I got too busy to make more.
12. Plant more trees for firewood.
13. Which reminds me, reinforce the goats browse area.
14. Fix all of the little jobs like greenhouse door handle, hinges on the compost bins, etc…
15. Re-design the lower part of our land.
16. Build new hay storage.
17. Build a new rabbitry.
18. Expand the summer chicken yard from 16×30 to something like 30×30.
19. Host Farm Camp.
20. Host Illumina Girls Camp.
21. Host Fish Camp.
22. Camp more, play more
23. Sing more.
24. Dance more.
25. Breathe more consciously.

I hope you enjoyed reading our summary of 2010 and being witness to us setting goals for 2011. Somehow it makes it a little more of a commitment if others know that the goals are set. (Maybe I should mention the 10 pounds?)

Oh, and if you come by for a visit, feel free to roll your sleeve up!

Thanks for reading. Your comments are welcome. Please do share our blog with others that you think might be interested. Happy New Year!

High 52  Low 43    Cool and with a rain on and off all day. Windy evening.

Did anyone else stay up to watch the lunar equinox? How cool was that? I hope you had a clear enough view. In my area, it was a bit cloudy but we got some nice clear views for sure!  Even though the evening air was quite cold, the kids and I were up until the early morning watching the magnificence of nature. The last time a lunar eclipse happened was in 1638! Although we will have more lunar eclipses, the lunar eclipse in 2010 will be the only most of will see in our lifetime on a Winter Solstice.

The next evening we kept the fire going. Our fireside vigil was kept with happy hearts. We drank tea and cuddled with quiet talk about dreams. We sang songs enjoyed each other’s company. Here is one of our favorites:

Round and round the earth is turning

Turning turning until morning

And from morning round to night

We hope all of you are enjoying this dream time season!

High  37  Low 33              Slush

http://www.grillabites.com/html/locations/snohomish.html

It’s the day after Thanksgiving. Our family is truly blessed with an abundance of community and dear friends. Our little home was packed full of adults and children but all were comfortable.

Looking around the room, I was delighted to realize that in the mix were permaculturists, yoga instructors, environmental education enthusiasts, wilderness skills instructor, self-sufficiency skills instructor and organizational development specialist (someone who knows the ins and outs of how organizations work and how to help them run in a healthy way).  If the SHTF, were well poised to take over the world. (ok, kidding)

We had a wonderful meal of a organic local turkey cooked in cider pressed on SongCroft, greens from the garden (picked right out of the snow so the sugars were present), home baked rolls, home made pumpkin pies from the pumpkins we gleaned earlier in the month, horseradish cranberry sauce with cranberries that came from our local barter fair, and potatoes that were traded there too. The abundance brought to the table by all who contributed was as plentiful as the enthusiasm, knowledge and skill we have for the future in a cooperative vibrant community.

I am thankful, must of all, for the hope that is before us.

If you would like to come site around the table with other’s who are ready to step up and make a difference, (or if you are just interested in meeting please join us at the next Snohomish Permaculture Meeting. We will be gathering at Grilla Bites in Snohomish at 6pm on November 30^th. 1020 1st St Ste 104, Snohomish, WA 98291

Do you recognize anyone in these  Thanksgiving pictures?

http://www.grillabites.com/html/locations/snohomish.htm

HIGH 52       LOW 47          Heavy Rain after 4pm

http://www.lucandthelovingtons.com

http://www.omculture.com/

The rain falls heavy outside. The darkness comes early and stays late. This is the week of the reversing the clocks. We adjust our clocks to leave daylight savings time and “fall back” an hour.

Now is the time for inside chores that make the house smell so good. Applesauce will be simmering on the stove by Wednesday and little noses will be scrunching up to get a whiff of cinnamon in the air. The kids love applesauce. I anticipate putting up about one hundred jars as it is a family favorite.

I am spending much of my time organizing the curriculum for the upcoming Self-Sufficiency Course that starts in January. A new syllabus and hand-outs are all underway. We are planning this year with a lot of excitement!

Our personal care product line is awaiting labels so we can get them on the market. We have natural food stores already waiting to carry our line. We are excited to get there all natural, fragrance free products out there. As someone who suffered from severe chemical sensitivities for many years, I know that there is a serious need for products that are truly safe! After formulating and making them on a small scale for a small number of clients and spa’s, I am glad to be able to offer them in stores and online through our soon-to-be Blissfully Natural website.

While it is true that I am taking care of responsibilities, I am also having a lot of fun!

Our family has been enjoying more social time. We have been out dancing several times. We feel truly fortunate to have the opportunity to have access to places that encourage families to dance together. Family dance is a great activity to start the kids with while they are young. They tend to continue to enjoy dancing as they get older, they tend to feel comfortable in their bodies during those awkward teen years and they tend to connect “fun” with family time. Also, unlike activities that they grow out of, dancing is something they can do their entire lives. An added bonus is, even if the power grid is out, you can throw a family dance for your neighborhood and have a great unplugged time!

Also, it create memories that the entire family can cherish. For example, I will always cherish images of my 13 yo dancing with her girlfriend- twirling, spinning, hugs and a dip. These are the times that life is about. Unplugged entertainment.

One of the places that a family can go to is Om Culture in Seattle, where we danced to Luc and the Lovington’s. Live music and dancing with children! Whoohoo! It’s a great place.

We hope that all of you are enjoying these darker, slower times. They are times for gathering, reflection and a little good ‘ol hibernation!

Registration for the 2011 Self-Sufficiency Skills Course is open! http://songcroft.com/index.php/the-songcroft-school-of-self-sufficiency/

High 84  Low 55  Clear with a beautiful blue sky!

It is high summer and the sun is out.The summer harvest is on. It is almost 85 degrees today and the rain has finally stopped. Not that I am complaining. We are fortunate to have the rain that we do. It’s just that we cherish every moment that that great yellow orb hovers above us!

We were in Nelson, B.C. for a wedding of a dear friend last week so I am a little behind schedule on chores. While we were away, our chickens got out and pecked away much of the Winter garden.  The rows of carrot seed that I kept moist and nurtured through the warm days, the meticulously laid out patterns of red and green cabbages with yellow beets between were all pecked and thrown about like a giant tossed salad.

Upon inspection, I could see that some of the carrots were still sprouting, so I left them. I replanted the rows with more seedlings. It will be interesting to see where the carrots end up. Perhaps there will be a secret message from the hens hidden in the carrot tops.

At any rate, we are harvesting summer cabbages, purple and green beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, lettuce, radishes, chili peppers and zucchini just to name a few.  I hope you are all enjoying your local summer harvest because it slips by way too fast!