December 2011

We don’t have any pictures from the farm for December.  Instead, here’s a picture of another project going on in our lives these days.  We invested some of our remaining savings in a small foreclosed house down valley a ways, in hopes that it might generate a little income.  A great couple responded to our ad to rent it, but Linc’s got quite a bit of work to do in the next week or two to get it ready for them.  The hope is that the rent from this, plus a little bit of whatever work we can get on the side to make up the difference, combined with continuing to learn to live on less money, while working on growing more abundance and diversity of food and life on the farm, and relationships in the neighborhood and in the larger valley community, might be a good way to go.
It’s been a cold month, with temps down in the single digits at night (cold for here), and a little snow.  On Christmas Eve, our neighbor Dev was walking by our place and saw something strange.  Linc and Jeanne, working out in the snow covered garden with gardening fork, dirt shovel and snow shovel, and a bucket.  “What in heck?” he probably thought.  He walked over and said, “Now that’s some hard core gardening!”  We were out digging up beets and parsnips for roasted veggies to go with a chicken we were cooking up for a Christmas meal that Dev and Jean shared with us.  Which brings us to the next photo.

The best thing about life here is the ‘hood, as Michelle calls it.  This is the nicest group of people we’ve ever lived around.  Here’s a shot from one of the potluck dinners the community has been having since sometime in July.  This one probably is from July.  From left to right; Linc, Jean, Eric, Emily, Michelle, Jaquelyn, Zoe, Jenica, Molly, Ben, Jack.  Missing from photo are Silvia, Nicoya, Sareya, Kahlia, Tyler, Colin, another Molly, Holden, Dev, Jeanne, Jordan, Pete, Siobhan, Randy, Sally, Cooper, Elizabeth and Robert.  Wow, are that many people in this neighborhood?  Nice.
Have a great year everyone.  Hope to see you all in 2012, and may the Mayan calendar be wrong, wrong, wrong if it’s forecasting the end of humanity in 2012, and right, right, right if it’s forecasting a change in consciousness to something even better!

On that note, we leave you with this link to a youtube video we posted featuring two of our goats, Gandalf and Eggplant, in a moment of mutual adoration.  Gandalf and Eggplant sure do like each other don't they?