Asparagus and the village

I am proud to say that my children have not eaten a single vegetable in this house,(excepting asparagus) that I have not grown since March when last years veggies ran out.

They LOVE asparagus. Love love it. They'll eat it roasted, steamed, grilled, stir fried. They love it best when David makes it. I usually make mine the same as his, but apparently, and I quote "Daddy does it better!" *hmph*

I have gotten away with a lot of gardening in the last 4 years. Nearly all of it breaking the rules of the all powerful trailer park lease. But an asparagus bed.....that'd be too much. Not to mention I just do not have the space anymore. Every patch of earth I have rented is utilized. At least the places that are more hidden from the road. I just keep telling myself that soon, soon we will have found the property we will actually live on. I plan to put in asparagus before I lay the foundation. Depending on the season of course. And a raspberry bramble, and rhubarb! Currently I have a deal with the 2 neighbors with raspberries. I harvest their crop, they receive a jar of two of whatever I turn it into. I love some of these neighbors. But most I could leave behind and never think of again. I really do not wish to be isolated on the homestead. Most homesteaders do. But I disagree. I homestead. A real one. It's not something that can really truly be accomplished in isolation. At least not for me. To me, what makes a life a life is the people in it. I would love to take these guys with me and start a little village, with a huge garden and communal meals. Working next to your friends. Working to grow food and hole it away for the winter. I love what I have here. 2 neighbors with fruits for the taking, one with a disability and usually only grabbing a handful to eat or to freeze. The other works 70 hours a week and does not have the time or knowledge to really make full use of her harvest. In a small way, I do have the village here. But in an urban setting. Which I cannot consider either safe or sustainable. If it were just me and David sure, but three little kids....

As it is, I am looking for a property that is somewhat secluded. Not because I dislike people. But because I fear the unknown. I fear who these people may be. In a SHTF situation, I would prefer to be isolated then to be surrounded by people I don't know or can't trust. So isolation it is, by default. Unless I can rise above this fear of mine.

One more year. Then life can really start.

Holy crap! It worked.

Well, blogger came through. This is part of the tiling job. This is before grout was applied. I still love it. No more damage being done to the wall from constant cooking and dish-washing. Especially good because our dishwasher has cleaned it's last load. I should just pull the thing out and put in one of those roll out garbage cans. (Unless we find a serviceable one road-side scrounge) Ah. That's a good topic. Remind me to use that one some day. Anyway, pulling it out would save some floor space plus save on dishes. I would institute a wash your own dishes rule. Some of the kids may be lazy, but stupid they are not. Despite their best efforts to convince me otherwise. Anywho.

I have switched positions at my job. Now working five 8-hour days, instead of four 10-hour evening shifts. I am also in the office so no longer getting paid mileage. I didn't realize it but that was apparently around 200-300 bucks a paycheck. Also spending 30 bucks a week more on daycare for the SOTSO. Sooooo that kinda sucks goat balls. Definitely impacting how much I can put in the Get-The-Hell-Out-The-Trailer-Park fund. I'm learning a lot and expanding my nursing background so that's a very appreciated bonus. I am planning to stay at this job for at least 5 years. But definitely longer if it suits all involved parties.

Today has been a day. I let my mind get away from me, (something which I normally keep under very tight wraps) and began to daydream about "Life after the trailer park." Doesn't seem like such a bad past-time right? WRONG! Very few people can understand how much of my life I have invested in this dream. And still, 10 years later, it seems so unattainable. And I do mean 10 years. I developed the dream for my homestead before I developed the goal of an RN. The RN was the means by which I was going to make my true dream, the homestead, a reality. I love nursing. I am good at nursing. So many of my patients have changed my way of thinking and expanded my universe in so many unbelievable ways.

But the homestead. Ah. The homestead. That is where I would really be living. Experiencing life. Teaching my children. Growing. It is where I want to die. It is where I want at least one of my children to plant roots, raise children and then die, if all goes well, after a short illness in old age, ending a lifetime of finding happiness and joyful work. (BOTSO I am counting on you!) And despite all my efforts, it always seems just out of reach. It's like something I once read in a sci-fi novel. (Another, less dangerous past-time of mine.) If you have a point in sight, x amount of feet away. If you achieve half the distance, and then half of that distance, and half of that, and on and on until infinity...........you will never reach your destination, no matter how much distance you have traversed. And that feels like the mathematical equation I am in. I hate math.

This could be the delightful blend of pear sparkling water and grapefruit vodka I picked up clearance talking, but I am worried my family will never get there. After all, the world is full of very intelligent people who worked very hard for their dreams and goals and did not make it. Success is not a matter of intelligence and hard work. It truly is not. Americans are deluded into believing otherwise from birth. We are taught, Success=x. If a person works hard and is intelligent (A+B) then, magically. A+B=x! Equation solved!

So, logically, if this is a conundrum a young American has found themselves in, all you need to do is change the value of x. Success. What is success? To some, lots of money. Eh. Not my cup of tea by any stretch, but if that's what floats your boat. Money is an imaginary construct that has been very efficient in keeping those in power, in power. Since money doesn't actually exist, what money really TRULY is, is power. So if power is what you are after. If that is how you define success? You are in for disappointment my friend. All that shit is sucked up. By people who have had it for centuries, and there is very little you can do about it. Unless........you change your mind.

Change what goal it is you have that means you've succeeded. That is what I have done. Success to me, is not getting a good-paying job and raising children who get good-paying jobs. Success to me is not even happiness! I mean, really! Being happy is great. But it should never be a goal. Happiness is a fleeting moment in time that will pass. Enjoy while it is present and then let it go. Happiness is not sustainable and to my eye, should never be the goal.

My goal is true contentment. When things happen that make me truly happy, I embrace them. But contentment is far more rewarding. Contentment=success.

Contentment is what I work towards. Every day of my life.

Contentment is what I will have truly achieved when I have purchased a small lot of land, built my earth-bermed, strawbale structure. And when I have developed my mind and my skill set so that I produce everything we need to consume on this land. When I have passed this onto my children and they are able to take over. When I have fostered children who may have been cast aside in this same way. Then I can look at my life and experience true contentment. This is my life purpose.

But the nature of contentment is completely at odds with this idea. If that is what I need to be content, then how can I truly be content until I have attained this.

I'll tell you. But shh. It's a secret.

If I die right now, I will die knowing that I spent every waking moment of my (ever-too-slowly) maturing adult mind and life working towards that goal. And if I know that I am working towards my goal, in every way I can? Then. Then I can be content.

I am content. Though nothing in my life is as it should be or as I want it. I am content.

I am living. I am growing. And I am content. I can be content knowing that I am trying my damndest.

And that is enough.

For now.

The garden plan

I follow the de-structions for pictures. They are uploaded to blogger. I click 'add selected' and a circle appears that changes colors for an extended period of time. At this point, I can't click cancel, I can't close the window. So nope, cant figure out how to embed pictures.

Next year is going to see some changes for the garden. I am adding 2 crops, and moving where I typically grow tomatoes. I have a roughly 6x2 foot bed in the front of the trailer with great SSW exposure. For the last 3 seasons our maters have thrived there, and as they are one of the things we eat the most they are critical to our food budget. This last season we still had a decent showing for such a small bed (about 20ish quarts of various tomato products) but they had blight and some sort of tomato specific worm found them. It's long past time I rotated crops anyway. So next season they are going to the back bed, which my father built for us out of an old bed frame. It's a deeper bed with more space so we shall see. In the front bed is where I will put my onions. I think they shall like all the sun. And where the onions were in the back (a shallow 4x4 bed with southern exposure but which ends up shaded by the neighbors trailer by around 4pm) I have planted garlic .

Garlic. We use a ton of it and I prefer it fresh. I have never attempted to grow it before. A quick google search and in Mid October I grabbed some sprouting bulbs from my Tupperware drawers and off to the yard I went. The sprouts are 3 inches tall now and despite several hard frosts and snow they are still green and seem to be slowly gaining height. Apparently it's not unheard of for garlic to grow throughout winter even as far north as Canada. I love garden experimenting. I hear that harvest time will be late summer. I plan to store them in braids the same way I keep onions.

The other new crop I am adding is.....rutabagas. My grandma loves them and I am hoping to be able to give her one that I grew.

The carrots I left in the bed for seeds next year, (another thing I've never done before) are huge. The greens still green and growing. I should probably mulch them before a big snow. Another experiment I know nothing about.

For now I am going to cuddle up with BOTSO and SOTSO who are watching 'Where the Wild Things Are.' Watching is used loosely. What they are actually doing is picking at each other and climbing, jumping and screaming. I think I know where the wild things are. They are on my couch. It's going to be a long day.

How broke people do home improvement

Was going to try to post a picture of my broke-a@@-person tiling job, but apparently I don't know how to do so.

My original 5-year-plan was as follows:

• Graduate from nursing school. CHECK!
• Get a full time job. CHECK!
• Husband gets full time job. CHECK!
• Work for a year or two, living cheap in the trailer park and thus saving money. CHECK!
• Use saved funds to put a down payment on a few acres of land just a bit outside civilization............. (enter distinct LACK of check)

I have been planning my capable-of-off-grid homestead for the last decade of my life. Everything planned out to the last detail. I have been doing as much as I can in the circumstances we are in to meet my self sufficient (though really there is no such thing.) goals until I can put them into full action once leaving the trailer park. And then, as usually happens when one makes plans, life said no. For reasons outside my control that I will not go into here, we are back at square one in regards to funds.

Let me be clear. There are innumerable people living in far worse conditions than we are. I am well aware of this and I am not a person prone to complaining. I much prefer to look at the positive side of things, almost to a pathological degree. But this recent setback really sent me into a depression. I couldn't shake the this-sucks-everything-sucks-whine-complain-blah-blah thing that makes me crazy. I discussed this with a friend of mine who suggested that if I hated the trailer so much, (and I do. Beyond reason.) I should put my energy into making some cheap quick fixes that may make it more tolerable as it appears we will be here another 2-3 years. I took her advice and looked around my home.

First stop, the kitchen. We are a family of 5-6-7 depending on who we are playing host to that particular week and in a 3-bedroom 1970s trailer. I garden, can, and cook nearly constantly. As a result, the kitchen takes a beating. Most annoying to me (besides the sinking floor and the leaking roof that finally has a patch that appears to be holding) is the wall behind the sink and counter. This is where my dream house was going to have a do-it-yourself tile backsplash. This area is always splattered with sauces, seeds, water, playdoh goop...........you get the idea. And if I attempt to wash the wall, the paint comes off with whatever else, even if using a soft washcloth and just water. So I began to look into doing my own tile. I went to the Habitat Restore and picked up a bunch of tiles for $3.86. I also grabbed some of that goop that makes the tiles stick to the wall. (As you can see, I did not do enough learning on the subject to remember what it's called.) I googled it and got the idea, put goop on wall, place tile on, let dry, add grout, wipe down. Seemed easy enough so I went to work. Halfway through the project I realized I did not have enough tile. But then I had a wonderful idea! The trailer has zero resale value so it doesn't matter what it looks like as long as I like it!

I went around the house and gathered all sorts of loose items that had no real purpose. A broken ceramic piggy bank, beads, spare legos, seashells, broken jewelry, several flip tops off of glass medication vials I use as an RN, a few buttons and pins. I placed these items in the 'goop' at random and smashed the remaining tiles and used those pieces to fill in the gaps! 2 of the 3 small ones were at home to help and the BOTSO laid tile while the SOTSO scraped the extra goop off after. Ages 11 and 3. :)

End result! I love it! Dave is happy I'm happy. If only I could figure out how to embed this picture......

The characters in my life

Husband Dave
I'm Leah.
3 children shall be referred to as:
Oldest = Biggest of the small ones aka BOTSO
Middle = Middle-sized small one aka MSSO
Youngest = Smallest of the small ones aka SOTSO

1st post

New to blogging. I intend this to be a page on my life, which is on the edge of a lot of things. I am an RN yet I am just above poverty level and my kids are on Medicaid. I live in a trailer that is falling apart and it appears we will be here another 2-3 years. I have 90 sq. ft. of raised beds upon which I cultivate about 75% of the veggies we consume. I save seeds, and can, dehydrate and freeze everything. This will be views on life as I see it and I don't really care who reads it, if any do at all. And I am still working out how to work this site. I work full-time so may post twice a week. We shall see......

Todays big event. Donated old Halloween costumes to the smallest of the small ones daycare. They are having a costume Halloween party this week. I know that nearly 100% of the enrolled children are below poverty level and I would feel awful if a child didn't have a costume and felt left out. Also brought some of SOTSO old toys to the infant room.

Most of the toys were musical instruments. Set them down in the middle of the room and instantly had six 1-year-olds scrambling for a spot in my lap or near the drum.

So there I am, infant on each knee and 4 more in a tight circle around me playing with shakers and tambourines. Squealing, giggling, and sharing; alternating with fighting and yanking another's toy away. I love young toddlers for that reason. They are so in the moment. Emotions come and go and they hold onto very little.

I look up to the infant teacher who is smiling and thanking me for bringing those because they don't have toys like that. I then handed her a bottle of ibuprofen............because when donating instruments to toddlers, the adult in charge of them will definitely need ibuprofen. My words of wisdom for the day.