We Found Sam!

It's been kind of like playing Where's Waldo, but for almost 2 months now we've been searching for a familiar face in a sea of Army green and this morning Steve succeeded. Maybe we would be the only people to recognize the stance, the nose (sorry Sam) and the widows peak....but that's our boy!

Their brigade is the last of the Army troops still in Haiti. He continues to protect engineers inspecting buildings for stability and making sure the make-shift camps are fully prepared for the upcoming rains. Someone set up a basketball hoop so the guys are playing a little ball on their day off.

Their expected arrival date back in the states is May 1st.

Me Too!!!!

Joel Salatin is a farmer, lecturer, and the author of a number of informational books about food and farming. His farm — Polyface Farm — is a family-owned, pastured-based, beyond organic operation located in the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia and Salatin was featured in Academy Award nominated documentary “Food, Inc.” and in the book “Omnivore’s Dilemma” by Michael Pollan. Here is an excerpt from a recent interview.

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Annie Corrigan: You call yourself a Christian-Libertarian-Environmentalist-Capitalist Farmer. Let’s break that down, title by title…Christian.

Joel Salatin: I am a Christian, and I think that the Judeo-Christian ethic calls us to realize that we are stewards of creation – that we are not to just rape it, pillage it, whatever, we are to steward it – and lays down certain principles of growth. When God made it in Genesis, the plants were to reproduce after their own kind. And genetic modification doesn’t make plants produce after their own kind. So, you know, even to that point, there are some nuances of order and a template there to live by.

AC: Libertarian.

JS: I don’t think every time there’s a problem, we need to look to the government for a solution. I think the government is the problem on many many things, and if we would free up entrepreneurial innovation and not give corporate welfare and special concessions to big business, and create regulations that aren’t scalable and always hurt the little person more than the big person, the size of big outfits (I’ll use that word loosely) would crumble in of its own bureaucracy.So, instead of artificially propping up big dinosaurs, we should let the dinosaurs collapse and fall so that a phoenix can rise from the ashes.

AC: Environmentalist.

JS: I am a tree-hugger. I think that it is important that salamanders have four legs and frogs remain fertile. And I have a real problem with the Christian-right stereotype that has put a lot more emphasis on dominion than on nurturing. That tends to balance out the dominion part.

AC:Capitalist.

JS:I don’t apologize for running a business that makes a profit. We too often just push the profit under the rug, but at the end of the day, profit is the life-blood of a business. We can’t make improvements, we can’t make creative innovations unless there’s a little bit of money left at the end of the day to put into something new.

Full interview here.

Hope

Do not fear, for I have redeemed you;

I have called you by name, and you are Mine.

When you pass through the waters;

I will be with you.

When you walk through the fire;

you will not be scorched.

Isaiah 43:1,2

'So This Is How Liberty Dies...With Thunderous Applause'

-from Star Wars III

Something to Think About

I somehow avoided getting hooked on the pursuit of all the myriad “lifestyle opportunities” our culture proffers as the road to happiness-a blatant lie, yet a lie that most folks fall for to the point that the pursuit of trivial distractions and working to pay for them devours the best of their lives.

~David Peterson

Father and Son

.....I've always liked that their numbers are the inverse of each other.

Say a Prayer.....

....for my Mom, please.

Our Back Yard

This is the kitchen garden off the back patio filled with garlic and lettuce greens....

...and more lettuce.

Further out into the yard is our second fenced area (heart on gate). We originally only grew veggies in the fenced areas but have gradually creeped out into the other unprotected beds.

Potatoes in the front....

...and an artichoke plant towering in the background (with pea vines kind of sprinkled thru-out).

Another potato plant in a pot....and getting eaten by something.

Lettuce greens under the apple tree.

Right inside the heart gate are 3 cabbage and the last 2 cauliflower plants (the tying keeps them white). The cauliflower did really well this year and I found a fantastic recipe for a salad with pecans, cranberries and cauliflower (thanks Joyce:)

And the other side is filled with broccoli going to seed, more lettuce, and peas not growing up the trellis.

More slow-growing cabbage .....

...and a very messy potato bed.

Next I'll share the front yard garden :)

The End...

....of the soccer season that is. I won't post a photo of the actual last game because it was a loss and pretty sad. So here are the girls after winning the semi-final game and making into the Valley Championship game for the first time in the school's history. Notice brown on faces....that was the celebratory cake. The game lasted two and a half hours, included 4 overtime periods and ended on penalty kicks....whew.

Great win and a great season.....Go Monarchs!

Funny....and mostly True!

And the Rest of the Quote.....

"To practice poverty of spirit calls us not to take offense or be supersensitive to criticism. The majority of hurts in our lives, the endless massaging of the latest bruise to our wounded ego, feelings of anger, grudges, resentment and bitterness come from our refusal to embrace our abject poverty, our obsession with our rights, our need for esteem in the eyes of others.

If I follow the counsel of Jesus and take the last place, I won’t be shocked when others put me there too."

-Brennan Manning