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What I didn't explain in the video was how I made the worm bin. It started as a big plastic bin. 30 gallons is roughly a good size for the amount of kitchen material that 2 adults makes, so we got a bin that size. Then I drilled holes along the bottom for drainage and near the top for ventilation. I covered the bottom with screen to keep everyone who should stay inside inside and everyone who should stay outside out (centipedes love to eat worms). The whole bin went up on blocks, with a tray underneath. The majority of the bin in filled with moist paper. The moistness should be equivalent to the moistness of a wrung-out sponge.

This is the chart I made to help us remember what goes where!

Gullibility

We, as a whole, tend to think of a gullible person as being dumb, naive, lacking common sense, or other similar negative traits. If you happen to suffer from gullibility, (as I often do) you are familiar with the feeling of foolishness, shame, or being taken advantage of when you realize that someone's got your leg. Many times, the person on the pulling side of your chain means well, or perhaps is lighthearted or humorous, but there is another side as well.

It is of my belief that the fault lies not with the gullible, but with he who is spinning tales. Naomi and I have many discussions about the types of people we want to associate with, and the type of future we wish to create. We respect hard work, kindness, communication, and honesty. I don't wish to fault the person for whom honesty is the norm; he or she who believes everything that another person says, because we believe in honesty and communication. There is no comfort in doubt. The gullible person is strong for adhering so closely to a policy of honesty in the face of those who wish to misrepresent themselves and the truth.

I can't end this thought without needing to mention the role of critical thinking (thanks Naomi) in our interactions, but this is all I wish to dive into at the moment.

Icicles

Plans for 2015

Things are always in flux, and I really like to think out loud. It especially helps me while planning, because I can easily see the flaws in my ideas once I tell someone else about them. With that being said, some of the things that Naomi and I were planning for 2015 as of a couple of months ago have changed somewhat. We're also trying to focus on what we can do based on time, money and resources in the coming year. The following are some of the things Naomi and I have been discussing as of late. Naomi may have a few more, but this is what's on my mind:

• Geese, not sheep
• rabbits
• mobile chicken coop
• worm bin
• refine duckponics
• gutters on the house
• attempt to replace one rotten windowsill

Geese- I had been talking about getting lambs in the spring because we have SO much lawn. Mowing it takes time, gas, and mower maintenance. Sheep would turn that grass into something productive- meat.  Well, the summer was very dry, and when October rains came, I realized just how wet some of that backyard lawn really is, which makes it totally not suitable for sheep.

I had also been interested in getting some geese, but thought I'd save it for a later year. Once I decided sheep were out, geese seemed like an easy decision. They're much much cheaper to obtain, I can stock them in a higher density, they also eat grass, and they would love it when the backyard gets a little wet. Pretty sure that's a done deal. I'm going to try to figure out how to still use the polydome I got from our neighbor to house the geese in. They might need a little ramp and some ramp training like Penelope got when she was a baby.

Rabbits- Rabbit might be one of my absolute favorite foods in the world. They existed in such abundance at our apartment that it seemed silly to try to raise domesticated rabbits. While we saw a few here in the end of summer/ early fall, they certainly weren't in abundance. Aside from shelling out for some infrastructure and stock costs, rabbits don't seem too tough to pull off this year. I had originally planned to knock this out during the end of winter, but I've sort of hit a design flaw and I'm focusing on some other stuff at the moment, mainly music. Rabbits are reasonably easy to take care of, not cost-prohibitive in regards to feed and care, and can add a significant amount of extra lean protein to our diets. Plus, they're cute and fluffy.

Mobile Chicken Coop- I've been talking about this quite a bit lately. I want to build another coop similar to our existing one, but on a trailer platform and be able to move it around the property. I want to fence the chickens into small paddocks with electronet, or even just non-electrified fence in the beginning so that I can focus their efforts where it will do the most good, and spread them across the landscape rather than keeping them in a fixed location- which usually turns into a mudhole. Again, this is a moderate expense, but if done right, should last a long time and its benefits will outweight the cost long term.

Worm Bin- A few years back I had wanted to start a worm bin, but couldn't find an appropriate place to site the bin while living in our apartment. Our basement now seems to have a very consistent temperature, and would be a great location for a worm bin. What little amount of food scraps we've been generating have been going straight into the chicken run, but it's never enough volume all at once to get some good aerobic compost going. A big part of our tiny volume of food scraps is that with the ordeal of moving, we didn't produce nearly the amount of veggies from our garden as in previous years. We just can't afford to buy the kind of produce we're used to producing ourselves. Just this morning we were debating over the best use of our shredded paper, and it hit me again- WORM BIN. So, this is a relatively new idea, but seems easy enough to get going, especially considering we have most or all of the parts needed. We just need for the ground to thaw a bit and find some appropriate worms.

Duckponics- This is Naomi's area of expertise, but she mentioned some adjustments and upgrades she's planning on for this year. I'll let her tackle that when she sees fit.

Gutters- We dearly need gutters on our house. They would fix so many issues that we're having like basement infiltration, exterior rot on the house (see windowsills), foundation stuff, and water supply issues. I'm really hoping I can slam this one out before next fall. I haven't even begun to research the cost of this, but we've got so many water issues I can't NOT get them.

Windowsills- Most, if not all of the windowsills on our house are rotten. Like sponge-soft. It's easy to see where water sheets off the roof, hits the house, and then hits the windowsills. I need to do a lot of work on the windows other than the sills, too, (reglazing, new storm windows) but it doesn't make sense until the water issue is resolved. I am, however, planning to try replacing one windowsill and see how it goes. If it isn't too much of a nightmare, I will then plan on doing the others. I'm hoping to replace the sills, eventually get new storm windows, and otherwise rehabilitate the existing wooden-sash, double-hung windows because they're beautiful and fit the style of our home very well.