Permaculture Reading Group and Training

Hello Everyone!

After an extended absence to get hitched and hike for a while on the Long Trail through Vermont, we have been busy getting back into the swing of things around here. Even though there hasn't been much activity on the blog, we haven't been sitting idle. It's been a busy fall and winter. Guy has been busy with winter tree work and some tree climbing activities and I have been working on preparing the gardens for the spring planting, ordering seeds, preparing to start seeds in the basement and most importantly networking with other like-minded people.

This networking has led to at least one immediately exciting event. These past few not so wintery months I've been reconnecting with Jamie Haubner who owns Liberty Hill Farm in High Ridge. Jamie is working to convert her 22 acres into a Permaculture paradise and has kindly asked for my assistance. Jamie has her Permaculture design certificate and a wonderful space to work with. She also had an amazing and ambitious vision. I've also been getting to know Rachel Levi with EarthDance farm in Ferguson. Together the three of us have decided to start a Permaculture reading group. The first meeting will be held here at Adventure Farm on February 21^st.

The first book on our list is Gaia's Garden. A great introductory book to permaculture.

Please consider joining us as we get together to support each other in our permaculture journey. RSVP by commenting here to get time and directions.

Another exciting event is a four day hands-on intensive course coming in March to St. Louis. The course is taught by my permaculture teacher, Bill Wilson, from Midwest Permaculture. I am very excited that St. Louis will have the opportunity to learn from this amazing teacher.

The course will be held at the MO Botanical Garden, March 8-11. This course will go towards your design certification if you desire to continue, which I bet you will. It is a great pleasure for me to look forward to seeing Bill and his wife Becky when they are here in March. Hopefully they will put me to work and I can help with the class some. Please check out the site below for more information.

http://www.usgbc-mogateway.org/2012/01/permaculture-training-a-four-day-design-and-hands-on-intensive-class/

Overall, 2012 seems to be getting off to a great start. I hope to see some of you at the permie course or the reading group.

Best,

Deanna

Six Life Changing Weeks

Earthquakes, hurricanes, apocalyptic bird swarms – just a few of the things that Deanna and I encountered on our 6 week trip to Vermont. Perhaps the Universe was celebrating our marriage (or maybe we just got lucky), but we sure enjoyed an adventure filled trip.

We arrived in Huntington, WV coincident with a huge swarm of Purple Martins bound for South America. Groups were testing roof-top guy wires and other roosting places, until they all settled into 4 or 5 trees next to a retirement home.

On our first full day in Vermont, we finished hanging our supply caches in preparation for hiking the Long Trail. Then, although we never felt it, the eastern U.S. had the biggest earthquake since 1897. Here's Deanna enjoying lunch at almost precisely the time that the earthquake hit.

We got married in a wonderful celebration outside under apple trees with family and friends all around. Then hurricane Irene rolled in, inundating Southern Vermont, washing out roads and causing a state of emergency.

We set out on our 4 1/2 week hike, spent a few days wondering where everybody was (until we found out that the Green Mountain National Forest had been closed in the aftermath of hurricane Irene) then continued on with the trail and shelters virtually to ourselves.

Tropical storm Lee rolled through while we were out there. Thankfully it wasn't all rain and mud. We had some nice hiking days and great views.

In the end, we finished 200 of the 273 miles. There's something indescribable about looking back from whence you've come to see, fading in the distance over the horizon, the mountain peak upon which you stood just days before.

Getting off the trail, we had unbelievable car problems - my brother's transmission gave out before we got back to his house causing him to junk his van. Then our car suffered from a seized alternator and rear brakes because of the soaking from hurricane Irene. Welcome back to civilization :-|.

We made it back to St. Louis in time for Deanna to return to work, me to pursue my Adventure Educator path, and for us to begin the next stage of our lives together. Thanks for reading. More to come ...

Adventure As A Life Choice

Five months ago I quit my former career and set out to work as an adventure educator. Learning from adventure means going beyond that which is familiar, entering your “stretch zone” where you feel uncomfortable, like you may not succeed. Well … I’m there.

Just between you and me, I’m terrified! On the one hand, I know I have a lot to offer. On the other hand, I’m not at all certain that I can survive monetarily doing what I do. In my corporate engineering career I could indulge my introvert, only concern myself with technical details, and collect my paycheck. Now I’ve got to do a whole lot more including outreach to prospective clients, package and promote myself and what I offer, and find ways to make it pay well enough that I can keep doing it.

I just want what I do to be meaningful and worthwhile. I recently had the opportunity to enunciate my personal mission and it came out “to help people learn and help people grow.” That’s it, that’s what I’m committed to doing. But how, specifically, will I do that? And why should you, prospective client, trust me with your best interests and compensate me for my efforts?

Don’t get me wrong, I have answers to those questions, and I think they’re pretty compelling. But is it going to be enough? Am I going to be enough? I’m in the nascent beginnings of building my adventure education practice and I’m not at all sure how it will go. Who will I serve, where can I do the most good, and how can I keep doing it? And what will I do if I fail and my efforts come to naught? I don’t have those answers and, moreover, I don’t really know how I’m going to find those answers except to not give up and keep working at it.

So here I am, in the crux of Adventure. Michael Meade, author and teacher in the ‘90’s men’s movement, said that meaningful transformation is often accompanied by feeling that you may not survive the experience; it reaches into your core. I feel that way now. But I do feel that this is my path and I must walk it. I can only have faith that it leads me in the right direction.

Sustainable Backyard Tour a Success

This past weekend Adventure Farm was a host in the first Midwest Sustainable Backyards Tour. There were 30 backyards on this self-guided tour and 40 participants visited our yard.  It was a great day with people trickling through at just the right pace, which allowed time to talk and enjoy meeting each person.  It was a wonderful way to introduce the backyard space we call Adventure Farm. I learned a lot from my visitors and I hope they gained something from their experience here and at the other sites. I’m looking forward to next year already.

Ed, Lucy and Arlo arriving in sustainable style.

Adventure Farm was also one of the featured yards in a St Louis Public Radio station slide show produced by Madalyn Painter.  It was fun meeting Madalyn the week before the tour when she visited several of the homes that would be participating in the tour. You can see the photos of Adventure Farm at:

http://news.stlpublicradio.org/post/st-louis-sustainable-backyard-tour

When you watch the slide show, Adventure Farm is featured in slides 5-13.

This opportunity and the positive response we received has made me think of other ways that we can share this small oasis.  Guy and I are already talking about  giving people other opportunities to enjoy the yard and share their knowledge about greening the space in which we live. We'll be sure and keep you updated as more events begin to happen here. The next big event is the “Essential Permaculture”  weekend on July 9-10.  The workshop is being held at St Louis University, and the afternoon immediately following the training we will once again visit my yard. This time the yard will look a whole lot different than the first walkabout in April (check out the April 5th blog entry to compare). 

I hope to see some of you at the Essential Permaculutre Workshop and walkabout in a few weeks.

"It is our choices...that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities. "
       J.K. Rowling

Make good choices my friends.

Deanna

Essential Permaculture Weekend Training

I am very excited to announce that Adventure Farm is Co-sponsoring a two day "Essential Permaculture" training in July.  Spend a weekend learning more about permaculture and how you can begin to apply permaculture principles in your yard and in your life. As a bonus, spend some time experiencing a walkabout at Adventure Farm immediately following the training with Bill Wilson, the Co-Founder of Midwest Permaculture.

Essential Permaculture Trainings  are regularly offered for $195.00. This first time St. Louis training will be offered for $175.00 and only $125.00 if you sign up before June 9th or if you are a student. I think this is a great opportunity to get an excellent introduction to permaculture and to meet like minded folks in the St. Louis area.  Bill is a dynamic and engaging speaker and one of my permaculture design certification course instructors. I can personally guarantee that this weekend will be well worth the money. Please consider joining us for this important event

Deanna

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”

―Victor Frankl

Adventure Farm is Going Public

Well, it looks like we are taking the leap with our first truly public event. If you're in the St Louis area mark your calendars for the 1st Annual St Louis Sustainable Backyard Tour on June 26th. Go to Home Eco's site http://www.home-eco.com/Home_Eco/Home.html  for more information and to register to take the tour or join Adventure Farm and be IN the tour.

This was the end of  last June. Lets hope the yard looks like this this year. 

Another exciting St. Louis event is coming up in July.  Brick City Gardens and the Center for Sustainability at Saint Louis University are co-sponsoring an Essential Permaculture Weekend Training July 9th and 10th. Go to http://midwestpermaculture.com/courses-training/about-2-day-essential/ for more information on this great two day workshop featuring my permaculture teacher, Bill Wilson.  It's not confirmed yet, but Adventure Farm may be involved with this too.

Bees are buzzing at Adventure Farm

The bees have arrived!  Karen, my good friend, came along for support, and Saturday morning we picked up the bees at around 7:30.  Boy, was I nervous. The bees were in what is called a nuc. A nuc, or nucleus, is a small hive of five frames that includes a colony of bees with their queen. 

As you can see there were stacks of nucs with bees flying everywhere. You can see in the foreground one of the helpers actually vacuuming the bees off the boxes. I’m not sure what happened to those bees. It appeared that the bees went into a box inside the vacuum. I wonder if you could start a hive from mixed up bees from all different nucs? 

Each of the boxes were a nuc

Luckily, I had thought to take the truck so we could secure them in the back. The trip home went well since most of the bees were riding in the bed of the truck. We did have one bee ride home on Karen’s jacket and two that managed to cling to the windshield of the truck.  I guess those hitchhikers were completely lost, as I seriously doubt they were from my hive. I feel a little bad for the bees that were trapped outside the nucs.

After arriving home I had to get this box of unsettled bees transfered to their new home.

The nuc next to the new home.  The goal was to get them transferred from one box to the other...Yikes!

I gathered everything I thought I would need:

• Hammer to get the top off
• Smoker to calm the bees
• Protective gear for Karen and me
• Sugar syrup that I made the night before for the feeder

Karen ready to release some bees

Once we were geared up, we started what turned out to be the hardest part, prying off the top.  There were only two nails, but between my nerves, not wanting to jostle the hive and having a hard time getting the hammer in a place to get some leverage, it took a little doing. I would suggest screws to make this a little easier.

Finally I got the lid off, puffed a little smoke on the bees with my brand new smoker and rather smoothly, I thought, transferred the frames full of bees to their new home. 

Adding the sugar syrup to the feeder to help the girls get a start without having to work too hard. 

Karen and I then left to do some scavenging for bargains at yard sales and let the bees get settled. They were still rather franticly buzzing about when I got back in the early afternoon, but by Sunday morning they seemed settled, and I even saw some coming in with bright yellow pollen on their legs.  It was hard to stay away form the hive and I found myself just squatting near the entrance to watch the comings and goings and not getting a lot done in the garden.

They sure are a nice addition to Adventure Farm.

Welcome Home Bees!