End of Week 12

Week 12 ends with things greening up both outside and in. Last weekend Kali and I planted over 700 tiny seeds in left over nursery flats. Before we did this I need to share that we spent a good portion of the day putting together some shelving and disinfecting the sun room. This is where I tell you how vital working with clean supplies is when starting seeds. It is fine to re-use old plant flats and containers, but you must bleach and disinfect them before putting new plants in them, especially seeds. Also, using straight dirt from your garden isn't the best for seed starting. Most garden soils compact and can suffocate your seeds. If you're going to the trouble of starting seeds, give yourself the best chance possible at success. We bought a specially mixed seed starting blend from Home Depot and mixed in some peat moss. Peat moss is great, as long as you make sure your mix doesn't dry out. Peat is the first thing to soak up the moisture.

I don't have to tell you how fun it was to share this experience with Kali. Of course, she wanted to do everything herself, and wanted her name on every label (she just learned how to spell K-A-L-I). We both stretched our patience levels with each other to the max, but it was worth every moment! I let her use the spray bottle to moisten the soil, and she helped plant the bigger seeds. Because I only brought from Kalispell a handful of planting containers, I intermingled different species in the same flat. I am now doubting the intelligence behind this space-saving idea. Different plants germinate at different rates, duh! If I had ample supplies I could have avoided this mistake, but we'll survive. Here's the problem: once seeds germinate, you should take the cover plastic off so you don't end up with 3-inch 2-leaved seedlings. The seedlings have to stretch for sunlight under the cover. The purpose of the cover is two-fold: to retain moisture and to keep it warm. On a nice sunny day, it can be a few degrees warmer under the cover than in the room itself. Like I said, our situation isn't perfect, but we'll survive.

Here's what we planted from seeds on March 20:

Gill's All-Purpose Tomato (early, organic)
Amish Paste Tomato (heirloom)
Blondkopfchen Tomato (heirloom, yellow cherry)
California Wonder 300 Sweet Pepper (red)
Gourmet Sweet Pepper (orange)
Red Bull Hybrid Onion (red, storage)
Montana Jack Pumpkin
Cilantro
Basil
Evening Sun Sunflower
Mixed Petunia
Mixed African Daisy (osteospurmum)

We will start these seeds in April:

Snow Crown Hybrid Cauliflower
Mesa Queen Hybrid Acorn Squash
Thelma Sanders Sweet Potato Squash (heirloom)
Charantais Melon (heirloom)

We will plant straight into the garden in May:

Cascadia Snap Pea
Canoe Shelling Pea
Wild Garden Lettuce Mix (organic)
Regatta Hybrid Spinach
Baltimore Hybrid Carrot
Nantes Carrot
Luscious Hybrid Corn (se, organic)
Envy Soybean (heirloom)
Misono Green Soybean

Again, I tried curbing my enthusiasm for buying seeds this winter. I bought what I know we enjoy and will eat. I splurged at Home Depot for the flowers and herbs. At $1.25 a packet, we can make things look pretty too! The pumpkins and sunflowers will be fun, and there's nothing better than fresh basil and cilantro. I am excited to try the winter squashes and melon. I tried them a couple years ago, and they didn't work out...our season wasn't long enough. I read this winter that you can start them as seeds about 3 weeks before planting, so I'm hoping that will help. My dad can get acorn squash to grow like crazy among his corn. I may try that this year too. I also plan to build some cold frames for the early fall frosts we sometimes get. Ryan invented a very easy design/way to cover crops, which we used for when we potted our perennial plugs and bareroot roses in early March with snow still on the ground. We had a very high success rate with these cold frames, and I'm sure they will work for extending the growing season a couple of weeks. Will share the design when we get to that point!

To my surprise, Kali's daisies were the first to pop! This shocked me, as I had terrible luck with Osteospurmum plugs years ago. Granted this was before I knew the importance of pinching and proper annual etiquette. Hopefully we can keep these babies growing! I also read that you can start sunflowers with mixed success. We planted only a few, and saved the rest for direct sowing into the garden. They popped yesterday. We'll see what works best. One week after planting, the daisies, sunflowers, and herbs have started popping through. We move the tomatoes inside at night, as I fear the 50 degree weather the sunroom drops to at night will be detrimental. We may have to do this for the peppers too. Problem is, the peppers share the daisy flat. Daisies are up, peppers are not. If need be, the daisies were cheaper than the peppers! Plus, we eat peppers.

We also started digging and cleaning up our future garden area. We're lucky that a portion of our property has an 8-foot chainlink fence surrounding it (one a dog run). Perfect guard from all the deer! Now if we can fix the ground squirrel issue by May, we'll be okay. We ran some basic soil tests and we will have some ammending to do. High alkaline and virtually no potash. So, our season of slumber is over and it's time to get our hands dirty again. My back already aches from the first week outside, but it will loosen up. It's just good to see green again!

Week 12 - Problem solved?

We may have figured out the base of our $900 problem...and no it wasn't splurging. Well, maybe a little splurging, but that's definitely not the root. I don't even think wasting is the root.

In January and February we bought a lot of groceries. If I walk into our pantry at this very moment, I probably still see half of those groceries on the shelves. We stockpiled. We went to Sam's Club once, spent 25% of my paycheck, and part of Sam is in my pantry. My freezer is well stocked. The cupboards aren't wanting.

Point is, we aren't eating the food we have. We get in our routine of eating the standard breakfast, lunch, and dinner. When we're out of the standard supplies, we go buy more. We don't delve into the grocery items we once thought were brilliant. We forget we have them.

This week we have made a conscious effort to eat up what we have already bought. Yes, we'll still need to buy perishables like milk, eggs, fruit, and veggies. But we're trying to make a dent in the stockpile we have on our shelves. We'll see what happens!

Unfinished Business

After my last blogs' revelation, I haven't stopped thinking about the food we eat, and what it takes to produce that food. Today in the news I read that Subway restaraunts are now making the transition into using only cage-free eggs for their breakfast menu, thus forcing a market-driven change in the world of incredible edible egg production. This transition has been dubbed a victory by the Humane Society. I am not a proponent of animal cruelty, and I do believe cage-free is probably better overall. This story is one of many where public perception is forcing change in the marketplace and food production system. I also read today that the US Dairy Association is hosting webinars for producers to learn how to use social media to help educate people on the truths behind the dairy industry. While in Arizona recently, a colleague overheard people complaining loudly and obnoxiously about the smell coming from the nearby dairy farm. They were in an ice cream shop.

Last week I read about a hog farm that lost a court battle with local homeowners over whether or not the stench from their yard caused the neighbors to lose quality of life. Forget the thought that the hog farm, like many others that face this PR nightmare, probably existed decades before the urban sprawl creeped in.

Now here's the biggie: Walmart now has a sustainability division.

"At Walmart, we know that being an efficient and profitable business and being a good steward of the environment are goals that can work together. Our broad environmental goals at Walmart are simple and straightforward:

To be supplied 100 percent by renewable energy;
To create zero waste;
To sell products that sustain people and the environment."

As I said in the last journal entry, I am all for sustainability. I also believe we can combine productivity and sustainability. Here's my nightmare:
the general public is losing sight of who and what feeds us. In attempts to be green, we are creating a false sense of reality. Those smelly cows produce the ice cream we love. The sad thing is, as my colleague so eloquently put it, "When people smell the dairy, they don't think milk, they think poop."

We are fed by production agriculture.

When did the perception of the US farmer switch from keeper of America's heartland to destroyer of all things good? Many urban people are terribly troubled by the loss of the small family farm. They have heard that there are nothing but large corporations now plowing up the fields and growing our food by the shipload with no care in how it is produced. They will trust a small tomato grower selling his wares at the local farmers market enough to pay him thrice for a single juicy fruit, but the production farms are devilish, greedy wolves who inject us with poisons through their mass produced bacon, hamburger, and corn chips. Oh, and they want our tax money for subsidies too! Damn them all!

Guess what...I'm one of those corporate farmers. My brothers are corporate farmers. So are my cousins, dear friends, and the men and women I proudly work for everyday. They are the greatest stewards of America's natural resources and land. Why? Because the land is what sustains our families. My father once told me "If we take care of our land it will take care of us." No trueblooded farmer wants to see soil health decline. No farmer wants to over-work his land so it can blow 500 miles away. No farmer want the climate to change. And I whole heartedly believe no farmer knowingly plants anything that could harm the public's health or well-being. I also think that if the farmer had his choice, animals wouldn't smell...including humans.

As for the small farms, there is a niche for them. The farmer's markets and local niche marketing can prove profitable for many. Yes, sadly many small farms have not been able to survive the world's demand for large supplies of cheap food. Do you like the $5 Footlong, or the $1 Menu? How about the fact that you can buy a loaf of hearty bread for $2, does that work for your wallet? In today's economy, are you glad that you can buy cheap food? You can thank Dr. Norman Borlaug and the true "Green Movement" of the mid 1900's. By the way, the farmer only gets about 10 cents of that $2 loaf of bread. Of environmental lobbyists Borlaug may have said it best:

"some of the environmental lobbyists of the Western nations are the salt of the earth, but many of them are elitists. They've never experienced the physical sensation of hunger. They do their lobbying from comfortable office suites in Washington or Brussels...If they lived just one month amid the misery of the developing world, as I have for fifty years, they'd be crying out for tractors and fertilizer and irrigation canals and be outraged that fashionable elitists back home were trying to deny them these things".

The current three/four generations now living in America don't know what it's like to be hungry. Remember, 96% of the world's population lives outside the US. Let's look at water, for example. Today was officially "World Water Day". According to the IRC International Water and Sanitation Centre, it is still a reality that an estimated 1.1 billion people rely on unsafe drinking-water sources. Living in the US have you ever truly been without drinkable water? Imagine walking miles everyday for a jar of fresh water to take back to your family...people do this in many 3rd world countries. That's reality. Another reality is that food is just as precious. Even the donation food the US sends to poor nations is under attack from hostile warloards, unfeasible storage capabilities, and Mother Nature herself. Imagine what it's like to be hungry and thirsty for days...not minutes.

So we are lucky to have food, let alone cheap food in America. I took my $900+ food bill a step further. How much can we truly live on? I mean realistically and frugally. If we made every meal at home, bought cheap ingredients/groceries, and were diligent, I bet we could eat for around $5 a day per person. That means my family of 2 and a half, could eat for about $12.50 each day. Multiplied by 30 days/month, that's $375/month. Wow. That's cheap, simple, and a lot of spaghetti. Now, realize that $375 is too expensive for many many families in America. Ryan and I are lucky in that we both have decent paying jobs. Let's look at a similar family making minimum wage. Mom and Dad, both working for $7.50 an hour, 40 hours a week = $300/week. 4 weeks = $1200/month. Subtract 15% for taxes leaves us with $1020/month. Multiplied by 2 = $2040. $375 is roughly 18% of their income. What really puts this into perspective is that on average, Americans spend less than 10% of their income on food. Not sure how they calculated that...maybe before taxes.

So, next time you smell a hog farm or see a tractor stirring up dust, I beg you to remember there is a farmer sitting in the driver's seat and feeding the pigs. Thank them for your 99 cent Junior Bacon Cheeseburger. See how that same burger tastes at $5.50 with 100% cage-free pig, cow, and wheat. Now I'm off to plan my garden and thank my family for feeding the world.

Week 11 - Oh my!

Okay. February flew by like no one's business. It's now St. Patrick's Day and I'm watching the ground squirrels reak havoc in my soon to be garden. Enjoy it now boys! Your fun loving days of running and digging will soon be over! In fact, Ryan went to work early tonight in order to re-stock our pellet supply. I am a nature lover, don't get me wrong. I love deer, birds, bunnies, and even find the little furry devils running around kind of cute. Cute, as long as they stay out of my garden and plants! I'm not blood thirsty, just territorial. It's a natural dominance in all animals...humans included.

Yes, I'm avoiding sharing how February went. I'll put it out there quickly, like ripping off a band-aid. Our average monthly grocery and food bill for January and February was $970. That's only including what we paid by check or debit card. That doesn't include cash purchases. Our monthly bill in 2009 averaged out to about $750, again not including cash purchases. So, what are we doing differently? In 2009 we spent about $290/month eating out, either fast food or fine dining. In Jan/Feb, we spent about $300/month. No jaw-dropper there. For groceries, in 2009 we spent about $450/month; the past two months we have spent $640. WOW! Makes sense...we've spent more on groceries because we're trying to eat at home more...right?

At this point, I need to make a very important point. Last year, my husband was home most of the year. As I mentioned before, he did a superb job of cooking and making sure we didn't waste food. Now with both of us working, we are having to make a more conscious effort to cook. I don't think we are cooking less and eating out more...the above numbers prove that to some degree (again, we aren't tracking cash purchases). Soooo, why are we spending more on groceries? Two things stick out in my mind. Either we are wasting more, OR, we are buying more expensive groceries. For the most part, I think we are bargain shoppers, or at least we try. We try to buy non-perishable goods at Sam's Club for the discounts on bulk shopping. But, we do splurge on a few things. Let's look at tonights grocery receipt for example from our local grocery store:
*Most expensive food items:
Wine (big bottle) - $10.99
Bolthouse Farms Juice - $6.99
Kashi cereal - $4.99
Nabisco Graham Crackers - $4.29
Tomatoes (3 big ones) - $4.17
Breyers ice cream - $3.99 (on sale)
Florida Orange Juice - $3.79
Strawberries (probably about 10) - $3.49

Okay, we also buy Fancy Feast cat food for our cat who is 13+ years old (she gets one jar once a day to supplement her dry food)...not a "food" item, but probably a luxury item none the less.

Let's look at the other side.
*Least expensive food items:
Broccoli (one crown) - $0.67
Reese's PB cups King Size - $1.00 (on sale)
Bananas (6) - $1.12
Roma Tomatoes (3) - $1.19
Carrots (little bag) - $1.49
Applesauce (6 cups) - $1.67
Yogurt (6 Dora containers) - $2.00
Milk (1 gal) - $2.50
Yogurt (large container) - $2.50
Foster Farm sandwich meat - $2.50 (on sale)
Red Baron pizza - $2.97
Salad mix - $2.99
Sourdough bread - $2.99
Apples (6 red del.) - $3.37

An interesting note...I'm noticing that everything I will be growing in my garden this year will probably fall into the "least expensive" column. Tomatoes and strawberries are about the only expensive items we currently buy that we can grow ourselves. This brings up a big issue: why do we always assume that if we make it ourselves it will be cheaper? I mentioned it earlier, but the whole juice story needs to be talked about. We tried diligently making our own juice last year for about 2 months. We found the only juice that was semi-dollar-saving to make yourself is orange juice on the condition that you find cheap oranges (which don't usually produce the most juice, let alone tastey juice). We surmised that it is more cost-effective to buy our juice...especially if you buy it as frozen concentrate.

This leads to another point. When we have the financial ability, we try to buy USA grown food, ie: Florida's Natural orange juice. Yes, it is more expensive, but we feel we are supporting our own farmers. We also try to buy as natural, GMO-free food as possible when finances aren't tight, ie: Foster Farm sandwich meat and chicken. Let me state right now, I am a strong proponent of production agriculture. My personal grain land is part of a large family-owned farming operation. We have farmed since 1887 and my family grows traditionally produced grains. The world would starve if it weren't for production agriculture. 96% of the world's population lives outside the USA. We cannot be fed by small organic farms alone. I also think there is a place for GMO. I think we can have productivity and sustainability together in agriculture. I don't believe we have to choose. Our American farmers are great stewards of the land and livestock. There are people much smarter than me working on creating a world that can be fed safely and substantially. I recently returned from a business trip to Japan. 12 million people live in Tokyo. I saw apartment buildings that rose higher than our giant Montana wind-energy mills. One third of Montana's wheat goes to feed Japan alone. The world is big. It's population is rising. Feeding that population cannot be accomplished by organics.

Now, back to the problem at hand. Maybe we are spending money on more expensive items. Maybe we aren't eating our leftovers as well as we should. I will admit that I have thrown too many things out that should have been consumed in a timely fashion. All we can do is continue trying to watch what we buy and cut back our waste. I'm still fairly confident we can cut our spending by growing and making our own food. On a side note, I'm also determined to cut our garbage in half too!

On a brighter note, I'm ready to start preparing my little sun room for seed starting! Over the next few weeks I'll have fun photos to share and we will finally get to talk about plants!!! The snow is gone and March is proving to be warmer than normal...but we're still due for a late season arctic blast. If the warm weather holds out, I'm sure we'll be regretting it come August, but for now I'm going to soak up the sunshine and enjoy the warmth. Now, I'm going to throw this damn receipt away and move on to greener pastures!