CHICKEN

A few months ago I made the trip out to the Hannegan Farm store to pick up our bee order (another story).  Shannon had warned me not to come home with any chicks.  She should have known better.  Our little flock of layer are doing great, the chicks I was interested in were destined for the table.

The kids of course were ecstatic, at least until the baby ducks arrived in the mail a few days later, which might have had something to do with Shannon's warning.  I wasn't too worried though, if we were already going to be feeding a set of small birds a few more wouldn't be so bad.  I only bought 10.  

Meat birds have been on my radar for a long time.  It's so incredible to be at a place in life with our house under control, and space in the yard to take on so many of the food and urban-steading projects that have intrigued me for years. Standard table fare is so far from the killing and butchering of animals. A great gulf separates the consumer from the death, blood, and carnage that is slaughtering.  Yet our consumption of animals is really an active acceptance of the industrialization of killing.  It became so so clear how and why the industrial mechanized labor models have swallowed up the meat packing industry.  I have know this for a long time, but I this knowledge became experience spending an entire afternoon even with knife, killing cones, a scalder and a plucker, it process 13 birds.  It is so easy for each step, killing, bleeding, plucking, gutting, severing, cleaning, and packaging to be differentiated.  Stopping to consider the sheer scale of consumption of meat and the subsequent demand there is no wonder that the economies of efficiency and scale dominate the industry.   Of course, there are the externalities with such systems.

  Slaughtering our own birds was an education.  Born from a desire to appreciate and have control over the food we consume.  It was also about community, friends and family sharing in a process that for thousands of years was elementary and fundamental to survival.  Yet here we were, the educated and privileged, ignorant of such a fundamental skill, how to kill and prepare our food.  Blood and gut juices dripped from our hands and onto the pages of the book, diagraming what we were to do.  But, we figured it out.  While those first birds were painfully slow, gruesome, and humbling we learned to decode the mysteries of organ meats, we located and removed the foul glands, we raked the inner cavity of the lifeless carcass with our fingernails removing the last bits of lungs and connective tissues.  We became the processing system.  Feather, entrails, feet, and lifeless chicken heads filled our curbside "Food Plus" bin and clean fresh chicken filled our freezer. It was a horribly uneconomical process, but one that I will do again. 

Birch Bay Bike Trip

 

About a month ago our ward announced that they would be hosting a campout at Birch Bay state park.  I leaned over to Shannon and said, "We should bike there".  Birch Bay has long been one of our destination clamming, crabbing, and warm water summer swimming destinations, but with it being so close, 20ish miles, we have always made it a day trip.

The week leading up to the trip was rain, but we held on to the hope that the forecast would be correct and we'd have sun.  Friday rolled around, rain in the morning and sun in the afternoon.  It was a bit of a crazy day at work, the last day of school before our final expedition, so I was running late for our 4pm departure.  When I arrived home I found the babe-o's ready to ride and hanging out in the yard next to their bikes.  

   I had packed up the gear earlier in the week so departure was relatively smooth, a few last minute shuffles and we were on the road! The trip was super smooth, sunshine, beautiful farms, views of the ocean and islands, and just long enough to feel like we were going someplace.   

The ride took us about 2.5 hours, we arrived in camp with time to eat, visit, and enjoy the sunset.  It was one of the better ward activities I've been a part of, low key, simple, and time to hang out with folks out side.  What could be better? 

The Garden

It's the first year in our new house that needs all sorts of work.  We started out wanting to be sane and reasonable. We would be doing a lot of house projects. It would be hectic. 

(I was pretty impressed that Abram agreed. He tends to be a bit less reasonable and a bit more wildly idealistic and ambitious, which usually turns out to be a blessing...)

We started with two raised beds and a sunny section alongside the garage. After spending the morning tearing up the sod, Abram came back that evening and realized that instead of two raised beds, we could have oriented them horizontally and gotten in 5. “Oh well,” I thought. “We can do it all differently next year.”

Then Abram talked to a parent at the school who’d had someone come till his yard with a tractor.
Then he found the craigslist ad. 

Then I said, “We might as well go the length of the backyard if he’s coming out.” 

So, here we are with 1200 feet of garden space. I was nervous going into it, but as soon as it was tilled and we began arranging beds that afternoon (and Abram actually agreed that we could do organic shapes and not just highly efficient rectangles!), suddenly I was just giddy with the possibility of what we had just taken on.  I could barely keep my mouth shut about it!

 Not the best picture, but you can see where it was heading a few weeks ago...  The squashes are rocking their whole section and filling in all the paths. The sunflowers are nearly as tall as Aurora now and I can't wait for the beans to climb to the top of the teepee. 

 I have to admit that I am so happy when I see the girls snacking on goodies from the garden. Even if they don't finish it (usually the case with beets), we cook it up for dinner and they're so much more interested in eating things they've watered and picked themselves. 

In the words of the Jack Johnson playing right now, 

"This is how it's supposed to be" !!

The garden is lush with goodness: chard, kale, lettuces, zucchini, beets, leeks, green onions, carrots, herbs. We are really enjoying it.

The winter gardening edition of the seed catalogue showed up at the school a few weeks ago and Abram came home with another wild notion.....

Yep, we’ve probably got another 8-900 feet tilled. I was not so convinced with one section, I admit it. I’m still a bit concerned about tying it in with the rest of the yard. And yet, as we were pulling up carrots for the girls to snack on and Abram was reminding me of the gloriousness of the garden, I thought, “Hmm, we could actually plant enough carrots to feed these girls through the winter.” 

I guess less lawn and awkward landscaping could work out alright this year.  ;)

Winter... already a memory

We were really excited about taking the girls skiing this year. Gear swaps were attended, petite skis and accouterments were haggled for, skiing was practiced in our carpeted hall with Abram standing in (pushing, really) for gravity and the fall line…. But then there was this whole buying our first house thing. 

So, instead, the one time we got up to Mt. Baker as a family this year, was on Christmas Eve for sledding.  It was a beautiful day. One unidentified jump on the first run convinced Rowen that she was done for the day, but she giggled away at the top of the hill contentedly while Aurora and Abram did more runs and built snowmen. 

Aurora in fact, was so enthralled with the snow, gravity, sliding on her bumski, and playing with her friend Adia, that she could not be coaxed into standing still to record for time immemorial that we had gone out to the snow together. 

And really, these pictures are a lot more visually interesting than all the ones not taken of us slimming down our belongings, packing, cleaning, moving, and embarking on the many house projects before us (though some before and after photos will make their way on here eventually).

We sure were thinking about all our beloved family and friends far away over the Christmas season, even though we didn't let you know! 

Why we've been slacking on posting--We moved!

Well, funny enough, the last time that Abram posted anything on this here blog was the first time we met our house. We bought a house! And a third job…. Really, though it is an amazing blessing, we did not think we’d be able to find a home in the area we wanted to be in that we could actually afford for years. Instead, we found the perfect fixer upper to showcase all those great skills Abram learned growing up in the industrious, practical and creative Dickerson family.

The house was owned by an elderly couple who’d called it home for over 50 years and raised 5 children in it. There are all sorts of upkeep and remodeling projects as a resultJ

It's in one of our favorite neighborhoods--many super deep "Victory Garden" lots so there's all sorts of urban farming and livestock happening right in the city.  Ours isn't giant, but we're grateful its nearly .2 of an acre. Plenty of space to grow food and happy kiddos....

The basement: one of the most blaring areas in need of improvement: Over his 2 week February break, Abram demo-ed, cleaned, framed, wired and plumbed this with minimal help. We now have a functioning laundry room and pantry! I am so happy every time I go down to switch the laundry, and I’m not exaggerating. It will be dry walled and painted this summer after he’s done rewiring, then I’ll post glamorous pictures. A pretty dang good birthday present, I have to admit, though I still harass him about forgetting to give me a card….

The living room. Ah….ancient green/orange/brown shag carpet with obvious paths to the bedrooms and the kitchen. Ah the minty green walls and all. Abram stripped all the paint off the trim and then we chose a more moderate cream color scheme. The wood floors will be re-finished this summer (I can’t wait!).

I am so grateful to have our own little house to dream about, a good-sized yard to cultivate and play in, plenty of sunshine streaming in (on those good days in the coastal northwest), awesome neighbors--including 3 horses and a flocks of chickens and ducks across the street--and loads of opportunities for creativity and improvement. Finally, when we get a moment to ourselves at night, Abram and I are no longer saying “What should we do with our lives?” and can instead go over the litany of upcoming projects and decisions on the wonderful little house.

We are really loving being able to walk or bike to the beach and easily bike to many other destinations around Bellingham. We love it here! We feel so very blessed!