Sheryl's All Organic Garden

Beautiful path the the front door of Sheryl and Gary's home

It is a lot of work to create and nurture a garden that will feed your family. but   Sheryl Reuter has done it.  Sheryl, a member of our traditional Lutheran congregation, bears the aura of the original earth mother..  She and her husband, a local attorney, live on a sprawling, sloping sight on the west edge of town.  She recently designed and supervised a significant remodel of their original home which now features a beautiful, well-equipped kitchen at its center.

Fava beans blanched and frozen for later use

To reach the front door, you walk past bee-filled planters filled with herbs and flowers.  As  you enter the glassed in foyer. you immediately relax.  Our small group shares a meal in the back yard.  We are surrounded by different fruit trees and other plants, some of which are volunteers, and some have been planted.

Honey bee on a leek blossom

Sheryl and her family eat the food from her garden all year long.  She shared some of the food with us at our meal.  She demonstrated how she preserves all of her food for use in the winter.  She has various techniques including freezing, drying and canning.  She showed us some freezer containers of eggplant, peppers and zucchini.  One of her favorites is a plumb sauce which is made without any added sugar.  She also cans hundreds of pounds of tomatoes, all grown from her own garden.

Sheryl with her budding green beans

Sheryl does not use insecticides and she does not purchase anything grown with the use of pesticides!!  We have a lively discussion on the pros and cons of purchasing our vegetables organically, or conventionally grown. Her views are at odds with those of some of the farmers in our congregation.  There is a new list of the "dirty dozen" foods that it would be best to purchase from an organic grower. Doctor Oz even recommends purchasing organic coffee and dairy products.

Next Sheryl takes us on a walking tour of her garden.  We pass an entire flowerbed planted with lambs ear.  It is literally vibrating with all of the bee activity.  Sheryl explains that she originally started with one or two plants, but they have reproduced--with a vengeance.  Next we look at the dozen or so gravenstein apple trees. (Did she have that many?  I thought she had only one big one)  Sheryl does not like apple sauce, so she cans them in chunks.  (I think we need to check this one out--does she can or freeze them? When one makes applesauce--and I love Gravenstein applesauce--one usually chucks them and "stews and mashes them" before canning.)

Next we get the tour of the garden.  It is surrounded by a six-foot-high, metal fence to protect it from marauding deer. The garden starts at the top of the hill with some raised beds.  Sheryl has as many kale and chard starts as you could ever hope to use in a life time.  Swing by she'll give you some.  Sheryl's attitude about pests is laze-fair.   "So what if they eat a few?"  she says.  Apparently she has enough to go around.

Down the hill are planted tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, and cucumbers.  The garden is huge (around 200 square feet?)  Along the eastern lower edge Sheryl has a compost pile.  She has a recipe for her compost.  You add a little of this, and a little of that.  The most important ingredient is worms.  "Red wrigglers, not earth worms!"  She exhorts.

Cocoa Relaxes under the tomato plants

We go away from the event amazed at the amount of work Sheryl puts in to growing and preserving her own food.  We wonder how she has time for anything else in her life. Sheryl is one these people who has bursts of creative output.  Maintaining a moderate homestead landscape can be a full time job.  When you add a huge garden on top of all that work, it would be overwhelming to most of us.  Of course, Sheryl does have a crew of Hispanic gentlemen who helps her out occasionally!

Got Worms????

We met with Ginger G. the other day.  She has worms, and she puts them to good use.    Ginger had been looking for a way to do composting on a smaller scale.  She wasn't interested in a composting bin.  She and her husband, Sam, don't make enough waste for that.  She talked to several people who had composting bins and asked them how they liked them.  The typical response was, "Great!  Would you like mine?"  Her granddaughter's school project provided the solution.  It's called a worm tube.  This one is special,  it was even made by her granddaughter.  

Her daughter has one that she has placed in her herb garden.  The worms break down the kitchen waste and leave behind a beautiful addition to the soil, making fertilizers unnecessary.  If you would like to make your own worm bin, follow this link. Click here  This blog spells out everything so clearly in step by step, easy to follow directions.  It's not rocket science.  You cut a 3" plastic pipe to about three feet long.  Cut several holes in the bottom part of the tube to allow worms to get in and out.  Bury the pipe in the ground and fill it with kitchen waste.

Ginger wanted to get started in composting, but wanted to take baby steps.  We like her approach.  Initially a task can seem overwhelming.  But, if it is broken down into simple small steps, we can make progress.  Ginger collects her scraps in the plastic bucket (in the photo above).  When the bucket is full, she goes out and fills her tube.  

Sam and Ginger have also created a neat recycling bin next to their garbage can.  Sam is a wizard with glass and plexiglass so he made a nifty square box to hold their cans and papers.  These are three pretty basic steps that just about anyone could undertake.

After the interview Sam and Ginger asked us if we'd like some greens to take home.  "Yes" Pastor Mark said, "I do."  Their garden is a beautiful project filling about half of their back yard.  And now, slowly but surely, their worm tube is going to help improve this soil, making it even more productive in the years to come.  

McMinnville Water & Light Energy Audit

Sam Graham and I had the pleasure of meeting with Matt Deppy today.  I know Matt from the Habitat for Humanity Board where we served together for a year.  Matt's job is to consult with home and business owners about ways in which they can save on their energy bills.  We were meeting with Matt today to look over our church buildings at McMinnville Cooperative Ministries.  Sam was our guide for the tour.  He has spent several decades working on the buildings of this church and knows them inside and out (literally!)
We start in the depths of the basement in the old building.  Our heating system is a problem.  There is a mechanical switch which has to be flipped to turn have one of two thermostats running the heating system.  There is duct work running in every direction and even Sam has no idea where they all end up.  Surprisingly the natural gas furnace is fairly efficient for a building this old.
Any McMinnville Water and Light customer can call and request information about home efficiency.  After we are done in the depths of the basement we climb up to the top of the sanctuary and Matt looks over the insulation (or lack of insulation in spots.)  Caulking up cracks and openings in your home is the lowest lying fruit.  I heard someone once estimate that the average American home has the equivalent of a three foot by three foot hole going to the outside.  This hole is spread out in tiny cracks that flush out cool air in the summer and let out hot air in the winter.  Right after sealing those holes the next step would be to improve insulation (especially in the ceiling.)  The last thing we do is head into the new building.  Sam knows of a groovy little half door that goes out onto the ceiling above the kitchen.  The view from up there is great! Sam has the door open and is springing up the too tall staircase with the dexterity of man half his age.  Matt and I hustle to catch up.  There are two huge heat pumps which supply the heat and air conditioning for the Great Room downstairs.

When we are done with the tour Matt shows us a chart of the church's energy usage for the past three years.  Surprisingly our electric bill averages only about $600 a month.  With all of the baseboard heaters we have in our old building, and with all of the people who use it, I was expecting a higher number.  That's good news except that we won't realize amazing savings by making our buildings more efficient.  If we lived in Portland, our bill would be twice as high.  McMinnville's little independent power company is extremely efficient, and when Portland Gas and Electric was being decimated by Enron, McMinnville was quietly investing in infrastructure.  It's a great blessing, but it's going to make it a lot harder for us to get a pay back on those solar panels that I want to install on the tops of our roofs.  Matt suggests that they would pay for themselves in a relatively short century or so . . .  

Dear Kraft Foods . . .

You can see in the photos above that the cardboard box for the sugar free lime Jell-o packet weighs .03 ounces.  While the second photo shows that the packet and product weigh .04 ounces.  However, the envelope itself weighs .01 ounces, so the packaging for this Jell-o in fact does weigh more than the product it contains.  Doesn't that seem a bit strange to anyone else?  Also the package does not indicate that any recycled materials were used in it's manufacture.  What's a consumer to do?  One option would be to stop using their product, but we LOVE Jell-o.  So we decided to write a letter.  And, why just send a letter when you can send it to the CEO of the company!  So, here's the letter.  It went in the mail yesterday.   We'll see if we get any response.
Ms Irene Rosenfeld, Chairman and CEO of Kraft Foods,

         I am one of a small group of church members who are concerned for the environment and are seeking to reduce our carbon footprint.  Today my pastor and I phoned your Jello division with our concern about excessive packaging of miniscule amounts of product in large, wasteful containers.  The weight of the sugar-free gelatin packaging actually exceeds the weight of the product contained in that packaging.  Judy, the nice, helpful woman to whom we spoke, suggested that we write to you at the above address.       Is there a way that you could creatively reduce the amount of your packaging?  Also, we are wondering if you have green policies in place for your company?  If so, is there some way we could view those policies?  Also, there nothing printed on your package to indicate that the boxes are made from recycled materials.  Can we assume, then, that the packaging materials are manufactured from "virgin" ingredients?  Would the cost be prohibitive to use recycled materials?         I remember fondly what a treat it was when my mother made cherry Jell-O with bananas for dessert, and I have been a faithful Jello customer all my adult life.  I would like to see you reduce your wasteful packaging, and to pursue using recycled materials.  These small steps would help me and all Jell-O consumers to reduce our carbon footprint.
Sincerely,
Joanne Walker and Pastor Mark C. Pederson

Green with Children

I know for an fact at least two people are reading this blog!  I'm so excited!  One church member I talked to shared he had cleaned up his composting bin after seeing our earlier post.  Then I got a message from a young mother who said she had an extra composting bin she would be willing to give away.  I'm going to become the king of compost if I'm not careful.

Jen N. is doing some really cool things in her yard.  She has two large dogs and two young children, so getting rid of all of her lawn is not a possibility.   Having a lawn to mow means that she has to have curb side yard waste recycling.  There's just no way to get around that.  Even a small lawn creates so many clippings that it is difficult for a home recycling bin to keep up.  Jen has a small plot off the back of the house for tomatoes and herbs, and also has two good sized planters that she is having her two children plant with herbs.  What a fun idea.  I'm sure the kids will love planting, and then take great pride in any dish that has been prepared using their special spices.

Jen also has a portable clipping bin.  She loves it.  She's owned several of them over the years and this one has a hole in the bottom and is about ready to be replaced as well.  She is getting rid of her old bin because she found a used rotating one to put in her backyard.  It will be interesting to see if the material in the rotating bin composts more quickly than a regular static one.  I'll try to go back in a few months and see how it is doing.  

In the front of the house Jen is planting a vegetable garden.  She has a good supply of mushroom compost which seems to be favored by gardeners in this place.  I think the smallest order delivered to your home is seven yards.  That's a lot of compost.  Jen is recycling some flagstones that they removed from their backyard project to this garden.  They will form the terraces that will hold all of that compost.  They will be able to step out of their car door and eat a carrot!  I think I'm going to use the extra bin at my house.  However, if you are really desperate for a bin, I could be convinced to deliver it to your house.  Of course you have to read our blog to know that.

Room for Jell-O

By Joanne Walker
I’m sure many of  you remember the old television commercial advertising Jell-O—there were large gatherings of people around a dining room table or picnic table having just partaken of a huge meal, and everyone is complaining that they don’t have room for dessert.  But then Susie Homemaker cheerfully assures them that they needn't worry—she has made a Jello mold, and she parades a sparkling, jiggling tower of Jello gelatin and sets it in the middle of the table.  To be honest, I was always pleased when my mother  fixed cherry Jello with bananas for dessert when I was growing up. The point of this writing, however,  is not my room for Jello, but the room that the manufacturers of Jello consume for their product.

Strawberry season has arrived in the Yamhill Valley, and I have taken to making fresh strawberry pie.  The recipe calls for a package of Jell-O Cook & Serve, Sugar Free, Fat Free vanilla pudding mix and a small package of Sugar Free Strawberry Jello.

The local stores have discontinued carrying the Cook & Serve variety of the fat free, sugar-free pudding mix, so I contacted the Jell-O company and was told I could get it  through Amazon.com.  I thought Amazon sold books, but, sure enough, they also sell pudding mix by the 24-package case. I ordered the case shortly before the end of strawberry season last year, so I am pleased to have enough left for the 2012 season.

I had finished slicing the berries into the pie plate, and was preparing to cook the pudding, substituting water for milk, when I was struck by the tiny quantity of pudding mix  that was contained in the large (2 ¾ by 3 ¼ by 1 ¼ inch) cardboard box.  It was like one person was soaking in a 6-person hot tub all by himself. I weighed the envelope containing the mix on my food scale. Envelope and mix weighed .9 oz.  The box itself weighed .4 oz.   The package of sugar free gelatin was even worse.  The envelope plus its contents weighed .4 oz.  So did the cardboard package.  What a waste.  What to do?

Together with Pastor Mark we did something.  We called Judy at Kraft Foods. Judy suggested we write a letter to Kraft Foods.

We’re working on the letter.

The Overgrown Compost Bin

I went over to Joanne's house today to take a look at her compost bin.  She had shared at our small group that she could no longer get anything into it, and that nothing seemed to be breaking down.  The bin was one that the local garbage company was giving away a number of years ago.  It is located about as far from the house as possible, which to me is a problem.  If it's hard to get to the bin I probably won't use it.  

And this one was full!  You can tell by looking at the photo above.  I brought along a screen, so we started to shovel out the bin.

Because she has a lawn, Joanne also has a yard debris cart as well. She had it stored right next to her recycling bin and garbage can in a very convenient location.  We decided to move the yard debris cart a bit further away and relocate the compost bin right next to the garbage can.  That's where I want it to be, so that when I take out the garbage I can bring out my table scraps as well.  

It took us a long time to dig out the compost bin!  It was completely full.  Not only that the local shrubs had sent their roots into that beautiful compost, locking it into the ground.  We finally managed to get it emptied, and what a treasure it contained.  The earth is so beautiful!  I was expecting a bunch of half decayed, wet, stinking garbage, but it was full of wonderful composted dirt.  I even took some home to use as potting soil.  

Joanne's problem is a common one.  It is hard to harvest the compost in one of these bins when you are still adding scraps onto the top.  There are doors at the bottom, but they were not accessible previously.  I think this set up will work a lot better for Joanne.  I suggested that she get one of those compost pails for her kitchen that have filters in them.  They work amazingly well with almost no aromas getting into the kitchen air.  It will be fun to see how this new system works out for Joanne.