Oh my!

Goodness, it has been quite some time since I last posted. Mostly I was just having too much fun!!!

Boston was magnificent, with trips to the Museum of Fine Art, a fantastic store called Paper Source (where I held back...), and the Unitarian Universalist Association. My sisters and I also had an awesome crepe potluck with some of Lindsey's friends. Overall, a very pleasant experience.

And then to Vermont, where I've spent an awesome week with my family in various configurations. This was quite possibly the best Christmas ever. Handmade/local gifts all around! I'll post pictures soon, but for a preview you can check out my mom's blog.

Now I've just been lazing about, felting little sock monkeys from a kit I got and reading good books. We'll see how horribly I've failed at my reading list soon, but I've added some others to make up for it! Cool family and friends keep giving me really awesome books to read, so I've been reading things a bit out of order. Back to school next Sunday. Overall, 6 weeks well spent sleeping and being crafty and lazy.

It's nice to see old friends and family. I love my family's unorthodox Christmas traditions, such as watching the animated version of Robin Hood every Christmas Eve and decorating sugar cookies as lederhosen boys. Never gets old!!!

But, I am excited to return to school. Among my classes this term is Plant Biology, which I am quite excited for and I'm sure will be making it's way onto the Crunchy Corner often!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Busybusybusy

Oy! I have not posted in quite some time! I have been ever so busy. First I was REALLY sick with some wretched grossness. Most definitely NOT H1N1, but horrible none the less. It was not fun, my mom and I were both in bed for pretty much 4 days straight... at one point we even Skyped each other from down the hall. Pretty pathetic.

Since being recovered, I have been busybusybusy with all sorts of Christmas joy. Sadly, this means I cannot share with you. But I will take lots of pictures and let you in on all the secrets later. Listening to lots of music as I work, and also watching The Sing-Off on Hulu. It is a really fun show, I stumbled upon it on accident. It is a few night series featuring 8 a capella groups from around the nation, including a group from Tufts, where a few of my friends go. They are all fantastic! It is down to the last three groups. Very fun, and Ben Folds (one of my favorites!) is a judge. If you like music/ love the show Glee as much as I do, check it out!!!

My fellow eco-freak and suite mate sent me this link to NPR's best gardening books. Worth a look.

And while you are in the holiday spirit, please consider wrapping gifts in recycled brown paper bags/paper. If you take a few rubber stamps to it, it can be quite festive! My family also has a collection of fabric bags we reuse year after year after year. We also use a lot of paper as kindling for our fires and in our wood stove.

I am off to Boston on Monday for a few days fun with my sisters. Then I am to Vermont, for a wonderful Christmas with my whole family at our Bit of Earth.

As for Copenhagen, I am beginning to loose some hope. Seems like a lot of it is a bunch of hoopla, and although many countries are supporting "strong" legislation, they're idea of strength is not nearly enough. Bill McKibben wrote an interesting article for Grist.

Most days I just think the world would be so much better if everyone just woke up tomorrow and decided to be decent human beings. Just decent. Then we might actually be able to fix the problems that face us.

But Dr. Seuss can make just about anything better... this quote is especially good:

"Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don't matter, and those who matter don't mind."

Copenhagen Update!

Here is the Reuters page with tons of articles about what's going on at the Climate Change Conference.

Enjoy!

HR 875

So this morning I came upon a group on Facebook called "Against The Organic Farming Ban". Obviously I was intrigued, considering I didn't think there WAS an organic farming ban. Turns out, there is a group that feels bill HR 875- Food Safety Moderization Act of 2009 contains a ban on organic farming. Rumors are swirling all over the internet. I took a look at the text of the bill, but there didn't seem to be anything explicitly banning or hurting local or organic farming. If anything, this seems to solve/slow many other food safety issues that we've been griping about for years, including e coli and salmonella outbreaks. Here are some other articles that try to clarify the real implications of the bill:

From the Daily Green

From Mother Jones

I will be keeping an eye out on this one. It seems to me that it is not as evil as some are perceiving it, but obviously we should be aware of what is happening with this legislation. There are in fact several food safety bills being worked on now. It's hard to regulate for agri-business and small local ag at the same time- while cleaning up agri-business, sometimes we create regulations impossible for small farms to meet. Perhaps we need different sets of regulations for different types/sizes of farms?

Learning something new every day!

Learning something new every day is very important. What did I learn today, might you ask?

I learned that tomatoes are carnivorous!!! Read all about it here.

I planted a whole slew of tomatoes during my internship at the Hickories farm last spring. They are pretty cool plants. Here's a picture I took of some tomatoes growing in the greenhouse last spring. Sadly a lot of the tomatoes I planted fell prey to the tomato blight- goes to show that farming is not an easy profession.

On a different note, I suggest listening to Sufjan Stevens' music. He is spectacular. Here are the lyrics to his song "All The Trees Of The Field Will Clap Their Hands". Even beyond his lyrics, the music itself is amazing.

If I am alive this time next year,

will I have arrived in time to share?

And mine is about as good this far.

And I'm still applied to what you are.

And I am joining all my thoughts to you.

And I'm preparing every part for you.

And I heard from the trees a great parade.

And I heard from the hills a band was made.

And will I be invited to the sound?

And will I be a part of what you've made?

And I am joining all my thought to you.

And I'm preparing every part for you.

And the winner is....

Valerie B!

Thanks to everyone who visited during the giveaway!

There is snow on the ground here, and the sky looks like it might be bringing us some more!

Time for Christmas craftiness!

The rest of what I've been working on

Another strawberry adventure... beads and hand sewing

Some random hand quilting, very small piece only about 3''x4.5''

So there are some more little tidbits for you!

What I've been working on...

Here are some little things I've been working on... I can't show very many things considering a lot of my craftiness lately is being directed towards Christmas presents...

Sorry about the poor lighting, it is ever so gloomy out today! So I couldn't really use natural light. I also did another fun piece, but my camera is not cooperating. I'll try to get a good photo later.

This is a little hand-stitched bag made with fabric printed with a strawberry block cut I made last year in a printmaking class. The buttons are all those extra buttons you get with clothing but never end up using.

And my giveaway is open until Monday morning whenever I wake up and pick.

Here's a little article about Cow Power. Pretty awesome, we use it at our house in Vermont.

Giveaway!

I'm doing a giveaway! It was inspired by Sew, Mama, Sew!, but I missed the deadline for signing up! So I'm just doing it anyway for the heck of it, even though I'm not on the official list of fun giveaways. The giveaways will be open until December 6th.

SO: what I am giving away, you ask? A set of three prints. The giveaway is supposed to be things that are handmade or can be used to make handmade things. My family is doing our second homemade/local Christmas, so I am all about the craftiness right now. These three prints are from original silkscreens I made, with frames made outta some old wood. They are primitive, but they work. All three are printed on cotton from old tee shirts. So they are reusing materials, are handmade, and can be used to make other handmade things. They are each about 12''x12''... give or take a little. They are fully washable.

The peace sign is black ink on red fabric, the robot is mostly blue (with some detailing done after printing) on lime green fabric, and the carrot is blue ink on light blue extra-stretchy fabric.

How to enter: leave a comment with your first name, last initial. I'll write all the names down and draw a name randomly when the giveaway closes. The next day I'll post the name of the winner and we can figure out how to get in contact. I suppose I'm willing to ship internationally, if people that far away are reading this, great!

Good luck to all, and give the list a look!