Learning Naturally with the Little Free Library.

R loves to watch PBS and the Create Channel where they build houses and cook, and they make it look real easy, too.  So R invades my tools and scatters them about the house. Whenever I needed a tool, I often found it missing.  Therefore, my just turned six-year-old daughter got a set of starter tools for Christmas.  Though toys are fun for the very small, real tools can also be added at a very young age.  Montessori has preschoolers hammering nails.

Of course R wanted to use her shiny new tools right away, so she started cutting and hammering at random. She then told me she was going to build a playhouse so I needed to go to the store and get some wood.  I tell her it will take a while because she first needs to learn how to build a playhouse (and I sure as hell don’t know how) and that I can help her do that.  She says, “I already know how to build a house.  You just take some big flat pieces of wood for the sides and stick them together, and then you put on a roof.”  Maybe I would have humored her with some shiny new flat pieces of wood had I a penny to spare, but probably not…

But I did realize it was time to learn some carpentry.   Not only is it an educational goal of my daughter’s, but it is also useful.  In permaculture they call it stacking functions. I call it living an integrated life. The more you produce yourself, the more competent you become and the less time you need to spend making money to buy stuff.  We already have a dollhouse and three birdhouses…so I went on a journey looking for something small and useful to build.  I considered a chicken coop or a rabbit hutch, but knew that that leads to chickens or rabbits and I wasn’t ready to commit to that. Then, I came across the Little Free Library and realized it was a perfect project for us.  We would build and promote "Take a book, leave a book" structures that fit in a front yard, by a sidewalk, coffee shop or park and are just big enough to hold 20-30 books that kids and adults can give and take.” The purposes of the libraries are to build community, and to promote reading for children, literacy for adults and libraries around the world.  As we build, mathematics have come alive in the real world, rather than fragmented in a classroom.  We also learn about social sciences and community and I can present and share values and morals with my daughter without dictating them to her.  

Examples of Little Free Libraries. 

So far our journey has been very interesting.  I picked the pictured model (mostly cause there were instructions on the website) and then I posted on a local community sharing/DIY email group that I needed help cutting some plywood into specific shapes.  Not only did I get response, but a women told us she would be happy to help and that she had some plywood laying around that we could have.  We went to her house and she taught us to cut the wood and even gave us the scraps for future projects.  However since she only had a circular saw, we were unable to cut the hole for the door.  So then I went to my neighborhood group and asked if someone had a saw that could cut a square within a piece of plywood.  We were then invited over by a neighbor who helped us cut the hole, then donated some caulk, clear adhesive, some molding for the Little Free Library’s door and some roof tiles. These tiles were the original redwood tiles from their house, built in the 1880’s.  They had just taken the 5 layers of roof off their house and found them at the bottom.

Needless to say, this project is truly becoming a community project. We are excited to see where it all goes and we will keep y’all updated. 

MY NEW BLOG! read me

Hello World.

I decided to write this blog because I like writing, because I outgrew my last blog, and because I can't believe there are so few of us (single-parent homeschoolers)!  Well I actually can believe it cause its true, but I want there to be more of us! I can't believe we live in a world that is so wacky that being unhitched, a parent AND the facilitator of your child's academic, physical and emotional education is so absolutely freakin' ludicrous.  This is especially true for non-religious folks like myself. The majority of single-parent homeschoolers have church support.

I wrote this because I wanted to encourage people to be bold, like I am trying to be.  Yes, it is hard, but it can be done and you can be happy doing it. And it would be nice if there were more crazy parents like me, cause I am sort of lonely.  So I hope to recruit more of you, in Sonoma County and beyond.  The more of us there are the easier it will be.  I have been a single mother since the birth of my child.

I wrote this to share my experience with others as well. I hope for this blog to be useful not only to single-homeschoolers, but all sorts of people. Especially people looking to live a down-to-earth, integrated, family and community centered life.  Many of the issues that come up for me as a single parent homeschooler are also issues of two-parent homeschooling families, single-parent families that use schools, and just people who like to learn together.

So, this is the first post of my new blog, though I have imported some of the posts from my last blog, the more useful ones. Those are the 2011/2012 posts.

BTW the reason "homeschool" is in quotation marks is cause schooling at home doesn't happen a whole hell of a lot. Also, by some standards, I am in fact not homeschooling. We could be considered taking "Independent Study." Ramona goes to a independent study charter school that holds optional classes between the hours of 9:30 and 1:30 twice a week. My daughter is in one of those classes right now as I type this.  I am so grateful I have this option close to me though it is not my ideal.  I would rather that I could offer the group learning situations though my community. I have received absolutely no help from my child's father to raise her, or from anyone else, so I need the help from Public Ed. But even if this "school" wasn't an option, I would have still started "homeschooling" or for a better term, "free ranging." There are so many resources out there, we need to use them, and keep demanding and creating more.

The day that it isn't such a rare bird that the concepts of single-parent and homeschool can hang together, will be a great day in an evolved society.

Becoming a Swallowtail Butterfly (in pictures)

This is where it all started. An aquarium planted with fennel.
We located fennel in a community garden that had little golden
eggs of the Swallowtail.

A day or two before hatching the egg turns black.

little hatchling. (images photographed through jewelers loop)

Three days old.

About 5 days old.

9 days old, third skin.

12 days old. 4th skin.

spinning the rope that keeps it in place as it metamorphoses.

Still working. Day 15?

About day 16, comatose.

after sitting around a few days,the last skin falls away...

Its moving

And now a full chrysalis, good morning.

After nearly two weeks of no change, the wing patterns
appear through skin

Emergence

stretching the wings

Stayed with us about 24 hours before taking its new wings to air.

Kid Art

Photos never do Ramona's art justice, since her work is always so glitter-centric, but here is a nice one she did yesterday.

The last day of my life.

Five years ago today, being fed up with my pitiful fat waddle and baby-induced sciatica going down my right buttock and leg, I became determined. I had been pregnant for 41 weeks and a day, and was very uncomfortable with even the word "induction." I decided it was time to take action. After eating pineapple for lunch, I boiled up a big pot of Raspberry Leaf tea and began to sip it. As the afternoon progressed, I started popping evening primrose oil capsules, rubbing my nipples, and massaging my hoku spot (among other things). I was beginning to feel a little peculiar. So I headed to the local Mexican place and ate the spiciest food I could get a hold of, and then took a long walk around lake Merritt. There on a bench behind Fairy Land it happened. My 9.6 pound baby's body and mine began to move in unison.

That was just the beginning.

I mused as I walked to my quiet empty home that every time I stopped to catch my balance during contractions, that all these people around me had no idea I was in labor. I remember looking people in their eyes thinking "Can you tell I am having a baby?" smiling, which may have at times looked like a grimace.

Raw Milk (and Butter) Ruckus

So bummed that the FDA has been putting pressure on my farmer for selling us raw cow milk.  Not us personally, but anybody.  It is illegal in most states now, because of, they say, risks of contamination.  Of course, everything is at risk of contamination. With all the crazy scare tactics out there about raw milk (I can't even go there, it would take me all week to write), you would think it was responsible for at least one death…nope.  We are more likely to win the lottery than get sick from raw milk, especially since I get the milk straight from a healthy cow within hours of the milking.  No processing plant.  No employees that may not have been trained well.  I am furious that the FDA is forcing a wedge between me and my farmer.  Grrrr. Food and Drug Autocrats.

I love raw milk. It's alive and I love life.  You are what you eat.  Living foods come from healthy colonies of bacteria and yeasts, they grow from living soil, they come unadulterated from an animal. They come from an abundant vibrant living food system, not the disgusting industrial food system.    Living foods can not be part of the industrial food system, because that system kills life

Raw milk contains 8 amino acids and 60 fully intact and functional enzymes, pasteurized milk has none.  In fact, humans could live solely off of the milk of a healthy, pasture fed cow.  Or so they say (click here for a great article explaining raw milk nutrients).

They say that once you start to drink raw milk you never go back.  I've been drinking it only a little while, but my body knows that raw milk is good food.  It tastes better. There is no flemmy after effect, or bloated feeling in my belly.  Plus, we get make a cube of fresh sweet cream butter every week from the milk fat.  Sometimes, I make yogurt as well.

So now we are on a hunt for a new raw milk source.  

Butter is super easy to make...check it out

 Here is a beautiful 1/2 gallon of milk, with a big old head of cream, ready for making into butter.  This one has been sitting in the fridge a couple days...I usually make the butter the night after the morning of milking cause it tastes so fresh and sweet.  I didn't get to it on time this time.

Heavy cream from the top, sitting, beckoning me to make it into butter.  This is a quart jar.  1/3 full is a good amount.  More than half full will leave you with not enough room for the next part.

And she is off, shaking and shaking the cream.  You need to shake for a while.  It is nice to sit around, watching a video, passing the jar amongst a group of friends.  Or at least to have someone to talk to.  It seems to take less time if you are doing more than just shaking cream.  Keep shaking. Don't give up, the cream, very suddenly, seemingly in just a few shakes, will turn to...

This clumpy butter. The nice thing about letting the milk sit longer before shaking it is that there is less milk in the fat...thus less buttermilk leftover (real buttermilk isn't that stuff you buy in the store, its the stuff leftover after shaking the butter.) I don't drink the buttermilk, but you can. I try to cook with it.

With your hand you can remove the butter from the jar, then run it under cold water, while squeezing and kneading it until the water runs clear. Leaving milk in your butter will turn in rancid a little to quickly for my taste. I usually add salt (if I add salt) either after I cleaned it, or I knead it in right before.  I am not sure which is better.

After you have squeezed it clean, make a little cube.  Tah dah! 

Me and My Kombucha

Recently, a mama from Hipmama offered up some Kombucha Mothers.  Kombucha is an effervecient fermented drink made from tea and sugar that has been used as a health elixer for thousands of years. I had been tasting it here and there and decided to give it a whirl.

Baby SCOBY (you can see mama SCOBY
sideways in a new batch of tea)

A week later a baby kombucha from New Jersey was born from my mailbox!  To clarify, the Kombucha SCOBY (Symbiotic Colony Of Bacteria and Yeasts) is often referred to as a “mother” because this is what makes the kombucha.  Every time that a new batch of kombucha is finished, a white (sometimes pinkish) baby SCOBY has formed on the top of the brew.  As soon as you remove the baby and put it in a fresh batch of tea and sugar, the baby effectively becomes a mother as well, and at the end of the brew you will have yet another baby/mother that has formed on top of the original one. 

I store my kombucha in
used bottles from this store-
bought kombucha

So, I have been brewing kombucha for a month now, and drinking it daily.  It is purported to have a myriad of health benefits, especially for detoxing organs and basically just an all round disease (cancer) fighter. 

I start and end my day with Kombucha. drinking about 16 ounces of it a day.  Ramona has been drinking a few ounces here and there.  It is a little strong for her.

A quick search can give you several sites with various directions for brewing tea, so I will skip the step by step (but here is a great FAQ).  Many people will say you have to use black tea.  Not true, though black tea is a good basic starting place since it has all the nutrients the mother needs.  They also say you have to use white sugar; I have been using raw and unprocessed sugar from the bulk section just fine.  I started off using a green tea mix, mint mélange from Trader Joes and Yogi Ginger Tea.  I later read that many of the herbs I was using are a no-no for reasons of acid levels and mold.  However, I have been successful using some of the no-no herbs, just not in excess.  Here is a great article about appropriate herbs to use. Also, black, white, and green tea and well as Yerba Mate work great. 

I must warn you though, sometimes they recommend adding a bit of vinegar to give the SCOBY some of the acidic environment it likes…don’’t use “live” or raw vinegar…this will interfere with the brew, and you will have a Vinegar Kombucha Monster, and those are not pretty!

Sugar and tea bags, waiting for boiling water.

Not finding a good gallon jar for brewing, I have been using half gallon mason jars. I use three tea bags, filtered water, and just under a cup of sugar.  Since Kombucha likes to be kept between 70 and 85 degrees fahrenheit, I invested $15 in a heating pad and keep it on low sideways between the bottles in the cupboard where I brew my Kombucha.

I am addicted to the stuff.  It makes me happy and healthy. Let me know if you want a Kombucha baby, I would love to share the love.   

I usually only fill it 1/3 of the way with hot water,
and add cold after I remove the teabags for
quicker cooling. Make sure to melt all the sugar
when adding the boiling water. 

Mother just added to cooled tea/sugar.

Ready!  See the baby sitting pretty on top? 

Brewing in the cupboard over the stove.  I switched
from covering with kitchen towel to paper towels
cause I don't have enough kitchen towels and for
sanitary reasons. These are two deep and I slide the
heating pad right between them.