Memphis Democrat Column Week of 8/3/09
Greetings from Dancing Rabbit. This is Alline with this week’s report.
It has been another glorious week here in Rutledge, MO. The weather has been just about perfect, for humans AND for tomatoes. Not too hot, not too cold; rather like the baby bear’s porridge. It has been ideal weather for swimming in the pond, building a house, pulling weeds, gathering wild blackberries, eating homemade ice cream, playing Ultimate Frisbee, and picking zucchini before they take over the garden.
Dancing Rabbit continues to add to our numbers. Tim officially became a full-fledged member on Sunday. Nani, Brian and Lily have all submitted their residency requests. Each new person brings skills, talents and his/her own brand of enthusiasm for what we are doing here, and it is exciting to welcome new people into our growing village. Even better, we still have one more visitor session this summer. We look forward to meeting those who are interested in what we’re doing!
And speaking of growing, Main Street, which was constructed a few weeks ago with grassy pavers (http://www.grassypavers.com/), has begun to sprout! A grassy paver system is a recycled plastic grid placed over a prepared gravel roadbed, which is then seeded with grass. It provides the strength of pavement, eliminates soil compaction, reduces reflective heat and allows for all weather accessibility. We chose to use native grasses; a group of volunteers has dutifully watered the road daily, and we are now seeing the results. In a few more weeks the road will be lush and green, and almost ready to be walked and driven upon.
The grass on our road isn’t the only thing growing this week - houses have been rising higher and are looking more and more like the homes they will soon become. It is great fun to watch, and an inspiration. Building one’s own home is empowering, terrifying, and ultimately incredibly satisfying. We end up with homes that fit our personalities and needs, have a small environmental footprint, use locally harvested materials (strawbales, cob, lumber), re-use materials that would otherwise molder in the land fill, are energy efficient and cost effective - no 30-year mortgages here!
Ma’ikwe has gotten all of the posts (phenomenal huge logs from neighboring Sandhill Farm) and the purlins up. Soon she’ll start stacking the strawbales that will make up her walls. Jan’s house, which has the roof on and the door bucks in, is also ready for baling. Dan and Mary Beth installed the floor on the second story of their strawbale timberframe building. Jeff’s “Earthship” is bermed, seeded and ready to grow. Dave, one of Jennifer’s Work Exchangers, has started a blog documenting the progress of the Timberframe addition (http://timberframe09.blogspot.com/). And the Milkweed Mercantile general store, while still a bit tricky to get to because of road construction, is open on Saturdays during tours (12:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.) as Kurt and the crew continue the work on the Café and Inn. Whew!
Ziggy’s parents Angelo and Donna Liloia came out from New Jersey to celebrate the long-awaited house warming of their son Ziggy’s cob house. It is absolutely beautiful and has a lovely organic, peaceful appeal. Entirely crafted by hand, it has sensuous curves, smooth plastered walls, niches molded into the walls for candles and branches embedded into the cob for hanging of coats, and the coolest roof ever. During the party folks scrambled around on the living roof (the kids were especially giggly!), admired the abundant light streaming in from the front window and skylight, and relaxed and chatted late into the night. Photos and how-to details are available on Ziggy’s blog (http://small-scale.net/yearofmud/).
It is indeed a joy to live in a place where vegetables fresh from the garden are greeted with oohs, aahs and general merriment! Potluck dinners have been featuring a delicious assortment of beautifully prepared fresh-from-the-garden-vegetables - the beans, squash, berries, and cucumbers are rolling in. Additionally we are also blessed with the abundance of the Farmer’s Markets in Memphis and Rutledge. Unfortunately, I am still suffering from severe tomato envy. While others are beginning to harvest jewel-red globes, all 19 of my tomato plants are still sporting green fruit. So I wait, albeit not very patiently. I content myself with donations of squash from friends of neighbors, and have been making squash fritters, zucchini relish, and double-chocolate zucchini cake, which tastes like brownies without a hint of nutrition (in some circles this is a GOOD thing!). I’ll post the recipes on my blog soon (http://ecovillagemusings.blogspot.com).
Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage is an intentional community in Rutledge, Missouri practicing ecological sustainability. We offer tours 2nd and 4th Saturdays of each month through October - our next tour is scheduled August 8th at 1:00 p.m. For more information, check out our website at http://www.dancingrabbit.org, or give us a call at (660) 883-5511.
It has been another glorious week here in Rutledge, MO. The weather has been just about perfect, for humans AND for tomatoes. Not too hot, not too cold; rather like the baby bear’s porridge. It has been ideal weather for swimming in the pond, building a house, pulling weeds, gathering wild blackberries, eating homemade ice cream, playing Ultimate Frisbee, and picking zucchini before they take over the garden.
Dancing Rabbit continues to add to our numbers. Tim officially became a full-fledged member on Sunday. Nani, Brian and Lily have all submitted their residency requests. Each new person brings skills, talents and his/her own brand of enthusiasm for what we are doing here, and it is exciting to welcome new people into our growing village. Even better, we still have one more visitor session this summer. We look forward to meeting those who are interested in what we’re doing!
And speaking of growing, Main Street, which was constructed a few weeks ago with grassy pavers (http://www.grassypavers.com/), has begun to sprout! A grassy paver system is a recycled plastic grid placed over a prepared gravel roadbed, which is then seeded with grass. It provides the strength of pavement, eliminates soil compaction, reduces reflective heat and allows for all weather accessibility. We chose to use native grasses; a group of volunteers has dutifully watered the road daily, and we are now seeing the results. In a few more weeks the road will be lush and green, and almost ready to be walked and driven upon.
The grass on our road isn’t the only thing growing this week - houses have been rising higher and are looking more and more like the homes they will soon become. It is great fun to watch, and an inspiration. Building one’s own home is empowering, terrifying, and ultimately incredibly satisfying. We end up with homes that fit our personalities and needs, have a small environmental footprint, use locally harvested materials (strawbales, cob, lumber), re-use materials that would otherwise molder in the land fill, are energy efficient and cost effective - no 30-year mortgages here!
Ma’ikwe has gotten all of the posts (phenomenal huge logs from neighboring Sandhill Farm) and the purlins up. Soon she’ll start stacking the strawbales that will make up her walls. Jan’s house, which has the roof on and the door bucks in, is also ready for baling. Dan and Mary Beth installed the floor on the second story of their strawbale timberframe building. Jeff’s “Earthship” is bermed, seeded and ready to grow. Dave, one of Jennifer’s Work Exchangers, has started a blog documenting the progress of the Timberframe addition (http://timberframe09.blogspot.com/). And the Milkweed Mercantile general store, while still a bit tricky to get to because of road construction, is open on Saturdays during tours (12:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.) as Kurt and the crew continue the work on the Café and Inn. Whew!
Ziggy’s parents Angelo and Donna Liloia came out from New Jersey to celebrate the long-awaited house warming of their son Ziggy’s cob house. It is absolutely beautiful and has a lovely organic, peaceful appeal. Entirely crafted by hand, it has sensuous curves, smooth plastered walls, niches molded into the walls for candles and branches embedded into the cob for hanging of coats, and the coolest roof ever. During the party folks scrambled around on the living roof (the kids were especially giggly!), admired the abundant light streaming in from the front window and skylight, and relaxed and chatted late into the night. Photos and how-to details are available on Ziggy’s blog (http://small-scale.net/yearofmud/).
It is indeed a joy to live in a place where vegetables fresh from the garden are greeted with oohs, aahs and general merriment! Potluck dinners have been featuring a delicious assortment of beautifully prepared fresh-from-the-garden-vegetables - the beans, squash, berries, and cucumbers are rolling in. Additionally we are also blessed with the abundance of the Farmer’s Markets in Memphis and Rutledge. Unfortunately, I am still suffering from severe tomato envy. While others are beginning to harvest jewel-red globes, all 19 of my tomato plants are still sporting green fruit. So I wait, albeit not very patiently. I content myself with donations of squash from friends of neighbors, and have been making squash fritters, zucchini relish, and double-chocolate zucchini cake, which tastes like brownies without a hint of nutrition (in some circles this is a GOOD thing!). I’ll post the recipes on my blog soon (http://ecovillagemusings.blogspot.com).
Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage is an intentional community in Rutledge, Missouri practicing ecological sustainability. We offer tours 2nd and 4th Saturdays of each month through October - our next tour is scheduled August 8th at 1:00 p.m. For more information, check out our website at http://www.dancingrabbit.org, or give us a call at (660) 883-5511.