Holidays...or not.

So, it's that time of year again...that time I love to hate. And this year we aren't even pretending to celebrate any of the traditional consumerist holidays. They are all tainted with lies and consumerism. We decided not to participate, but to make our own traditions and celebrations instead.

This year when everyone was spending their Thanksgiving stuffing themselves, we decided to go out into the woods to search for sticks. I read about a Native American custom of making prayer/spirit sticks, which then would be planted in the ground on the Winter Solstice by the head of the family. We thought we would give it a try.

Into the woods.

While most of the nation was inside watching football and eating turkey, we spent the day hiking through the pristine, quiet woods (no hunters out) looking for our perfect sticks to transform into objects of power.

Looking for sticks.

The next day, which Americans celebrate as Black Friday, the biggest day of greed, we cooked our organic, free- range turkey, which we bought locally from a turkey farm down in the river valley. The turkey was delicious, and expensive, but a nice treat. We never did get around to raising turkeys this year. I also made the kids a homemade and handmade gift to show my gratitude for being their mom.

Car bridge over the Rio Grande...to the turkey farm. One car wide and a little scary.

Homemade dinosaurs from scrap material.

The prayer sticks turned out great. We worked on them December 20th, in celebration of the Winter Solstice--a big one this year. Residents in our town of Taos have been working toward raising money to install a pyramid on their land. There is a lot of talk about pyramids working with the energy during this Winter Solstice to bring in good things. Pyramids. Hmm...

So, we decided to build one. At first we were going to build one out on our land (with pallets) and then anchor our spirit sticks to the directional corners. But, it began snowing here around December 14, and hasn't really stopped, or at least the dirt roads haven't cleared, and it is so cold. We haven't been out to our place for a while. So, with time growing short and the Solstice fast approaching, Richard decided to build the pyramid out of conduit from his hoop house projects and put it in the house. The only place it would fit was in the kids' room. So, that's where it is, with the prayer sticks anchored to each corner. It looks cool. We meditated in the pyramid on the Solstice, and yesterday when I had a stomach upset, I sat in the pyramid for a half hour and felt energized and my stomach issue cleared up.

Pyramids are said to have healing properties. No, it doesn't seem to matter if it has solid sides or not, only that it is angled correctly, in direction and in how it is built. Richard spent a lot of time figuring out the dimensions and angles so it would be correctly energized. We added distilled water and crystals, plus the prayer sticks that have copper wire...all to pull the beneficial energy in.

Pyramid

Prayer /spirit sticks on the pyramid.

Duck and chickens in the snow.

Before the snow and the freezing temperatures came, we did manage to get some mudding done on our pallet shed out on our land. That was great fun. We hooked up the mixer to the generator, which made it go a little faster. I really enjoy the "flow" of putting the mud plaster on the walls.

Doesn't look like a pallet shed anymore.

We also decided to insulate the shed with a light straw and mud insulation, which we packed into the spaces in the pallet walls. This is still ongoing. We had to clear out a rat's nest and cover the floor with a few inches of gravel, which we also filled inside the first few inches of the pallet walls. We hope this will keep the critters out of our shed. We did get all of the outside walls plastered with the first layer of mud before the snow came. And it all dried. Lucky.

Light straw and mud insulation.

Richard has also been building chicken coops out of disassembled pallets and selling them on Craiglist to raise money for hay for our llama herd. The girls and boys are all doing great, but they sure do eat a lot (well, not as much as goats, or horses, or a cow).

Richard's pallet chicken coops.

Big bale of oat hay.

We have made several trips around the area to find hay. One to the San Luis Valley for alfalfa, one to Espanola for oat hay, and then another to Espanola for some wonderful grass hay. Richard has been building chicken coops like mad....until the snow came.

Llama smorgasbord.

The pallet feeder works great. It is between the girls and the boys on the fence line so they can all get to it. The little llamas reach up from underneath and the rest dig into the hay from above. So many of them are now spitting at each other, to try to scare off the competition. It doesn't work--the spitting, but it is funny to watch the llama antics at feeding time.. Everyone gets their share and everyone seems happy enough.

Yesterday we went to a Solstice ceremony at the New Buffalo Center, and to see the pyramid they brought up from central Mexico. It seems more like an art piece to me, but was still designed to capture the energies. We participated in another labyrinth ceremony, but this time my little girl was a little bothered by the crowd moving in for a group hug (of about 50 people) and the humming (Ohm...) so we snuck out and missed the talk around the pyramid. Too bad.

But, we have our very own pyramid at home in our warm and sunny Earthship. I love this house. I hardly even notice how cold the temperatures are outside. Except when we brought the chickens into the spare room for a night with temps around -11. That was a bad idea. The roosters started crowing at 3am. It was a night of little sleep and I found myself eagerly awaiting the rise of the sun so the flock could go back out to the coop. Now we put heat lights in the coop. The downside is the power drain. Being on solar, the lights suck up the power over night, and we usually lose power in the morning sometime, before the sun comes up. This morning we hooked the generator up to the house. This is only going to work while Richard is on vacation for the week. When he goes back to running his computer for eight hours, we won't have enough power for the lights.

How we took our on grid lifestyle for granted, with heat lamps and electric water de-icers for the livestock. Life is more interesting and more challenging now for sure. But, we love it and we are doing great figuring it all out. And, it's kind of fun.

Frosty the little llama, roads, mud, pallets and earthbags

Today I'm fasting, and the urge to eat is incredible. Richard and I decided we would begin this fasting/detox regiment at the beginning of each month, for at least three days to begin the new month with clean systems. But it's hard. Haven't gotten past three days in my fasting attempts, which is when everyone claims the hunger subsides. I'd like to make it to that point.

Frosty the new llama boy.

Yesterday we picked up another llama. His name is Frosty and he's seven or eight years old. I found him on Craigslist for free. He's a little llama, like my two boys. Today, he's standing out in his yard humming, nonstop. I think he's pretty upset about the whole arrangement. We have him separated from Turbo and Vader, but in connected yards so they have time to adjust. Frosty is a gelded male, like my two llamas, but still, they will probably challenge each other and try to decide who gets to be the new boss. My money is on Turbo...he's been strutting around like the king of the playground, showing us his "crazy" eyes, ever since we brought the new llama home.

Turbo and Vader looking on at the new llama.

I enjoyed our ride into the mountains to pick up Frosty. It was green and there were lots of trees. Lately I have been missing the trees, in a bad way. But as we drove the scenic mountain roads yesterday, and I looked at the huge Ponderosa Pines, I knew with the fires hitting the southwest, it is far better for us to be in a more defensible space right now. Still, it was so nice and cool up there... and there were little creeks running next to the roads. I miss standing in mountain streams on hot summer days.

Pallet coop.

Also at home, Richard has been busy on a pallet chicken coop for the Jersey Giants. It's finished now and the chickens have been moved to their new yard. Still too many roosters crowing in the early morning hours though. They are twelve weeks old now. Another month until they can be processed for the freezer.

Richard is getting pretty good with building out of pallets. This time he cut the pallets and then infilled with other pieces of pallets to make solid walls. There is a hinged roof and three nest boxes inside. The space underneath the coop allows the chickens to find shade when they need it. Pretty cool. I will post a more detailed blog about this later.

Out on the land, we have been repairing the road in front of our place...the spot where we got stuck, hoping to prevent a similar situation in the future. We brought in two trailers full of base course, which is sand mixed with gravel, and filled the ruts we left  the day we planted the Kia and trailer in the mud. Hopefully this will keep others from getting stuck too.

Next weekend we are planning the beginning of the ongoing workshop to build the Earthbag cistern, and we want people to be able to get there. They will still need high clearance vehicles to clear the mound of grass and sand that fills the center of the tiny dirt track we like to call a road.

Richard also finished the shade structure, which is the most wonderful thing! And we even hung up a hummingbird feeder for the little bird that has been buzzing us the last few times we have been out there working.

Classroom space cleared.

While Richard put the finishing touches on the shade building, and finished up the walls of the pallet shed, I cleared more sage. I got the 30 x 50 foot space cleared for our classroom/temporary house, and a space cleared for a pallet hay barn. I'd like to stock up on hay for the winter...before it hits $18 a bale like it did last year.

Pallet shed, west side.

Front of Aly's Earthbag house.

I haven't been posting much, and so much is going on. We made it over to Aly's house a couple of weeks ago to help her plaster the inside of her house. That was fun. David and Simone were there too, and they left a few days later to head back home to Maryland. We sure did appreciate their help while they were here. Thanks guys!

Mixing up the mud plaster at Aly's house.

And...the ducks started laying eggs! Well, at least one of them. I saw some rather suspicious mating behavior yesterday, so one of them might be male. Maybe we will have Pekin Ducklings next spring. That's be fun.

And on a side note, but very exciting for me, I got accepted into my first Taos art show, which is pretty darn cool, considering this is a REAL art town.This event, Arte de Descartes XII (sponsered by Wholly Rags) is about art made from recycled stuff, which is right up my alley, but since all of my recycled wood masks were done so long ago, I had to come up with something new. I asked for wood scraps on Facebook, and a wonderful lady in town has been supplying all the wood scraps I need for many art projects to come. After I get the piece hung up in the gallery--August 23, I will post a picture of it. Still making art for the young at heart!

Having fun in Northern New Mexico!

Stay tuned for the Earthbag Cistern news and directions on how to build a pallet chicken coop (for up to six hens).