A spiritual quest for potatoes

So much catching up to do. With Richard on vacation from work, we have been going nonstop.

On Monday we loaded up the family in the big old truck, hooked up Lucky, the handy trailer, and headed over the pass to the San Luis Valley to pick up potatoes for the Canon Co-op at an organic farm. I was excited. I hadn't been to Salida since we went to their big art festival when I was pregnant with my three year old daughter. I enjoyed the little town then, with its art-friendly attitude, and we had recently been reading about the local food movement that was occurring there as well. A town after my own heart. Was this a place we could ultimately relocate? (I'm always keeping my eyes open for my own personal Shangra-la or Cicely, Alaska, for us Northern Exposure fans.)

Let me tell you, it is hard, so very hard, living life on the fringe and being looked at by the mainstream like you have two heads. Wouldn't it be nice to be welcomed into a community that was already established as spiritual, environmentally conscious, art friendly, educated, open-minded, healthy, etcetera, etcetera...? I have dreams. Not that anyone has thrown stones...not in this decade anyway (when I was young and sported a mohawk, someone once threw a tennis ball at me from a passing car), but I am always leery about telling anyone too much about myself and my belief system for fear of being persecuted or ostracized. I am an outsider in my own family and it is a rare day indeed when I can  meet someone who gets it, someone on the path to enlightenment, someone with whom I feel safe enough with to finally let down my guard.

Isn't it an odd thing to be looked down upon for not eating red meat, or not following the established rituals of a mindless religion? Wouldn't it be wonderful to find the Utopia where everyone was equal and lived a life based on enlightenment and healing the planet and saving humanity from its current course of extinction, a place where the community understood the importance of raising our children not as capitalistic sheep to be led to the next mini-mall, but as stewards of our planet, including the soil, air, water and creatures who share it. Where is this mythical place? For a while I thought it was Taos, and Taos is getting closer, but how could I reconcile myself with the fact that the Taos mountain kicked me out? Anyway, I keep looking, trying to decipher the spiritual clues to the location of my heaven on earth ( I know, I know, it isn't a place) and I had been wondering recently if Salida might be it, at least for me?

Also on this trip, we were going into the massive alpine valley of San Luis, where I knew some sort of spiritual movement was taking place. There is Crestone of course, which we did visit a few years back, and turned out not to be my spot to permanently move, although some would swear it is the spiritual place to be. Maybe it is for them, and they are definitely doing some good work there, but with the freezing winter temperatures, and the "feelings" or lack of, really, that I had when we visited, I knew Crestone would not be the place I spent the rest of my life.

But could I have been wrong? Maybe just somewhere in the San Luis Valley was my little piece of high desert heaven. If the aliens found it interesting enough to make frequent stops, there must be some valuable energy floating between the two mountain ranges that I was missing.

So a trip to the Valley via Salida was welcome, but never justified in expense and fuel use, until now, when we could run a worthwhile errand, which we made even more productive by responding to an ad on Craigslist that was selling really cheap straw bales in the San Luis Valley. Potatoes and straw. That was our main focus, with a little bit of spiritual journeying on the side for myself.

So Monday, we ended up driving through the canon to Salida. The roads had a bit of snow and ice around the curves of the highway that were hidden from the sun, and I was struck by how much the drive reminded me of the trip from Taos to Santa Fe, with the river snaking along beside the twisting road. Well, that was okay then, and except for the dusting of snow and the looming dark clouds ahead, I was in a great mood. We stopped at a little store a Co-op friend had recommended on the outskirts of Salida. It was a bizarre place with really cheap food and items, kind of like a bargain store with dinged up cans and day old discounts, but this place had flour and sugar in bags made of printed cotton material. Where did this stuff come from?

It was freezing when we left the warm cab of the pick-up, and I couldn't think straight. I couldn't focus on spiritual feelings when I was trying to keep myself and two toddlers from getting frostbite on the five yard dash to the front door of the tiny little store. I didn't find anything I needed to have, but Richard found a few bargains when I left him alone and returned the kids to the warm truck to eat our prepared lunch of homemade peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I also had the two chihuahuas on this trip and had to take them out to the potty, at which time, which they glared at me and shivered because I had forgotten their winter coats.


We drove through Salida a bit, into the historic downtown, still full of art galleries and outdoor shops, but nothing really grabbed me and we didn't stop. I was still angry at being cold. I hate being cold more than anything. I just wanted to be on our way. The clouds were looking ominous and I wanted to make it back to the other side of the mountains before the snow started to fly. I hate driving on icy roads about as much as I hate being cold, and now I was ready to go home and be warm with a nice cup of hot cocoa flavored coffee. Forget this trip, forget the potatoes. My mood was getting as dark as the clouds, and I just closed my eyes as we headed out of town, trying to eliminate snow packed sections of the highway from my view, from my reality.

When we got through the pass at Poncha Springs and headed south into the Valley, things got better. As the sun came out and the roads cleared and the sagebrush began to pop up on the prairie outside my window, my bad mood eased and I began to enjoy the scenery. Now it was better, kind of like the drive to Taos from Ft Garland, and I began to feel a sense of peace come over me. I enjoyed the warmth of the sun and envisioned a passive solar house in sage where I could just sit and soak up the winter rays without having to step out into the reality of freezing temperatures. Based upon my feelings on leaving the higher mountain passes and cold, cold environment, Salida does not seem like my next Utopia.

We came into Mosca without incident and pulled up to the gas station where we would meet the farmer (?) who was selling the organic potatoes. Some man loaded a couple of bags of Quinoa grain into the back of the truck and then we were driving back across the highway to the farm where potatoes were being cleaned and loaded into bags and boxes. Lots of potatoes. 

There was a huge truck full of potatoes just from the field and a strange hopper/conveyor thing that loaded the potatoes, and moved them inside the building. I'm not sure where or how they were cleaned and sorted, but they were. Our potatoes came in 50 pound bags and 50 pound boxes, which went into the horse trailer. Now I was concerned that with the cold weather, the potatoes would freeze. Good thing our next stop was for lots of straw that we could insulate the potatoes with.

I asked the lady that we did our potato business with how cold the temperatures really got in the Valley. She said there is usually at least one solid month where night time temps fall from -20 to -40 degrees F in the winter. But of course the sunny days could get up to 40 or 50 degrees F, like so many other high desert Colorado or New Mexico places. Sure, great. Nights are too cold. Even if I built an awesome passive solar house, it was still too cold for me to function. Maybe I better keep searching for my special place.

Mt Blanca

We continued south and then east into Blanca, the town named for the snow covered mountain that was the backdrop to almost everything in the valley. Richard likes to take pictures of this mountain. he says it is one of the most photogenic mountains in Colorado. Being from Texas, I think he is awestruck by this mountain as it seems to be a stereotype of the perfect Colorado mountain. It is a pretty mountain, as long as I can stay far enough away from the cold snow I see piled on its peaks.

We found our straw at a farm south of town and on the way there we noticed a field full of birds. "Geese," said Richard. But I looked a little closer and noticed they weren't geese at all, but a field full of about three hundred Sandhill Cranes. Amazing.I'd never seen more than two Sandhill Cranes in any given place, at any given time. As we loaded straw into the pickup bed and trailer, I could hear the cranes talking amongst themselves, and it sounded like there was a wild bird refuge in this man's backyard.

I could feel a palpable excitement building within me and as soon as we were finished with the straw, I had to sneak as close as I could to the field of birds to snap a few photos. Unfortunately, I haven't had access to an SLR camera for years and I couldn't get close enough to the cranes to get a decent shot. They were incredible, raising their wings and flapping, bumping chests like my guineas at play. Richard tried his hand at pictures from the truck, and then, the birds took off. They all started to fly. I felt like I was in a nature program in Africa, watching the birds take off, perfectly orchestrated.

That old homestead in Blanca

I was having a moment of pure natural joy, just watching those birds, and when I saw the old, abandoned homestead at the end of the road, my first thought was I could live there. There was an old adobe house, outbuildings, including an old grain silo I could turn into an art studio (see Mother Earth News for ideas on how to turn silos into houses.) And, there were the birds, the glorious birds. There was Mt Blanca to look at and the sage surrounding this small farm. I could live there, I thought again. But it's not for sale and the temperatures are probably just as cold in Blanca as they are in most of the San Luis Valley.

We headed back up to Canon city the long way, over La Veta pass, trying to avoid any snow or impending storms. We drove through La Veta, another burgeoning art community, which has grown significantly since the last time I was there maybe seven years ago. It is still quaint, but I imagine the prices for property are rising as it becomes the new trendy spot. The coolest part of that drive was passing a herd of cows heading back to their barn for the night, and when I thought they were going to walk into the road just as we pulled up, I was surprised to see them disappear entirely. They were crossing from one pasture to another, under the road through an enormous culvert. Ingenious!


We got home after dark, dropped off the potatoes and got the little kids into bed. Overall, I was pretty happy to be home, back in my warm little house where the outside temperatures never fall to -40 degrees. Sure, it isn't exactly where I want to end up, but if we do end up staying here forever, I'll be okay with it, and I can  take an occasional drive into the sage filled lands of New Mexico every now and then to feed my soul. Here, we are building community and the people we are meeting are wonderful, and it turns out, maybe not so different from me after all.

Fuzzy footed chicks and steaming mulch

Baby Bantam white Silkie

I got six more baby chicks on Friday. Two are interesting and four are run of the mill layers--New Hampshire Reds. One is the tiniest Barred Rock Bantam Cochin and the other is a white Silkie, also a Bantam. The Silkie has got to be the cutest little ball of fluff I have ever seen. I have fallen in love with a chicken! The Cochin is the tiniest chick in my chicken crib (rubbermaid container), but the one with the most attitude, running over to peck at my fingers when I fill the food dish. Could this tiny critter be a rooster? The two bantams are straight run, so we won't know what sex they are until they mature into their teenage bodies.

Tiny Bantam Barred Rock Cochin

The Cochins and the Silkies have feathered feet and are just amusing. I have decided to add chickens that are fun to look at to my flock. I still fantasize about a peacock wandering around our small farm, but haven't been able to find one locally...yet. I'd like to get some Araucanas which lay blue and green eggs, and some heirloom chicken varieties too, which used to be the standard on old family farms before agribusiness started breeding chickens for profit and mass laying capabilities.

Our organic eggs are a big hit with the Canon Co-op (http://www.canonfoodco-op.com/) members. Thank you guys! We are selling a dozen for $3.50 which is a bargain when a dozen sells for $3.66 at City Market in town. How about that? We will have to see if our price is enough to cover the cost of the certified organic feed. I know our chickens are happy chickens and the eggs are big with bright yellow, firm yolks. Backyard chickens are the best. I recommend a flock for everyone.


 Richard had been spreading leaves and mulch like mad. We got our second drop of wood chips from the tree trimmers, and the pile was steaming as it was dumped from the truck. It makes Richard soooo happy.  He has been working on the new flower garden space and will eventually move to the upper garden, which he has laid out on paper...keyhole gardens connected by a central garden path and anchored by our big raised bed which now contains garlic and onions.

I'm thinking perhaps our wall on the road side should become a wooden privacy fence, which we can buy and work on in segments. Originally we wanted to build a wall out of rammed earth tires or earth bags and cover it all with an adobe finish. Very nice, but we are having trouble coming up with the materials to get it all done and we need a fence to keep the deer out of our garden and to keep the neighbors eyes off of the tire windbreak surrounding the greenhouse. The tires don't seem to be a big hit...aesthetically speaking, but they work great to protect the greenhouse.

Tire wall wind protection

Today we are expecting another mulch drop, and hopefully we can move injured Guinea into the greenhouse. I took off his foot splint and his wound is healing nicely--all pink and healthy looking. He's squawking more and more into the evening hours when the little kids are asleep, so he has to move back to the great outdoors. Richard also has plans to either go into town and pickup the leftover grape squeezings (to make compost) from the Abby's wine making or to go to the alpaca ranch for a load of alpaca poop for our sheet mulch project. Maybe we can do both.

Saturday we went to a small farm in Florence that had llama poop for free and met the nicest family. The man may let me adopt a female llama to put in with our goats as a livestock guardian. He says he has too many and wants to find approved homes for some of them. We will wait and see. Wouldn't it be exciting to have more llama wool?

Oh, looks like the big orange truck is here with the wood chips....

Farm with a view

view from my kitchen window--today

I do live in a gorgeous place, with Colorado being what it is, and have a lovely backdrop of mountains in both my front and back yards. I can stand at my kitchen sink and stare out the window as I do dishes, looking up the path at the llama barn, which hides the ugly little water tower that supplies our small town, and instead pulls the eye to the dark green of the Wet Mountains in the distance behind the barn. If I'm lucky, my fluffy, cute llamas will be hanging out in this picture and I can consider myself blessed to be living this life right now.


Today there is a storm hanging over the Wet Mountains and the air is chilly with the threat or promise of snow. Slowly, the silhouette of the mountain range disappears into the gray clouds, and I shiver, happy to be wearing my warm alpaca slippers.

The greenhouse is almost sealed up, and I'm thinking of putting injured guinea in his playpen in the greenhouse, where he can be warm and close to his guinea friend in the pen ten feet or so away.  Then they can talk to each other as much as they want to. Now, they have been "talking"--yelling and squawking--when I leave the kitchen door open to let in the warm afternoon sun. Today, however, it is far too cold to leave the door open, but the guineas are still trying to talk through the walls. I'm sure Richard, who has gone to work in his office, appreciates the guinea social hour. I think maybe after this weeks freezing night time temperatures, I will relocate my injured, feathered friend to the greenhouse so he can get acclimated back into the outdoors. As tempting as it is, I don't really want the guinea as a house pet. It's already a circus with two toddlers, the cats and dogs. Adding the clown faced bird to the mix would be more than I could tolerate. Think of the carpet scrubbing I'd be doing then...

northwest perimeter

While Richard has been outside, working on electric perimeter fence (those llamas won't get out again), and getting the upper garden ready for sheet mulching, I have been working on our farm logo. I even took a moment to paint a picture to use as a backdrop. Wow, doesn't a paintbrush feel awkward after so many years? I'm still trying to integrate the logo into the picture and have simplified the shapes to create a more generic logo to use on product labels.

lower east perimeter and Pikes Peak in the distance

With the mountains in so many of our views, it seems somehow necessary to include them in our farm logo. Stay tuned for the final image.

Richard has begun his own blog about the farm, sustainability and related topics regarding the world and the crises we face now and in the near future. Finally he's on board the ship to save the planet. The revolution has begun. Check out his blog at  greendesertecofarm.wordpress.com
And yes, that is my painting in his header.

Happiness is...a truck full of leaves and a yard full of mulch

Leaves of Fall. Falling leaves. Lots of leaves. Bags of leaves, by the side of the road. This week we collected leaves on Richard's days off, filling the truck several times over several days. At first I was a little embarrassed to be cruising the neighborhoods, stalking the leaves, but after a while it becomes old news, and the kids are still in the back seat screaming and fighting, lending a moment of normalcy to this strange farm life. I'm more concerned about what the old lady walking her dog thinks of my out-of-control kids than the strange man (i.e. Richard) picking up the neighbors' trash, and really, people only ask occasionally what we are up to, and most nod in understanding when we tell them.

truck o' leaves

You see, we have no soil at our house in the high desert land. No workable soil. No dark, rich, plant-able soil. Being big fans of the Permaculture movement, and like knowledgeable gardeners and farmers everywhere, we know we have to build our soil. It isn't going to make itself out of nothing, so we have to find organic materials to compost into beautiful, nutrient rich soil that will become the basis of our gardens. We sheet mulch. We compost. We prepare for next Spring, when our flower beds and garden beds of leaves and mulch will have composted down into lovely, workable soil.

There are so many wonderful books on composting that will tell you how to create a basic compost pile, and the main ingredient is "stuff" like leaves, grass, hay, or any other plant materials. We mix anything we can find, including plant kitchen scraps, with goat or llama poop and hay, weeds, wood chips, whatever, into compost piles located strategically around our small farm.

Compost bin made of pallets

The piles take about a year to decompose into something resembling soil, and it might be faster if we dedicated more time to watering and turning our piles, but even our unworked piles eventually turn into soil, which is a vast improvement over the desert hard pan we have in our yard.

So, it is the season for leaves. Lots and lots of leaves. We plan on creating a size-able sheet mulch project in our new upper garden space.

seeding the chicken yard

When Richard went to get hay this week, he came back with a big bag of Rye grass seed. Enough for an acre. When we moved the chicken yard to the other side of the coop, the plan was to plant the old yard and the old garden.

So, out went the leaves, followed by a good dose of water, then the seed was spread, old rotting hay was applied and the sprinkler was put on again.  Always water in the layers. The seed was spread in the tomato field as well, and we hope to move the llamas to a new pasture and seed their cactus filled pen with the Rye grass. It is a start, and hopefully a winter cover crop that will improve the soil.

leaves and bamboo

It was a bountiful few days with  leaves and bamboo stalks, but it got better when the local tree trimmer dumped a load of mulch in our driveway. Crazy. Epic yet? No, Richard assures me, it has not reached epic proportions yet. I'm not sure I have ever seen him look so happy as when that big orange truck dumped a mass of wood chips right behind his pile of bagged leaves.

wood chips

The chips were gone in a day, spread out onto our pathways to prepare for the snow and the winter mud that comes with it. Next load will go into the upper garden

And, while picking up the bamboo stalks in a trash pile, Richard scored some live bamboo from the man who was unfortunately not composting his leaves and garden detritus, but was willing to sell us bamboo if we dug it. Sounded too good to be true.$5 for a big bucket that planted windscreen/privacy barriers on the two western corners of our house.

I have now come up with a layout for my cut flower garden, bordered by the fast growing and very tall (7-10 feet) bamboo that was planted somewhere around what we suspect is the leach field for our septic tank. No edibles over there, but plenty of pretty flowers to gaze at and cut to sell at the farmer's market next year. Now all I need is some sheet mulch for my new flower garden--more leaves and more wood chips. Next week we are hooking up old "Lucky" (the horse trailer) to the back of the truck so when we cruise for leaves, we can bring home three times as much.

It is a strange little farming and gardening community we have immersed ourselves in. On a trip to pick up cow manure (for our sheet mulching projects), we came across an acquaintance who was filling her truck with bags of leaves, and so happy for our windfall of compost-able materials, she was almost cheering. Only a fellow gardener would understand. In addition, Richard has been nominated for a board position with the Canon Co-op, http://www.canonfoodco-op.com/. Only been here a year and a couple of months and I feel like we have fallen into the right place. Synchronicity in action. It is a wonderful thing.

Running with the llamas

Today I had a nice visit with two of my Aunts and two of my cousins, who came to see the farm and my little ones. It was great fun. I was telling them the story of our morning farm activities...


I was cleaning the house, preparing for the family visit, when my eyes were drawn to the window as Richard went running by. What on Earth?, I wondered and ambled back to my bedroom to get a look out the back windows. And there he was, and it looked like he was messing with two large animals, cows? I thought, was he trying to shoo them away? It wouldn't be the first time there were cows wandering in the yard. But no, those weren't cows...they were my llamas! How did they get out?, I asked myself over and over, as I leaped over a million toys and dodged two small children who were very loudly and adamantly telling me that the cat had just thrown up on the living room floor. Oh boy!

"No time, no time," I yelled. "The llamas are out!" My brain was working hard and fast now. How would we catch two llamas, who were now free on the range, when we couldn't catch them in their pen? Think! Food? Llama candy? They loved the guinea food and would eat it out of my hand, and even come running if I had the guinea bucket out. Giving them llama candy I actually got to touch and pet them. Okay, guinea food and some halters. And the car. And the two little kids. "Kids, get your shoes on!" I yelled.

I got the little ones in the car and ran to get the halters and leads, all the time watching my two prized llama babies running across the field and Richard running after them, like a bad movie. Now he had a bucket, which he held out in front of him as he ran, offering it to what, llama butts? He who runs with llamas.

What did I think I was going to do? How could I possible make this situation better? I quickly dismissed the fear of my llamas running off into the woods, farther and further away. Would we actually be able to get them back? We needed help, I thought. Who could I call? No one. All of my neighbors were on the verge of elderly. Would any of them be able to chase down two teenage llama boys? Nah. It was Richard and me, and so far, he was doing a bang up job.

As an after thought, I let my two chihuahuas out of the house and told them to get in the car. Then I grabbed their harnesses and leashes, wondering where any of this would lead? I sped down the road as the llamas crossed to the other side and headed for some trees, doing everything they could to avoid Richard who was huffing and puffing by now.

I pulled into a driveway, thankful this house was for sale, and jumped out of the car, my heart pounding wildly. I grabbed my little cup of llama candy (guinea food) the leads and halters, and headed slowly towards the rebellious camelids, speaking softly and shaking the seed. I threw the halters to Richard. They looked at us with suspicion and ran back across the road. Now what, I wondered, and then remembered the two little dogs in the car who were barking furiously. Maybe they would scare the big animals back home or at least towards our farm, which was up the hill some distance.

I let out my little female chihuahua, the barker, Kierra, and let her run. Richard followed with the llama halters and leads. "Get the llamas," I told the tiny dog who charged the nearest llama, Vador, the black one. Now Vador is always interested in tiny creatures, like small children and guineas, and he turned and looked with amusement at the little dog who was sniffing at his feet. He stretched his long neck down to get a good sniff at her too, and then he began to dance, and I thought, oh dear God, now he's going to stomp on my little dog.

"Kierra," I yelled, hoping she would back off. I ran over and offered the llama candy to Vador, who fell for it and stuck his nose deep into the cup to reach the seed. I threw my arm around his neck and Richard put his halter on and snapped on the lead. "Tie him up." I yelled and turned to the other llama. "Turbo, come here boy," I said and shook the cup at him.

Richard had tied Vador to... the neighbors' gas meter? Really? "I don't know if that's a good idea," I said, but Richard was gone. He had grabbed Kierra, who had been running off into the neighbors' yard, and was now taking her back to the car. Turbo, meanwhile, was headed up the road with no interest in me, the llama candy or his buddy Vador. He, in fact, was so proud of himself and his new found freedom he would occasionally kick his feet into the air like some happy little bucking bronco llama.

I quickly untied Vador and decided to follow Turbo up the road. At least he was headed in the right direction. Richard followed in the car with the kids and dogs. So we walked, my llamas and me, all the way home, and when we reached our driveway, Turbo looked at it and began to walk on by. I called to him and led Vador into the yard, hoping, and praying that Turbo would worry and follow. (Normally, Turbo is the protector, and when Vador goes anywhere, Turbo follows, or tries to.) Sure enough, he was following us. Around the truck and up the path...and then he wasn't.

Turbo had detoured off into the upper garden, toward the guinea house, so I pulled Vador back around that way too, and used his lead and his big old llama body to trap Turbo, until Richard came to the rescue with the other halter and lead. After that, it was easy. We lead them back into their pen and I gave them each a little llama candy and thanked them profusely for coming home.

Then I headed inside to scrub cat puke out of the living room carpet.

And here I was wondering what I was going to write about. Later I thanked Richard for giving me some good blogging material.

Always make sure the gates are closed. And make sure again, just to be safe.

Kierra: llama herding, working dog