Lists

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Are you a list maker?  I have made lists in my life, but don't so much these days.  Maybe making blogs has replaced making lists.  My friend was out in the garden across the orchard that separates their house from our tiny homes.  I saw her red sweatshirt and knew she was putting in the veggie starts she bought at yesterday's Tilth Farmers' Market.  I walked over to chat and see if she needed some help.  "Hey," I said.  She'd already heard the clatter of the gate at the far end of the orchard so she was alert to me heading her way.  "I'll take it from here,"  the starts were mostly in the rich dark lepo.  I took over the watering and then we just chatted about the current state of duck and chicken land, and this question:  "How much food does a family need to feed themselves?"

Whidbey Island is the largest island in the Northern Hemisphere, approximately 60 miles from tip to toe.  We live in one of the wooded communities in So. Whidbey and in a year we have experienced --seen, heard and got ourselves in touch with the enterprise and energy of people mobilized.  A ferry separates So. Whidbey from the 'mainland' (never did like that word from my Hawaiian Island times) and makes a big difference in the way life is lived.  We live in a rural place.  People garden, people farm, people raise their food and sell their food and mobilize around the keia ma kela (the everyday stuff) of food and sustaining practices. 

The question "How much food does a family need to feed themselves?"  came from conversation between my planting friend and her friend/our friend.  Well, I thought that was a good question, but thought maybe we needed to start with another question and that's where the 'list making' comes in.  Before you answer how much food a family (your family) nees to feed themselves start here:

WHAT do you and your family eat now?

While Mahina moves into the four 'ole moons of the First Quarter, that's a good review and consider kind of thing to do.  We're planting our first gardens in many years, and eating eggs from our chickens though not eating the chickens who lay the eggs.

I think I'll start them lists again and see what comes of it.  You?

Part 2 of The Workshop COUNT ON THE MOON: "Malama I Ka `Aina

The second month-long study group-work shop begins Sunday, May 1st.  A preview of "Malama I Ka `Aina is now available for all to read and enjoy.  This  preview will only be accessible to the public through Saturday, April 30th, and becomes a private registered-reader blog come MAY DAY, May 1st. (More details about the 4-Part Count On The Moon Workshops are outlined on the side-bar of this blog, Makua O'o ... over there, to the right.)

Click here to enjoy the preview and glimse the next level of study that weaves Counting on the Moon with Caring for the Land. 

To register for "Malama I Ka `Aina":

Email us at ssvardoATgmailDOTcom
Subject "Malama I Ka `Aina"
Ask to be included/invited (or ask any questions) to the blog-workshop
We will reply with directions for registration

Mail your check to:

Mokihana Calizar
P.O. Box 483
Langley, WA 98260

Mahalo,
Mokihana and Pete

POST 'Ole Energy: Truffled and Celebrating

Well, here we are after the 'Ole Moons, and the lessons that come from rest, retreat and review.  We took it nice and easy yesterday.  The rainy day helped slow us down, leaving a good couple of inches of water in the wheel barrel.  The Easter Bunny delivered a bunch of truffles freshly-made in town, and we enjoyed a first dinner at friends in a very, very long time.  The workshop and study group COUNT ON THE MOON is really something!  We are learning so much about ourselves, and our connection with the natural cycle of things.  I'm especially aware of how making mistakes makes me a more bearable being ... like a bush bean, I think!  I've learned how teaching something can be the best teacher.  I've learned my son is my best teacher.  I've learned to see mistakes as practice.  Practice so I can make more mistakes, and still keep practicing.

We have reason to CELEBRATE.  Pete and I arrived on Whidbey Island a year ago, and are still here and loving it.  Those who have read our journey here at Maka O'o know the years before Whidbey.  Those years have brought us here, and the story can now be different.  A pot of turkey chilli is bubbling on the stove.  Sunny rays fill the Quonset, and the sounds of birds and Pete at the saw make for the sounds of being at home.  We are in the process of making one more small space to become our bath house ... an ofuro house.  A soaking tub (oh thank you akua!) made to suit us with hot water that we can sit in.  Oh how beautiful that will be.  Our friendships here on this island expand and people really know who we are, and we contribute the authenticity of folks who have been honed by time and nature...a couple of real characters. 

Work-play-writing and walking in the woods is a combination of gifts that sustain us.  We grow from all the compost of our past experiences and work it back into our today.  I have updated the sidebar over there(to the right) with the newest kahea (call from akua lani e).  COUNT ON THE MOON Workshops are now a 4-part series of monthly study groups.  Take a look, read on, and maybe we will see you there for the newest workshop MALAMA I KA 'AINA (Care for the Land/Earth/Home) or a Hana Hou (one more time) of COUNT ON THE MOON 'Ole Mahalo (blessings of the 'Ole Moons).

Spring is happening here in the woods.  Fall is happening on the flipside of Papa.  Whereever you are, hope there's joy there with you, too.

Many blessings,
Mokihana and Pete