Thursday, September 30, 2010

Craft Night and Other GreenHouse-y Events



Calendar of Events

October 5th @ noon: Cider Making Workshop at the GreenHouse

October 6th @ 7:00pm: Environmental Studies Majors dinner at the GreenHouse

October 8th @ 7:00pm: Craft Night (co-sponsored by SPECE) at the GreenHouse

October 10th @ 12:00pm - 3:00pm: Community Garden Party (co-sponsored by Sustain Sewanee) in the Mary Sue Cushman Room / Organic Garden

October 11th - October 13th: Zero Waste Events during the VC Installation. Volunteers still needed. Contact Rocco Calandruccio (rwcaland@sewanee.edu) for more information.

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Minutes for GH Meeting 9/26/10

What kind of superpower would you have?

Callie—look at something and turn it to stone/gold at will

Katie—shape shifter (Barbie in particular)

Kate—musical, speak all languages

Sean­—breath under water

Thomas—control all metal (like Magnito), talking to animals, Dr. Manhattan, God

Carson—fly

April—run fast, be strong (run from the cops after she robs banks)

Pam—know everyone’s emotions

Stewart—telekinesis/influence things with emotions (Jedi Master)

Rowan—turn head 365 degrees

Deanna—read minds at will

Carson—kitchen gone astray, lots of dirtiness, not just one person’s job to clean up the messes in the kitchen, April doing a good job at being a kitchen manager, but people need to clean up their own dishes. People from the community do drop by, so we need to keep the rooms and commons area tidy. Keep lights off when not in use, fans off when not in use.

Someone please take the SNACKSTER. Carson HATES the Snackster.

Pam—email SPECE wants to help craft night on Oct. 8th at about 7, Deanna and Katie and Pam want to help. Anything that people think that could be used for crafts leave outside Pam’s door

Carson—Callie has been taking care of the worms, fertilizer is looking good, so black it absorbs light, surrounds everything in shadow

Katie—apple pressing, people need to collect apples and respond to a date for the cider. Mrs. Bowman wants to do it on a weekday. Send out an email on classifieds (Callie) to ask people if we can harvest their apples. Pressing would be in the afternoon, making cider in the evening, and make dinner for our guest. Open workshop! Need to advertise! Need to collect containers for the cider

20:30 Carson—Having McCardell over for dinner in November. Menu Armentrout in November. Jen Bachman wants to be involved in Armentrout as well, do the food part? Take a month to plan, huge commitment. Not going to do the Haunted House, high maintenance. Dead Poet’s night, light a thousand candles.

20:35 Michael—ERs need help to organize a garden work party, need a list of tasks for what needs to be done. 20-30 people will show. Oct. 10th at one o clock, gonna have food from Julia’s at the Women’s Center

Carson—some could work here, maybe not all in the garden, but some. Most in the breakfield garden. Build raised beds, plant garlic, make cold frames. Might not have everything, requires funds.

Sean—boosted compost at McClurg

Michael—keep in touch about tasks and tools, if need to borrow some from PPS

Carson—email about signing up for composting at a VC event, ensuring that every event is waste free, McClurg is almost all compost, if can’t deliver at either garden, dump behind PPS

Callie—team compost dedicating 2-3 hours a week moving compost getting started in October, ERs GreenHouse and others

Sean—garden managers need to meet about gardens tomorrow over breakfast, need to plant before temperature drops.

Pam—need to write the op-ed article soon, Thomas will get the journal tomorrow

Deanna—How Then Shall We Eat last Thursday, another on Oct. 7th with Bill Keener people should come

Box of wheat on porch should be threshed before it gets wet, tomorrow evening at 5

Favorite Things About Callie!

Stewart—when she tries to be mean or intense and she fails

Thomas—how excited she gets about little things

Kate—when she makes music

April—hair and laugh

Pam—bubbly in the morning, makes day better

Katie—when she smiles, how passionate and excited she is

Rowan—when Callie smiles I smile

Sean—how excited she gets about using her truck

Carson—I like Callie’s big ole cow eyes

Deanna—day she was going to dinner, saw chickens chasing another chicken, heard Callie playing her fiddle, and thought that life felt perfect.

Thursday, September 16, 2010

community wisdom from Wendell Berry

"A community is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared, and that the people who share the place define and limit the possibilities of each other's lives. It is the knowledge that people have of each other, their concern for each other, their trust in each other, the freedom with which they come and go among themselves."

Wendell Berry,
The Long-Legged House (1969)

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Bunnies, Banjos, and Bagels for Breakfast.

We've had quite an eventful start for the school year here at the GreenHouse! Lots of exciting changes and new plans a'brewing--both in the house and in the University (composting team, anyone?).

First off, we added a couple of adorable new members to the household:


No, not those wieners. These furry and feathered cuties:


The rabbit proposal is slowly coming into fruition with the arrival of lady bunnies. The boy bunnies seem to be really excited about this. Katie has been doing a fair amount of research on bunny breeding, and yesterday, Professor Haskell came by the house to provide us with more information on the subject.

A handful of new chickens have arrived at the coop. The old hens are still adjusting to their new housemates (just like the rest of us), but we're hoping that it won't be long until the new arrivals will be integrated into the flock. For more info on the new chickens, a fantastic article by Waleska Solorzano just came out in this week's issue of the Sewanee Purple.

It was a busy weekend for the GreenHouse with two events back-to-back on Friday night and Saturday morning. Refusing to let the rain stop the fun, we relocated the tea/jam session scheduled for Friday into the living room. Not quite as fun as a backyard campfire, but everyone still made the best of the night with Bob Dylan/Neutral Milk Hotel/Joni Mitchell/Bright Eyes sing-a-longs and the infamous Oreo game.


We hosted this year's Environmental Residents for breakfast the following morning. It was a great way to start the day, with eggs courtesy of the hens, fruit salad from pilfered McClurg bananas and apples, and Callie's tasty bagels. Granted, the attendance from the ERs was a bit low, but everyone compensated by eating extra servings (not that anyone complained). We'll probably have to figure out a better way to boost attendance for Saturday Morning Breakfast for next time. I mean, who can resist a homemade herb bagel made with fresh ingredients and lots and lots of love?


Sunday, September 12, 2010

Minutes for GH Meeting 9/12/10

Thomas—wants to be Wes Anderson/Rowan (to look at self naked)/Cormac McCarthy

Callie—Jenifer Aniston

20:10—Callie—Need to have a meeting about the rabbits: what to do with them, what to do about Big Mac, lunch meeting—Wednesday at 1:00 PM

20:12—April—Clean up mess in kitchen

20:15—Callie—Two activities over the weekend: Friday Night Jam, Saturday Morning Breakfast. FNJ—Facebook invite, more fliers, put it on the blog. SMB—Try and get the word out sooner to people.

Sean—Paul Farmer

Stewart—Fidel Castro/the guy out of Blow/April/Jesse Jackson/Lil’ Wayne/pretty girls for John Wayne

20:18—Callie—Cooking the bunny: rabbit stew, April, Rowan, Callie. NEXT Sunday Meeting.

(Bunny died from stress… Common occurrence.)

Bunny hide is still being soaked, soaked for 4 days, anyone who wants to help can help.

Is the rabbit dinner going to be public? Invite Rick?

Dr. Haskell coming over to discuss giving the rabbits better lives, unhappy with the way the situation with Big Mac transpired. Suggests that we buy books and read them and report on them to the rest of the hosue.

20:25—Thomas­—Starting up the library with Dr. Potter, getting people to donate books, get a fund to buy books, magazine subscriptions.

20:26—Stewart—workshop to organize things in the dishwasher…

20:27—Deanna—Lending property of the greenhouse? Is that cool? … Need to keep good records of who has which books. Sign out system, going to build shelves.

20:28—Callie—Chicken and rabbits is the most important chore and people need to be very diligent, if you are gone get cover, it is a top priority for their livelihood. Need to get more food for rabbits and shavings for the chicken coop. Everyone needs to read the rabbit report, but should not base all knowledge on it.

20:32—Garden Managers—Garden hours, Tuesdays and Sundays 1-3 at Breakfield Garden. Need to get out advertisements in and around campus. Get chalks and go out and write! Weed pulling coming up, need to get things planted now. Winter plants: beets, carrots, wheat, kale, broccoli, pumpkins?

20:33—Thomas—GreenHouse Journal, everyone should write in it and record all the stories.

Katie—CEO of National Geogrphic

Deanna—Switch between Art Garfunkel and Paul Simon/Clint Eastwood

Kate—John Steinbeck

20:37—Deanna—Everyone needs to be on the food-working group. Sustainability master plan. Need to make cool stuff happen with McCardell, make proposals.

Pam—Tesla

April—John Wayne

Rowan—Jesus/Stewart

Tuesday, September 7, 2010

Minutes for GH Meeting 9/5/2010

20:06—Waiting in the Family Room for Thomas Sanders to get his butt over here.

Things We’re Tired Of:

Carson—people screaming outside his window, loud noises at night

Stewart—soap, shampoo all over the bathroom, April not loving him

April—confusion, frustration, bitches not cleaning up their messes in the damn kitchen, Stewart not accepting that she’s gay

Sean—running out of tea, stealing Rowan’s tea

Rowan—tired of people thinking that he really doesn't care, mosquitos, wants them to die

Callie—bitches

Thomas—being awake, tired of being tired

Katie—bitches not composting their shit

Deanna—fake happy relationships, one in particular which is fake happy all the time and not happy any time

Kate—lacking the motivation for running

Pam—McClurg food

Victoria (guest)—being bruised easily

20:20—Pam’s chore line is up, starting on the chores tomorrow, switching on Sunday nights and starting on Monday

—Sunday nights=recycling nights

—Carson gives a speech—Friday, Sustainability Summit, meeting of the people on the Natural Resources Committee, Nan Jenks from Middlebury, environmentalism director, spoke of how Middlebury is the number 1 sustainable school in the country. How does Sewanee get act together?—Office of sustainability on campus. Good indications of Sewanee in the right spot: the garden, Dean Hartman mentioned the GH as an organization that represents a lot of sustainability on campus, the model for campus, Dr. Potter mentioned that students inspire faculty to work together, GH and CoHo good at asking permission to fail… We’re awethome.

20:33—Carson—Project for this year, living up to the expectations of us. Brining people, students, into the GreenHouse who do not have a home on campus. Bringing faculty here. VC McCardell is looking for ways to kick start sustainability on campus: funded position of a Farm Manager in the near future. How do we go about it? Natural sciences: agriculture, farming classes.

20:39—Katie—bike renting program where people who can’t afford a bike or cannot get their bikes to campus can check out a bike

20:40—Callie—need to start garden workdays; garden managers need to meet to decide workdays and what is going to be planted where. We need to get started with work this week.

—Carson—Managers need to build a group of people who can work in the garden, mass emails, posters, etc. Split up one of the garden spaces where we supply all the seeds and tools and anyone can start their own plot. NEED to get people out and working. Competitions to donate to the CAC. More work at the student garden so that people do not feel uncomfortable gardening our GH garden.

Gardening text? How to start your own space

20:47—Thomas—a collection of gardening reading material, build a library, Thomas wants to be the librarian. Email for donating books

20:49—Callie—next time there are new chickens they need to stay separated from others so that they can get used to each other so they do not fight

20:51—Callie—Katie starting breeding rabbits tomorrow morning, rabbit journal to track what they’re doing, naming the animals by cage so that we do not confuse the males

20:53—7:30 tomorrow morning house picture.

20:54—Stewart—profile questions for each person in the house:

1. Favorite combination predator?

2. Spirit animal?

3. Birthdays? (need to make a list of birthdays and what everyone wants)

4. Favorite vegetable?

5. Hometown?

6. Majors?

7. Favorite books?

8. Favorite hot beverages?

9. Favorite yoga positions?

10. Languages?

11. Instruments?

12. Car?

13. What would you’re role be in the house?

14. Make up a question?

21:00—Deanna—Grundy County Food Bank Monday Thursday Saturday 12:45-1:45, needs physical help. Gardening at The Bridge with seniors, when can we do it? Senior Center behind The Market quilting group Wednesday mornings, invite Lina to come and have a meal with us. Kat Odonahough Folks at Home, gardening for people, shitake logs, helping garden at the CAC, Stephanie Lauria recycling—plastic containers with bottle caps, cardboard most valuable

21:10—Carson—egg breakfast for the ERs, Rowan and April and Katie Qualls, need to make a Pig run, faculty/staff dinner?

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