Sunday, September 28, 2008

This Old Recyclable House

This Old Recyclable House

Check out his article on the New York Times magazine about using old houses to create new living spaces.

Sunday, September 14, 2008

Meeting Minutes for 9-14-2008

GreenHouse Meeting Minutes
September 14, 2008

Meeting Leader: Jonathan
Minutes: Helen

Jonathan calls to order

Fourth grader at SES has started an environmental club. Exciting! Dr. McDonough told us about this and would like ideas from us. Becca will e-mail him and find out what needs to be done, and then she will take charge of this. We’ll help and we’d like to involve some other Sewanee students too.

GreenFest- bentley’s idea
It would be great if there was a weekend when going to the GreenHouse was the thing to do. But should it involve alcohol? Laura and Elspeth think it’s important to show that it is possible to have a sustainable party. We could get fraternities and sororities to co-sponsor. First we need to talk to Dean Hartman and see what he thinks.

We’re hosting lots of dinners!On Thursday with Emery at 5:30. GreenHouse will contribute meat and Emery will make side dishes. Chelsea will cook the meat on Thursday before dinner.
People who don’t live in either house are also invited.
We need to make sure this is okay with Emery.

On Tuesday with Dean Hartman. He will provide pizza. 5:30 again we think—but we need to make sure this is okay with him first. Elspeth will see what he says and send us an e-mail with what’s happening.

Emily—should we cook on Sunday nights? Or dessert? Kate loves cooking and will do it every Sunday. She will write the information on the chalkboard each week. If you want to help cook and if you plan to eat, write your name on the chalkboard so she knows what to expect.

Anyone cooking must wear the chef hat.

Emily and Fritsl Butler are coordinating a run to raise money for the school in Guatemala.
It’s Sept 27th. Register for $10. Emily would like us to participate if possible. We don’t have to run—we could walk or ride a unicycle.


Julie Putgen suggested having an art gallery in the living room to display student work. This is a cool idea especially since there aren’t many places on campus for students to display work. This means that the walls in living room would be covered with a special art-hanging up material, and the furniture will be moved for receptions. Everyone’s okay with this if the art department pays for it. Laura will head up this project and Hanna will help too.
It would also be really great to display a sculpture in the garden—we could have a contest and the winning work (out of recycled materials!) would be displayed for the year. This could be at the Breakfield garden or at the house. After all, we do have scary gargoyles here.

When will we have a garden party?
In the past it’s been on fall party Sunday

We had a Music Jam on Thursday—good job!
Do we want this every other Thursday (on the alternate weeks of the community center jam)?
Let’s plan to do this for the next few months and see how it works out. We’ll advertise through c-student e-mails.

EMS house wants to hang out too. We’re so popular. Maybe they can co-sponsor greenfest? Maybe a cookout? Laura can talk to Drew Mather.

Enviro studies potluck
1st week of October? Maybe. But there are birthdays, midterms, 150 mile bike rides around that time. We’ll keep in contact with Sid Brown and discuss this later.

Kate’s parents are coming in two weeks. She’ll cook dinner Friday and we’re all invited.

Wash your dishes.

We fried some fruit flies in the microwave, but we’re still battling them. Don’t leave crumbs, food matter, dishes out. Wipe down counters. We’ll take away one drying rack to prevent dishes building up there.

Love and joy—Carson and Chelsea deep cleaned the kitchen. Thanks!

Sustainablity on campus conference—in November. If you want more information, talk to Laura

We have newspaper and cardboard up in the kitchen. Write your favorite quotes there, draw pictures, tack things to the cardboard.

Mission statement. Elspeth will send out our compiled ideas tonight.

Projects update:
Carson and Elspeth wrote a proposal for ACS grant money, but it needs to be updated. The grant was to fund outreach stuff (community gardens, elementary school projects)—talk to them if you have more ideas.

Also Carson is growing shitake mushrooms under the porch, but they won’t be ready until spring.

Becca- chickens. These would be at the Garden. Cost? About $200. Online they come in sets of 25 chicks. Katherine Alvarez was allowed to keep her chickens, so the atmosphere is in our favor. But we need to talk to Dean Hartman before we plan any further.

Emily—events, dinners, jams—going well so far.
Right now we should focus on getting a diverse group of people here. We should co-sponsor events with many organizations—not just enviro ones.

Chelsea has updated her project to focus on green building with Housing Sewanee.

The garden chore is tricky right now because we’re not sure what to do. Once the garden in the backyard gets started things will be easier. Carson can help take charge of the backyard garden.

Can Emily’s bible study meet here on Fridays at noon? Sure! Put it on the calendar.

McClurg has green bananas right now. They match Emily’s jacket which is also green.

Meeting adjourned. Everyone in the GreenHouse picked a different room in Emery and we called them all at the same time. That was fun. Invitation extended for dinner on Thursday.

Bentley- can you show us how to not fill the entire blog with the minutes? link to the full text.

Summary:

Things to talk to Dean Hartman about:
Backyard garden/ compost bins
GreenFest party
Chickens

Monday, September 8, 2008

Ethos of the Garden

This is what we came up with last semester:

Ethos of the Garden
The Sewanee Organic Garden believes that the following values and farming practices be upheld and maintained throughout the garden's existence:
• Only non-genetically modified seeds and seedlings shall be planted.
• Pesticides and harmful industrial fertilizers shall not be used.
• The use of electrical and gas powered tools and machinery shall be kept to a minimum if used at all.
• Use recycled, scavenged, and prior materials as opposed to purchasing new ones.
• Transportation to and from the garden should be done only by means of walking and bicycling unless transporting heavy materials.


The Sewanee Organic Garden, through the implementation of the prior guidelines, hopes to achieve the following goals:
• The involvement of the community, student-body, faculty, and staff of Sewanee.
• A commitment to education and enlightenment of sustainable agricultural standards.
• The continual refinement of our gardening techniques in hopes of making them more ecologically sensitive.
• The initiation and sustainment of a community garden program in which any Sewanee community member who wants a garden is provided with the tools, manual labor, and passion to ensure that their garden is a success.
• Work with the local farmer's market and Aramark to provide the Sewanee community with locally and or student-grown foodstuffs.
• The implementation of any and all Sewanee gardens as a necessary learning tool into academic curriculum of the University.
• Encourage and provide the means for tours of local farms, agricultural communities, and conferences and workshops focused on sustainable practices.


I want to add:
To support local nurseries and stores as much as possible and using recycled and reused materials to avoid shopping at chain stores

To buy heirloom and unusual types of seeds from non-GM seed sellers and avoid buying from chain stores

To collect and save seeds from our own successful plants

To experiment and demonstrate different types of green manures and mulching techniques

Sunday, September 7, 2008

Meeting Minutes 9/7/8

GreenHouse Meeting Minutes Sunday September 7, 2008

Kate: Meeting Director
Carson: Minute Man
The Party
enjoying different cultures and social groups coming together, Rebecca - introductions of house members - name tags? need to do a better job to explain who lives here, Chelsea - knowing a bit about the “greenness” of the house - what makes house special is something we need to know

The Treasurer and Scheduler Positions
a new leadership role? says Elspeth
in charge of reimbursement forms - keeping track of garden and house budget
also, a “go to” person for scheduling the house for events (ER meetings)

Chelsea takes the position! THE GREENSCHEMER!!!!!!
Helen jumps up to duty for the Treas. Helen “Money Bags”

Jono says green is also a colloquial term for cash money, someone says something inappropriate

Dishwasher use
Clean as we go would be better - do our dishes after we use them
duty of kitchen chore people to put away dishes?, says Kate - Emily is all like “lets put up the dishes ourselves after we use them”

Low Key Event - MUSIC JAM? - this week
adaptations of haskells food for thought?

Dr Miller, according to emily, not very scheduled would be great

what night asks kate?
a theme, maybe? no! we shall say ACOUSTIC

Becca “thursday night makes sense”
Helen remarks that choir is coming over at 7 and afterward we could jam acoustically
c-student email - elspeth jumps to duty

Greenschemer role
to use house, week ahead in advance
on the bill - tuesday (kairos), thurs (music jam)
emily talks of making delicious muffins
bently says he will walk in his undies

Annie A - Archives
says we can keep records of events in the archives
yes-elspeth, laura, others, general yes consensus

Sewanee Purple
ask to write article? asks Kate
editor - megan plummer

Yes - everybody

Kate’s Indy Study - Farm Tours
indy study - farm tours
kyle and jakes house
every 2-3 weeks - use greenhouse to advertise it
transportation - ok to use money of GH? everybody says heck yes

Jake and Kyle - wanting to teach, beer brewing workshop

GH Workshop
Ideas - jam making, paper making
should we put on the agenda?
compost teaching? worm bins?

lets find the worm lady - get in touch with the worm lady, a local worm expert
elspeth - compost 101
laura - advertise in the messenger to attract - asked by kate to do a paper making workshop - not yet she says

Clearance for back yard
Elspeth says to stop by admins office on wed to get the ok

Expansion Committees
Emily - we should have a meeting with the old list of people, including new people - we need to keep up with the most vocal, most excited of the crew like Dixon and Dr Coffee.
Elspeth - will bostwick also interested
Bentley - represents the Garden Committee, recounts meeting with 5 people, not many people went due to scheduling conflicts
Jono - in the dark, with Laura b/c came late
Elspeth explains... the official history of the GH
Bentley and Els - should people be on both committees
Bentley wants a co-leader for Garden Expansion - Carson jumps to duty
House Committee - look at green designs - green homes tour field trips

Individual Projects
Helen - bike stuff, generators, we already have a trainer, we need two more parts, it would be around 150-60, under two hundred, we need a battery, and a motor that generates, jono - need electrician to verify setup, elspeth answers - tom from pps - jim from woods basement - dr coffee - helen - good to sit down later this week

Chelsea - no house as of right now, working with housing sewanee to incorporate more green technology, inquires Kate - Chelsea kind of sees her project (right now) as a bad idea

Emily - talks about putting a garden in the middle of campus
Laura - Garden Expansion committee shoudl take care of it
Helen - asks Chels about her community engagement anthro class, maybe she could persue a greenhouse project for the class

Kates project - making a cobb shedd with tires and earth pack (sand clay straw), water collecting, building it where the shed is now, Chelsea asks that it usually is a place you live in, Jono offers help, need to ask permission from pps and lady who runs garden (name?)

Bentleys project - GH website, other-getting IFC and ISC spots to REPRESENT - getting spot would be difficult, Carson inquires about what they are all about

Laura - says we should save other half for next week

Buying seeds and Trees
kate - made list of garden tasks, we need to buy trees, is it ok to buy trees?
emily and chels - want a peach tree
carson offers to call buddy who owns a bunch of nurseries
jono - what phase of tree is it in when your buy it

Individual Garden Plots
Emily and jono support idea of having individual places to grow things rather that general tasks - a better way to be personally invested in the garden space

Garden Chores
three work days a week
try to have everybody come out would be excellent

Mint Tires and Cold Frames
kate wants to ok as long as movable
starting to build cold frames for windows

Mission Statement
elspeth will send out compiled documents


Flies
make a point to close containers - emily
chelsea - GROSSSSSSS - we dont want to be seen that way
dirty towel box - move to Tupperware container should fix the problem

Table Looking Better
maybe making a table cloth - cons are that it is hard to clean
glass with pictures, quilt a table cloth, a crazy quilt
bentley - maybe we should since it

Elspeth - white clothing needs to be washed
self explanatory

Killing bad vines

everybody is excited about it
kate - having garden work days
elspeth - changing work day to something appealing

chelsea - getting people to allow garden work to count as community service for bad kids

Recycling at Frat Houses
Emily - pps wont pick up recycling, maybe we could get them to recycle
bentley - get someone to talk to IFC ISC
someone could talk to ashley, the head ER

House Party
alcohol at the house? - maybe better to talk about this a little later
solo cups are #6 , and not recyclable, a sham

Love and Joy - hugs all around

CHELsea - “I Think that is the first time I have ever hugged bentley” “but not the first time I ever thought about it...”


the room clears, a good night at the greenhouse, people feeling warm inside

Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Green! House

Things that are green about our house:
Dual action, low water toliets
Low flow showerheads
Efficient, mercury free fire/smoke detectors and water sprinklers
VOC free paint
Green products used during carpet cleaning
CFL lights
Low odor varnish on floor
Energy *star* appliances

AND they are talking about putting in a water collection system for our garden.

Numbers of important PPS people and emails will be in the information hall.

Green House mentioned in paper

Here's the article we're mentioned in from the Chattanooga Times Free Press.
I heard that there are different photos in the online and print versions.

http://timesfreepress.com/news/2008/sep/03/chattanooga-environmental-concern-grows-campuses/

Monday, September 1, 2008

Meeting Minutes for 9-1-08

Hello folks, here are the notes from our meeting on September 1, 2008!

Website for the GreenHouse: not tacky, maybe green. We haven't decided on anything definite as far as a website goes. Maybe we're still brainstorming.. any ideas?

GreenHouse picture: we talked about having a picture of all the members of the GreenHouse kind of "like a frat", which I think Elspeth said. Bentley's idea was to have "titles like alpha" and Helen wants us to have "nerdy info like in Woods", so maybe we can make all of that work out. When shall we have it you might ask.. Well, we're going to have it at 1:30 this coming Saturday (September 6th) which is 30 minutes before the housewarming party. Becca's going to ask Hanna if she will take the picture.

HOUSEWARMING PARTY!!: This coming Saturday (September 6th) from 2:00 to 5:00 pm, but everyone should know when it is by now. I'm just reminding you. Here are the jobs to get ready for the party and who volunteered for them AND what day they need to be done by. Tell me if I got something wrong.
  • Salsa with fresh tomatoes - Laura and Elspeth, Saturday morning or sometime before the party
  • Coolers from SOP (3 of them) - Bentley, sometime on Saturday or before
  • Healthy cookies - Kate and Carson, Friday
  • Unhealthy cookies - Emily, Friday
  • Hummus (but we need tahini sauce) - Becca, Friday or Saturday? We didn't come up with a specific day for this one
  • Chopping vegetables - Bentley and Jonathan, Saturday?
  • Bread - Chelsea and Elspeth, Friday
  • Grocery trip - Bentley, grocery list (which will be on fridge) needs to be finished by Thursday so we can get groceries by then at the earliest. SO, that means write down what we need at the grocery before Thursday.
  • Tea - Helen and Elspeth, Saturday morning
  • Ask PPS for folding chairs and a table - no one picked this one up.. we just talked about it, so we need to figure this out.
  • Cleaning - Becca's in charge (because she's super clean and good at it too) and everyone is helping
Music for house warming party: mountain top musicians? Carson, will you see who is willing to play on Saturday? We're thinking more on the lines of background music rather than a concert.

House blessing (during house warming): Dr. Potter will play a song/give a talk. Ask Mae Wallace if she will give a talk (Bentley? I think you said you would do this.. tell me if I'm wrong). Elspeth will say a thank you/give a talk.

Invitations: haven't been sent out, so they need to be sent out as soon as possible. AND Bentley is going to send out a Cstudent e-mail about the housewarming because he is skilled in the art of creating creative cstudent e-mails. We need to send an invitation to the Sewanee local farmers and we need to make sure that we tell the Mountain Messenger about the party as well.


Other meeting news (in the order that we talked about them):
Kate's excited about the two large spools in front of Woods and so are Jonathan and Becca, SO, Kate, Laura, and Elspeth (but not Jonathan and Becca because they have class? I think that's what happened) will go get the spool tomorrow (for the house warming party)? Let me know if this is correct?

"Hippies use back door" was taken down because we didn't want there to be pictures of it in the Chattanooga newspaper. Unsure feelings about the Jackson Hole poster. I don't think people will mind if we take it down (I think that's what we decided).

Jonathan has a black flag with a birthday cake with an X through it.

As far as nails go.. use indoor nails?

Don't leave bikes out in the rain - really bad for bikes. Put them in the basement... preferably not the screened in porch because that room will get really crowded really quickly.

Chore wheel - instructions on the blog and on the fridge. We will rotate jobs after every meeting.

Everyone needs to load their own dishes into the dishwasher and whoever has kitchen duty for the week has to keep an eye on the dishwasher and start it whenever it gets full. Not hard.. oh and we will need dishwasher detergent.

Clean up after yourself in general (as far as shared spaces go... kitchen, living room, porch, etc.... so, it doesn't apply to your room.. clearly)

Meeting duty: 2 person duty. One person heads the meeting and the other one takes minutes. If anyone has anything they would like to have brought up at the meeting then find one of the 2 people that are on meeting duty.

Garden duty refers to the garden in our backyard, so right now whoever has garden duty will just plan for the garden in the future because right now we are only growing grass : (

WORK AT THE GARDEN THIS WEDNESDAY FROM 2-4!!! yea! (highly encouraged.. but not mandatory if you can't make it)

"I would like to direct your attention to the garden game." -Jonathan

Meeting with ERs: vines killing trees, mowing yard (that goes to PPS), everything yard-like that needs to be approved by Hartman

Compost bin in our backyard.. when is that going up?

BIRTHDAY AND CAKES! (no box cakes, they're lameee) and whoever memorizes all the birthdays and favorite desserts gets...... ... ... brownies.. made my me.. no joke. On a first to do it basis. We'll see if anyone actually reads this far into the blog anyway. You have to recite them to me.
  • Jonathan: 10/5, chocolate cake, pumpkin cheesecake, summer berry pie
  • Bentley: 11/22, pecan pie
  • Becca: 2/13, red velvet
  • Elspeth: 10/7, chocolate or carrot cake
  • Carson: 2/24, red velvet
  • Laura: 4/27, carrot cake and ice cream
  • Kate: 12/11, oreo ice cream cake or chocolate cake
  • Chelsea: 1/9, Fudge pie
  • Emily: 3/7, chocolate cake with a whole lot of chocolate
  • Helen: 3/12, Banana pudding
  • Paul 8/28 or 29?, Paul, what's your favorite cake or dessert?


"I would like to direct your attention to the family creative workshop books." -Jonathan

Speakers to present to the lecture committee? Anyone have any ideas? I think this would be a great way to get people to the house for a small talk or dinner with the speaker after the talk and it would be sweet to get a great speaker here.

Glass bottles in the garden breaking? Not as long as you don't rake the soil or use any hard tools in the beds. We won't need to as long as we have good soil. No glass around main pathways, though, only raised beds.

DON'T WALK ON THE NEW GRASS IN OUR FRONT YARD.

Richie Hubbard's basic needs program.. we may not sponsor a kid as a house, but if you are interested in doing it yourself then go to Kate. Sounds like a great program.

IF YOU PICK UP TRASH IN THE BACK YARD BETWEEN HERE AND BETA THEN CARSON WILL GIVE YOU A BIG HUG!

Bringing classes over to the house? YES! But, I think we need to talk about it as we see it coming just so everyone knows what's going on. Calendar for all the events.. good idea. I think we have one up right now in the main hallway on the first floor.

Stopwatches for timing showers.. we need them right now.

We did have a hummingbird named Tetra last night, BUT, she is okay now! SO SHE FLEW AWAY!!!!! YEA! We'll forever remember her from those 27 hours we spent with her.

THE END.

Meeting lead by Bentley Cook
and minutes by Emily Ezell

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