Saturday, November 2, 2013

What is your Earth Mission ?

I looked at our blog today and realized it’s been several weeks since I’ve put up a post. Usually I try to post something on the weekends but my weekends have been really busy lately. About two weeks ago I attended the Alpaca 101 workshop that was held here at White Violet Center. There was a nice size group and we learned a lot about alpacas, including how to give shots, trimmingpeanut and vet hooves and body composition. The vet came and gave Peanut a plasma transfusion. It didn’t take very long and Peanut behaved as well as you’d think a baby would when they get stuck with a really big needle. All went well though.
The newest baby cria had blood drawn to have her IGG new cria getting IGGchecked. I haven’t heard the results of that so I’m thinking they must have been OK. It was an interesting workshop with one person driving up from Kentucky to attend. She and her husband just purchased two alpacas and she is trying to learn all she can about them.
I rented a car and went back home to see Linda and spent a few days with her. We drove up and spent an evening with mom. When we got back to Chambersburg I helped get the RV winterized. Right before we arrived home in August, our bathroom faucet starting leaking underneath, inside the cabinet, and I tore it apart to see if the o-ring was bad or something was out of sorts. All seemed to be fine so B called Thor this week and apparently they are having issues with that particular faucet and told her to call the manufacturer and they would probably send her a new one. The rig is only two years old….guess they don’t make faucets like they used to.
So I was home from last Thursday till this Wednesday…got back in time to help with this week’s CSA. On Thursday all of the interns and most of the White Violet staff went to a conference put on by “Our Green Valley”, an organization of businesses and like minded people concerned with sustainability in the Wabash Valley area. The keynote speaker was Betsy Damon and she was outstanding.

She has devoted her life’s work to working with water; whether it be in her artwork or in communities all over the world. Positive change to try and restore water to its natural state. She says that water is not meant to be encased and confined in concrete spillways, etc. but a free flowing entity that works with nature to restore balance. She has created wetlands and bioswales that take polluted water and cleanses it by putting it through natural means. I think it was pretty cool that I just happened to have my “Water is Life” t-shirt on the day of the conference because that was what the very first slide said in her presentation.

She has worked on some fascinating projects around the world and though they may seem prestigious, she pretty much lived in poverty while pursuing her passion. That takes true courage and focus to do something at great personal cost to yourself. I’m reading a book that my daughter bought for me at the Mother Earth News Fair and it’s called ECOpreneuring and it talks about something called.. “Earth Mission”. What have we chosen as our life’s work while on this earth. I think we know what Betsy’s Earth Mission is….water. Here is the video that she started her presentation with….it is trying to make the point that we are connected to water. Since our heart is 75% water and our brains are 78% water (when you have those mornings where your brain just seems really soggy….maybe you went over the 78%) and our cells are made up of water, we are connected to the earth in more ways than we tend to think about.

I went to two other sessions at the conference. One was on Energy Programs in Indiana, where they are doing home and business energy audits and offering some pretty great rebates. The other session was on Waste Management Streams and mainly geared towards a manufacturing process to eliminate waste and save money for the company and also minimize the amount of waste products. It was really interesting.
The temps are back around 50 after a week of really chilly temps and raw winds. Trying to catch up on things this weekend. Work on my project for here and I have to go guard the chickens tonight and when I finish that I have to go give Peanut a bottle. Last night she only took about a 1/2 ounce but she is gaining weight. She’s up to 14# now. Wahoo !

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