too much to catch up on!

my mom sewing a skirt for me at dry pond

besides the fact that i constantly lose vital components to either my laptop or camera which prevent me from posting and/or uploading pics, i've been so busy lately that i can't even remember all the stuff i wanted to blog about! the past few weeks have been a whirlwind of friends and family and job hunting, apartment hunting, roadtrips and living out of a suitcase. this is literally the first chance i've had to sit down and write. so while my camera is uploading 300 pictures onto my computer, i'll just briefly touch on the highlight of events.

picked crystals on my new green skirt...

i've spent a lot of time with my mom. going to dry pond and her land that has the crystals. we've picked so much crystal that it filled a pickle jar (thanks, johnny!) and 3 strawberry cartons. i'll post pics of that. i've learned a lot of new things about my family, my mom's past, why she did the things she did and it was kind of a breakthrough. for the first time in her life, she apologized to me. she really apologized and admitted things she never could. she's still a stubborn pain in the ass but i understand her now. the woman has had it tough and never got any credit for it either.

bog mint tea, picked fresh from the koi ponds!

i also spent a lot of time with my cousin suejin and it is now a top priority for me to help her and her mom make a better life for themselves. suejin is 6 months pregnant and has absolutely no support - physically, emotionally, or financially. they are teetering on the edge of homelessness and despair and i just can't bear to think that i've been helping everyone but my own cousin my whole life. she and i are so alike, and i can imagine how totally sad and broken i would be in her position. i don't feel sorry for her, i feel frustrated at how things have happened.

my wonderful friend Shai from india is in town for my wedding. Unfortunately, the wedding has been postponed and she flew all the way from Mumbai! luckily, she's not pissed off and we are all so happy to see each other we don't care. I missed her terribly and I don't want her to leave but she's got other places to go, people to see so she'll be gone this friday.

shai finds a broken perfume bottle in her luggage...

shai is so cute!

princess pei pei

sweet pink baby toes and soft juicy baby cheeks. om nom nom nom... i stocked up on nibbling the baby the last few days before her family packed up the vw and drove across the country back to the west coast. penelope has grown into a happy chubby little baby that you just want to squeeze and nibble all over. she has the cutest toothless grin that lights up her face and makes her cute little dimples show. it takes incredible self-constraint not to just grab the baby and lick her from head to toe like a mama cat. everyone took about a million pictures of this baby in the last couple of weeks and now i just have to show them off. my friend kim is a total paparazzi and took some awesome pictures that she IS going to upload soon. it's sad but exciting to think that the next time i see princess pei pei she will be so much bigger. this kid is so loved and is going to have such a wonderful life. she got to see the sunrise on the east coast with us. it was a beautiful morning on the beach in beaufort and we found all kinds of sharks teeth. the very first tooth i found was an inch long! i should have taken a picture but i gave it to penelope because she needs a bad ass shark's tooth necklace to go with her spear. i'm going to miss her!

pictures of paradise

well, the fence didn't last long as an effective barrier. the chickens have decided that the grass is far better on the other side. B and i must have chased the chickens from going into the street 3 times. once they were actually all hanging out right in the front lawn! the chickens can literally walk right through the fence. so a new project for this weekend will be reinforcing the chicken barrier.

we also realized that 9 chickens should not go through 40 lbs. of feed in one week. they are getting really big fast and eating a LOT. i'm afraid jerky is going to be sunday roast pretty soon. i liked the little guy - he follows me around the most. maybe we'll eat one of the smaller ones instead...

From SPRING 2008

it's been a long time since johnny and i were up at dry pond. it's a little piece of paradise with all the plants and ponds. the dogs just love running at top speed in the fields and lounging in the lush grass under the pecan tree. even the weeds at dry pond are awesome and beautiful. my mom's koi fish are friendly - they will eat pellets out of your hand. you can actually pet them. my friend was just fascinated with the koi so she wanted to bring her new baby and i wanted to show off my mom's crazy landscaping obsession to B. we also planned to fish in my mom's lake not far from dry pond. as soon as we got there, the dogs were out running and me, johnny, and B walked to the far edge of the property picking wildflowers and watching the dogs play.

From SPRING 2008

it wasn't long before we heard the splash. bibi found the spring and soon all three of them were splashing around in the stinky mud. i was busy snapping pictures of weeds. we came back to the lawn and played in the pecan tree. syrus had to prune it, first. B had to climb up and syrus even climbed up the tree! bibi wanted too, but she can't. ahhh... fresh air. sun. birds chirping. trees.





i have no clue what's in this bouquet, but it's pretty and i gave it to my mom :)



look at the size of this weed! it's huge! it had big, fat, furry leaves.



the berries on this bush look delicious. i wonder if they are edible?



according to johnny, they are not.



let's go bananas!



water lillies are so photogenic, aren't they?



B is practising cartwheels. you just can't resist doing a cartwheel on a lawn like this.



syrus went right to work. look at him in the tree!





B monkeyin' around...

now we come to the lake adventure. my mom had a bunch of her korean friends and their families over for a picnic and some fishing. the funny thing is, the only one who caught fish (besides my mom of course) was V's vegetarian husband, who promptly threw his fish back into the lake. Kiera (pictured below with my momma) almost jumped into the lake after the fish. she just couldn't believe why he would do something like that. so, to make up for it, he caught her a bigger fish.





did you notice that my mom is wearing two sun visors? she is ALWAYS wearing a visor, making her look like a perpetual tourist. the worst thing is, they are never plain visors. no, hers are always sparkly.

when we first arrived at the lake, i almost got the mazda stuck on a hill and almost tipped it into the lake. that was a little scary cause i don't think mazda mpv's were meant for bush hogging through thistle. the guys went through shoulder-high grass to try and find a suitable path to drive my mpv through but the weeds and grass were too thick. the dogs followed the guys and i guess louie didn't see the barbed wire fence and ran right into it....



we all got some minor boo-boos from being out in the wilderness (i found a tick on my thigh later that night!!) but poor louie got the biggest boo-boo of all - on his face, too. he heals fast, thankfully.



syrus and my mom look back at our camp from the boat on the lake.

so that was memorial day monday. it was a nice holiday and we remembered to thank the men and women who sacrificed their lives protecting our freedoms.



oh, i almost forgot - i joined blogcatalog and NaBloPoMo with the username seagrass. i still don't know how the hell to use twitter.

bloody monday

**warning, this content may not be suitable for the squeamish** (no chickens were involved)

oh, it was an eventful weekend. well, eventful for me - other "normal" people might consider it boring.... anyways, things were going great once friday was over. it was a long weekend ahead of us and everyone was happy. we decided to go visit dry pond for some fresh air and beautiful scenery and fishing. we wanted to spend the night but that didn't work out so we spent all of monday at dry pond and my mom's lake (unnamed so far...). we made it a priority this weekend to clean the house. in an effort to run a more effecient household, we have all agreed on setting some goals for the house, and ourselves. i obviously need help in this department cause it's hard for only one person to organize and keep up what's going on. so i started a fridge inventory to keep a running tab on its contents and monitor spending and waste. i will be coming up with a cleaning schedule to help keep my very messy house somewhat under control. and B and V and i are resolving to lose some weight with exercise and diet - all of us together. i really really hope it works. unfortunately, it may mean i have to wear a bathing suit. ugh.

anyways, back to bloody monday. i guess you could also call it... yesterday. i woke up around 6:45 and let the chickens out and fed and watered them. i let the dogs out and sat outside a little bit. nobody else was awake. so i went back to bed and must have fell asleep because i missed the commotion. when i woke back up about 9:30, B was in the kitchen cleaning. i was impressed that she woke up and cleaned and she informed me that the dogs caught a possum and ate it in the kitchen (or dining room, depending on what side of the fridge you are standing). she spared me the anguish of cleaning up blood and guts and threw what remained of the poor creature on the bramble pile to be picked up by refuse. i felt so bad for the thing - it was just eating my chicken feed! somehow it must have wandered into the backyard right into the waiting jaws of three large dogs. B was right, there's no way i could have cleaned up that mess without losing my cookies.



then i remembered that earlier that morning i saw choco in the side yard carrying a rather large (dead) frog in his little mouth and eating it by the curb. i watched him chew off a leg and bite the frog several times. it didn't bother me, but when i went back to that spot i noticed the frog was still alive! and minus two back legs! it was a sad, sad, situation. i felt horrible for this pretty frog but i can hardly scold my cat for being a cat.



so, i made johnny move the frog from the curb over to my mother's backyard where hopefully some frog deity will have mercy on it and let him re-grow his legs. more than likely it will die, but i chose to believe there are frog deities. fairies, even. so that was bloody monday (morning). a lot more happened that day which i will probably have to continue in another post later. it was a beautiful weekend, hanging out with awesome people and animals. we put up a small wire fence to help keep the chickens from wandering onto the street. it's working so far. i am amazed that they seem to know where their home is. they stay close, so i let them roam all day. they mostly peck and scratch around or sit in the monkey grass or the straw pile. last night they even tucked themselves in bed! i was being lazy and didn't herd them into their coop and when i finally went out, they were already inside, sleeping! awesome!

i told you guys i was going to be the next georgia o'keefe! the magnolia tree in front of my porch is blooming! you can sit there and smell the scent of magnolia perfume the air - and enjoy the beautiful view as well!



our weekend was fun and productive! like i said, we resolved to gain control over the household so we busted ass and did a lot of cleaning. johnny did a lion's share of the landscaping, but look at the beautiousness of the porch now!!!

From SPRING 2008

we mulched the hibiscus with this really dark bark-y mulch, and put down a weed cloth under the pea gravel. we edged along both sides and johnny re-wired the landscape lights. B and i planted the marigolds and the lilies are growing happily. i moved all my herbs over to the greenhouse roof so we can still enjoy them from the porch but they are out of the way.

i also tackled the gargantuan task of cleaning out my closet. i thinned out my wardrobe and gave away a whole bunch of clothes i don't wear (or fit into) anymore. i made enough room for johnny's clothes by packing away our winter clothes under the bed. now we can share a closet! now all we have to do is organize and sort the sheets and blankets. since louie decided to take a shit in the bathtub the other night, B also scrubbed the bathroom down with some brand-new environmentally conscious cleaning products from target called "le scrub" by method. i like it.

my mom's garden

my mother is the original green thumb in the family. she's a hardcore landscaper. her expertise is ponds, and she has many of them. her koi fish breed like rabbits. some of her most notable achievements are: building a lake (yes, a LAKE), building a driving range, installing several, several koi and non-fish ponds complete with waterfalls and fountains, building an outdoor wedding venue and outdoor kitchen (Dry Pond Garden), installing a fruit and nut orchard, and remodeling several homes. it may sound like she's a rich developer, but she actually did all of this with her own two hands. her garden at archwood (next door to my house) has been in gradual deterioration since she moved downtown a couple years ago, but it still looks lush and pretty. my dad is nowhere near as good a gardener as my mom, who can grown ANYTHING. she can pick a branch off of any plant and re-root it anywhere. she has quite a diverse collection of plants in all her gardens, some of them older than me! i made a huge slideshow of her archwood garden (and some of my chickens, of course), see if you can identify some of these plants! many of them are edible. i call archwood the secret garden, like the book... anyways see for yourself....

14 acres & a 60th bday

johnny and i just got home from dry pond where my mom is probably still belting out korean karaoke songs. it's her 60th bday and a bunch of her friends came over to eat and sing. unfortunately, my poor mom has a very bad ear infection and she is in quite a bit of pain. but nothing can stop my mom from having a party. when i was a kid, she used to invite all her friends to my birthday party and it always ended up being more her party than mine but i got used to it; i liked to see my mom having a good time. i can only take so much karaoke, though. she loved the digital picture frame - everyone was oohing and aahhing over it. i also gave her the shiitake mushroom log all wrapped up. i think her friends were jealous at all the awesome gifts she got.....



before the party, johnny and i went to 14 acres and surveyed the land. we let louie run around (we left syrus and bibi at home) and we hiked along the creek as far back as we dared to go with the daylight fading. i am falling in love with this land - it's pretty wild. there's little to no evidence of people being there - i found a really old rusted soda can and someone long ago carved their name on a tree by the banks of the creek. the ground is completely covered in a thick blanket of leaves, which made walking the land treacherous. i almost broke my legs when i stepped into a deep hole that had been filled with leaves. i fell as though the ground gave away beneath me, like in a cartoon, up to my knees. for a split second i panicked but it was no big deal.



i totally love the creek - it winds between our land and the neighbors - everything to the right of the creek is ours and everything to the left belongs to another farm. they have cows. the creek has some small waterfalls - and even beavers! we saw at least 3 beaver dams - so cute. we saw evidence of busy beavers all around the banks of the creek - all the trees had been chewed about a foot from the ground in a perfect conical shape. the creek is definitely the highlight of the property - but most of it just looks like this:



....lots and lots of leaves and tall scraggly trees. i don't recall seeing any pines - a blessing! i hate pines! i have enough of them at my house. occasionally we come across big hardwood trees that grow in a clump. i think they are birch trees? i love them. see the carving? we are going to bush hog all of the small brush but leave the bigger trees. the land will look very different after that.

desperately needed hope and inspiration

despite the fact that johnny and i had to wake up and leave the house by 6:30 am, i am in very good spirits today. i took marta and met my mom at our second southface sustainable roundtable. this roundtable's topic was food. i was all over it as soon as i heard about it. i knew my mom would be down for it so we signed up. there were three speakers - a guy who does urban farming programs, a master chef, and a co-housing community farmer. it was very interesting and heartwarming and i listened to every word. after the lectures, i went straght up to the co-housing guy and asked him about interning on his farm. he said he had one spot left and that i could apply. so right away i emailed him when i got to work.

i also spoke to a lady from UGA's agriculture dept. and she gave me information about a certificate program in sustainable farming. since the alpaca farm didn't reply to me, i think i am going to have to go through contacts via southface - but that's even better! oh my god - i feel so much closer to my dream i am overwhelmed with hope and inspiration. one thing unanimously agreed upon is that georgia needs more - more organic farmers, more sustainable processing facilities, more farmer's markets and CSA's. the demand is there and strong - we just need more people to supply. during lectures my mom would lean over and whisper into my ear about roof gardens on her hotel and having ricky spread chicken poop on the 14 acres.... oh my god.... my 14 acres.

i am going to have to name it soon.... mom has dry pond but i want something unique and expressive. when johnny and i walked around the land it was nothing but a forest of small hardwood trees. relatively few pines and a few larger hardwoods. it's atop a pretty steep hill but there's plenty of flatness. there's a bubbling creek at the bottom of the hill, alongside the property line that has a small waterfall. the ground is soft and organic - and the only access is a dirt road alongside the interstate. we will have to put sound dampening skyrocket junipers and probably a bridge of some sort to cross over the really deep culvert, but first and foremost i must plant the orchard. this weekend i am going to visit the site again and i'll post pictures. i am pretty excited!

bibi can't walk

this is a very difficult post for me, i have been very very upset since sunday and didn't even want to write about it but i think i should. we took the dogs to dry pond to run around and bibi somehow hurt her good hind leg. now both her back legs are bad. the left one is lame from the surgery that failed back in spring and now it's the only hind leg that she can use because she stopped using her right one altogether. i'm so devastated i can't stop crying and i want to throw up. we are probably going to have to have the implant surgery on both hind legs which means she won't be able to walk for a while - and for bibi that's going to be tough. she is such an active dog, she loves to swim in the ocean, run at top speed, and wrestle. i don't even know how we are going to get her to potty, much less play. she's only 3 years old. it will take months for her to heal, then we have to figure out how to get her physical therapy which is basically learning to walk again in a pool. i had to do that when i broke my ankle and it can be tough - not just physically but emotionally. she's a very dense dog and after all of this i'm afraid she will be reduced to half her size. the worst is sitting at work knowing she is at home in pain and not being able to do anything about it. i am trying very hard to get her vet to admit her to UGA's vet hospital for emergency orthopedic surgery. until then, she won't eat, drink or even wag her tail...poor bunni....i just hope we can afford all of this because if we can't i really dont know what to do.

'tis the season

yay! it's almost christmas! i freakin love this time of year - especially when it snows. i used to love christmas so much as a kid, but after a while it became kind of a burden. i've been thinking lately about the whole concpet of xmas and after some research have decided not to teach my children that santa claus brings them toys and of course baby jesus was not born on that day. what a confusing holiday, huh? so many traditions from different cultures just got meshed together and now all people know is they need to start shopping in october. since i am not christian, it seemed a bit hypocritical to celebrate xmas, so i decided to learn about the history of the holiday and see if i can find the real meaning somewhere hidden and disguised by the church. well, there's a lot. and it's way too confusing to go into here so i decided to make up my own christmas. to me, it's a day to celebrate winter, to celebrate the warmth and bounty of the hearth and family and friends. it's a day where you can show your appreciation with a thoughtful gift. it's a season where you can decorate the house to look alive and pretty despite the dead branches and cold wind outside. i think santa claus is a fun story character but i am not going to have my kids seriously believing that a fat man in a red suit is going to jump down our chimney. i'm sure they will wonder what's up with all the mangers and babies and mules so i'll explain the christian version of the holiday too. it's hard to resist the shopping binge especially with all the sales but i don't want my kids thinking that it's all about presents. it's about making other people happy.

so today johnny and i went up to dry pond and let the dogs run around and play. we were going to try to find a tree to cut down but luckily we saw a small sign for xmas tree farm right up the street. for $18 we spotted ourselves a nice little cedar tree which we cut down and strapped to the roof of my car. we like this tree. it's so cute in its own little way. i felt bad for having to cut it down, though. we have a whole month to decorate it and i think it will be chock full of good times for us.

dry as a bone

it's amazing how easy it is to take simple things for granted in this day and age of convenience. you get so wrapped up in the silly things like cellphones, tv shows, he-said, she-said, baby mama drama, etc. All the while, the planet is still turning and there is an entire world that you are only a teeny weeny piece of going through an amazing transformation. Life on this planet, no matter how much we think we are in control, is still precious. It takes only a flick of mother nature's wrist to induce a devastating catastrophe. Maybe as kids you just don't think about it much and you take it for granted that way. I was pretty eco-conscious as a kid. I thought everybody was, honestly. Conserving was kind of a given - especially in the korean culture. I'm used to rationing water and reducing waste. I started living my own life and got trapped in the american lifestyle of abundance and waste and this drought has turned a glaring spotlight onto my evil ways. Like many people, I took water for granted. I have never "felt" the effects of a drought, whereas our ancestors relied upon it life or death. Thankfully, I don't waste extreme amounts of water like say, a wealthy family with a 3 acre front lawn. But I could have conserved more I suppose. I'm not so worried about our water consumption as much as our waste production. The recycling program at our house is still working out very well. The next thing I worry about is our electricity consumption, which is out of this world. I really want some solar panels (I need to cut down some of these trees, first, though!). However, this past weekend the drought took center stage when we went up to my mom's driving range and saw this:

this is the fishing pond. the black thing you see on top of the pipe is the overflow drain. the wall behind it is the dam. there's barely enough water in this poor little pond for fish. I imagine they are all dead. the lake looked ok, and i think it's partly because they sacrificed this fishing pond to make sure the lake didn't go down too much. it's weird walking into what used to be a fishing pond. the floating dock was sitting in the reeds on the wall of the pond. the dogs however, saw water and dove right in - to the mud. it was actually pretty funny watch louie and bibi try to run in mud up to their shoulders. of course, syrus wouldn't dare get that dirty.

in other news, I have officially become a craft addict. I have spent a ridiculous amount of money of fabric - but dear god they are the most beautiful fabrics ever. I almost don't want to cut them. I now have plenty of fabric to make some crafts and even a few skirts. I haven't given up on knitting - I think that's just going to take a little longer. I have banned myself from craft shopping in the meantime. It was starting to get out of hand.

mentionables

dry pond garden is a wonderful place to visit. it is also a fantastic place to get married. the landscape is beautiful and the old house is very charming.

BUYING ANIMALS FROM PET STORES IS EVIL. THEY BUY THEIR ANIMALS FROM MILLS THAT END UP IN SHELTERS IF THEY AREN'T BOUGHT. THEY DO NOT TAKE VERY GOOD CARE OF THEIR ANIMALS. THEY CONTRIBUTE TO THE STUPIDITY KNOWN AS "DESIGNER BREEDING" WHICH IS BASICALLY CREATING A NEW KIND OF MUTT. IF YOU ARE SOMEONE WHO HAS BOUGHT A PUGGLE OR A COCKERDOODLE FROM A PETSTORE, YOU SHOULD BE BEATEN AND HUMILIATED. YOU JUST SPENT SEVERAL HUNDRED DOLLARS ON A MUTT YOU DUMBASS. GO TO THE SHELTER AND ADOPT AN ANIMAL FOR WAY LESS AND YOU WILL BE SAVING A LIFE.

costco is now carrying an environmentally friendly product!!!! it's called ecos and it is a liquid laundry detergent. it costs about $12 and you can do something like 150 loads. it is biodegradable and made from soy products! they are considering carrying more eco-friendly products IF there are good enough sales. we bought some yesterday and if you have a costco membership, you should too!!

taking vitamins is good for your health, people. i was a very adamant non-vitamin taker because i believed that our bodies are capable of extracting vitmains from food and other sources naturally. which is true, BUT - the energy that your body uses to extract these vitamins from food causes damage to your DNA (it's called aging and is caused by the release of free radicals) and if you take vitamins (GOOD ONES like juice plus) that energy can be used for other functions that benefit your mind and body thus contributing to *gasp* evolution of your dna (which is then passed down to your children who are less likely to inherit negative traits from you!). don't believe me? well, i am no scientist but these people are:

morphologists tell us that certain body structures would be impossible to build without enough of the right kinds of food. to build a brain, for instance, you need miles of lipid (fatty) membrane to wrap around neurons, and lots of vascualr tissue to feed those neurons. both components are made of essential (long-chain) fatty acid derivatives, which are chemically manufactures in an herbivore's body, startin with fats in leaves and seeds. an easier way to amass large quantities of these "neural" fatty acids is to eat animals that have already manufactured them for you. switching from a leaf only diet to one with meat, therefore, might have given carnivores a larger supply of neural building blocks - the ticket to advanced structures like keen eyes and a bigger brain.

second, in addition to being a structural material, food is also a batch of chemicals, which, by their nature, are reactive. when these substances enter the body, they bump into and interact with the bath of hormones, enzymes, genes, and neurotransmitters that govern and regulate cell life. above a certain threshold concentration, food chemicals may begin to influence which enzymes start to work, or when genes will turn on or turn off.

this threshold mechanism gives food the ability to tweak powerful control knobs within the body. imagine, for instance, that an adaptation is lying dormant in the genes, just waiting for a chemical surge to "turn it on". there's no telling what might emerge as a result of a good diet. witness the spurt in human height, for instance, when nutritious foods became widely available in the western world. in this case the nutrients affect the phenotype (the growing body) but not the genotype (the set of instructions encoded in DNA that is passed from generation to generation). take the diet away from the next generation of phenotypes, and heights will shrink to prior averages.

but what if diet can affect certain aspects of our permanent genotype over the long haul? Crawford and Marsh think that it can, and they offer the following rationale. if you can eat an animal that makes an important nutrient, such as vitamin A, you no longer have to devote your biosynthetic pathways to making vitamin A. this frees your energy for other chores, like building a brain. it may also free up genetic space, the authors speculate. say you have only so much room on your chromosomal "hard drive" and it's already filled with genetic instructions. by eating vitamin A manufactures by another animal, your instructions for synthesizing vitamin A become superfluous. if a mutation suddenly rewrote that gene sequence with another set of instructions - a new adaptation - you wouldn't miss the vitamin A recipe, and you could therefore live to take advantage of, and pass on, the new adaptation. evolution, stuck on its plateau, would suddenly spring to a new level.

excerpt taken from Biomimicry - Innovation Inspired by Nature by Janin M. Benyus