Hello, My name is Rachel, and I have so many things to say about the “green” machine, I am losing focus. I’ve started/deleted, started/finished and then finished/deleted this post at LEAST five times. Instead of recapping what I’ve already said on my own blog, or trying to fit too much into too small a space, I’m asking you (if you’re interested) to visit that post ON MY BLOG.

Here on Andrew’s blog, I thought I’d share about my chickens, and how they are a part of my Chewy Living.

Before our recent move to the country, I had a small city flock of chickens. They lived in a chicken tractor. I had read about battery hens. The ones that lay your eggs if you buy them in the super market. Their life is NOT a nice one. I decided that hens would be a great addition to our family. MY chickens would have a better life and thus provide me with better eggs. Since you don’t have to have a rooster to get eggs from chickens, and we lived in the city with neighbors close by, I chose to have only hens. I should just warn you now. If you get chickens, you’ll be hooked. If you’re anything like most of us crazy chook people, you’ll always be looking for ways to grow your flock and manage them. How can you NOT?

All I can think when I see that photo is “GUESS WHAT?!?! Chicken Butt”. Oh yes. I’m THAT classy. Moving on.

Now that I live in the country, I have more options as to what I can do with my flock. I decided to start by getting a rooster in order to allow my hen to raise their own chicks. (Hens to a MUCH better job raising chicks at a much lower death rate and with much less WORK than we humans. MUCH.) Rather than start having chickens all over the place, I created a flock management plan that will allow me to maximize my hen’s laying years, sell eggs to neutralize the cost of feed, butcher some chickens for meat each year and still maintain a smaller scale flock. I wanted to have my flock in rotation in a way that would allow me to have a full and productive flock in a cycle that would never stop. Here is what this will look like:

• I will add to my flock in groups of 3-4 each year until I have 18-20 hens.
• I will be allowing my hens to hatch and raise chicks starting next year. I plan to allow them to sit on about 12 eggs.
• I will keep 3-4 of the pullets and butcher any roosters and extra pullets I have from the hatch. When I have a full flock (20 girls), I will also cull the oldest batch of laying hens that I have. This way, I will have 12 or so laying hens in varying stages of productivity at any given time, and a fresh batch of soon to be layers coming in.

My flock should be full and in rotation by 2012. At least that’s the plan.

Getting chickens seemed like a huge leap, but we LOVE our chickens! I can’t imagine ever NOT having them now. They were a great decision, and I love knowing that our eggs come from happy content chickens, who frankly, live it UP here in the country. Free range pastured chicken life? yeah. They’ve got it good. I also like knowing that when the time comes to butcher, they’ll be treated with the dignity and respect they deserve, and an appreciation that I’ve learned can only come when you truly know your food.

So tell me. What leap did you take toward a chewy life that you can’t imagine living without?

I’m sure each of you has a person or two that you have met online and just can’t remember really how or when or even why. They seem so integrated into your daily life that you can’t imagine them not being there. Such is the case with whetzelmomma.

Rachel is a farm gal who currently lives in Oregon with her family – which at last count included a husband, 3 boys, some chickens, a dog, etc. Her blog Memories of Mine to Thine is a great read with updates almost daily. Wait. WAIT. That’s how I met her. I was on Twitter one morning and asked about Portland and she spoke up. She was working part-time at a little coffee shop and being a chook farmer during the day. It was an instant connection and I only became more enthralled when I saw her doll making, her photography, and her thrift store crafts!
Lately though our conversations have turned to a more disgruntled place both showing disgust and weariness about the greenwashing of America by “the man.” I have to warn you though. She is much more feisty than me!

And just to show you I have asked her to be a guest blogger beginning on July 29th. I can’t wait to hear her take on the situation and see how she encourages and challenges even the most hardheaded (myself included) to be more conscious of how we live and how it effects the world around us!
Before she talks is up over here make sure to read up on her and fall into her free spirited world the way I did some months ago!
Oh! And did I mention I was going to be talking it up over in her world starting the same day!

A few weeks back when I was burying bits of Sun Chips bag at the far reach of our main garden I had no idea that it would create such a stir. Perhaps it wouldn’t have had my experiment gone off without a hitch. But, alas, it has not so far so it seems to have attracted some interest.

Thanks to Mike Leiberman (@CanarsieBK on Twitter) and several others (okay 39 others) the word of my experiment spread fast. So fast that I have been contacted by 3 journalists and even Frito-Lay themselves.

I have to say that the SunChips team and Chris K. specifically are a pretty solid group of folks and they were more interested in the variables of my experiment and how it played into their testing efforts. Chris offered to let me speak to their compost experts and their product specialists but I declined stating I would rather wait until I do Part 2 at 9 weeks to see if the result had varied any. It seems that the bag will only compost properly and within the time outlined by Frito-Lay if it is in a correctly set up, hot, active compost bin. Otherwise it won’t get the necessary heat and moisture. It is also important to have the correct balance of green and brown materials in a compost bin needed to achieve a proper carbon-to-nitrogen ratio that will encourage microbial activity.

So allow me to recap my testing grounds.

I buried the bag (cut into 3 sections) 18 inches in the ground spaced about 12 inches apart (separate holes) so as to keep a sort of constant variable. The soil is the far reach of our main garden so it was treated with cow manure (compost) the first week of March this year and then amended the first week of April with a small bit of cedar sawdust and lime. Since planting the segments middle Georgia has maintained an average air temp. of 96 degrees with only 11 days of rain.

I assured Frito-Lay that I did not just throw the bag in a dirt heap and hope it would disappear.

I am anxious now to see how part 2 turns out and if the bag ever decomposes in what I consider a fairly good testing space. I am also interested in whether or not anyone else has done this experience and what the results were. So, have you buried the bag?

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Original Post
Part 1 of the SunChips saga

It is now Week 3 for the Sun Chips compostable bag project. You should have first ready about the project here. So far, the bag has not lived up to either the written statement by Sun Chips nor the pictures on the back of the bag. Here, see for yourself!

We dream of a world with less waste. That’s why we’ve introduced a bag made from plants so it’s fully compostable. Every 10 ½ oz. SunChips® package is designed to fully break down in just 14 weeks when placed in a hot, active compost bin or pile. If it takes a little longer, don’t worry about it. Mother nature will get to it soon enough.

Three weekends ago Pan and I went with Ma and Pa camping in Panama City, Florida. Not the most quiet place, I know, but wonderful to be so close to the beach and away from the computer and even our own little farm. While there we, of course, indulged on junk food and things we wouldn’t ordinarily eat including things that are so far removed from the source I think they were pure corn syrup. Perhaps the most interesting of our munchies though was the Sun Chips we ate. They were packaged in the loudest, most thin, bag I have ever seen. All was revealed though when I read on the back cover that they were now in a 100% compostable package. I thought to myself, “how is this possible?” I refused to believe it. Which is what brings me to today’s blog post.

I am going to see just how accurate the 12 week “back to the earth” strategy is. And then I intend to contact Sun Chips and let them know the result and my feelings on the subject. So, on Monday, August 30 I will dig up the final of the three holes to see if the bag is gone or not. In the meantime I will dig up 1/3 after 3 weeks and then another 1/3 after 6 weeks and report on my progress. (more pictures below)

So, what do you think of this little experiment? Have you seen the bags? Do you believe it can be so? How do you think production prices are effected by the new packaging?

I hate to see things at a market individually wrapped in plastic.The Family That Preys buy The Bilbee Boys buy Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who ipod mayan 2012

• Washington Heights movie

• The Pearl of Death full movie

• Gangster No. 1

Ever want to view rooftops in your area (maybe even your own) via satellite imagery, draw out a solar array on it, and get an estimate for installation of that array? Well, thanks to RoofRay you can. Basically, it’s a neat little widget that allows you to view yours and others’ solar potential and finally put some energy and financial figures to your idea. It can also go into depth about what the drawn array will be able to do. So? Go ahead. Give it a try. If you wouldn’t mind…post some of your results as a comment to this post. I am very interested.

I am pleased to say that I am contributing a post or two (or more) to a new blog that you can find at DeepGreenConversations. Involving two of my old blogosphere friends, Josh Brown and Ariah Fine, the blog hopes to be an interactive site full of content and resources that help you integrate your faith into a deep green lifestyle . . . rooted in practice and fueled by conversation. Please support other eco-evangelists and by all means, speak up!

For those of you who may also have an interest in green subjects but aren’t sure of writing, contact me and we can craft something together. I love being able to empower the voice of others and I am all for getting the ideas out there.

At Bertrams Hotel video

Well, the shoes have been delivered. Thanks to my neighbors and cousins, I was able to take 17 pairs of “gently worn” shoes to The Foot Comfort Store in Manhattan to donate. Soles4Souls is very cool and I am grateful I was able to do this.

In all of my eco-friendly efforts so as to be a solid steward of the environment I never once stopped to think what Jesus would think of what we have done to our own precious planet. How would he feel knowing that we were knowingly destroying 1.5 acres of rainforest per second? Would he choose paper or plastic or choose to only buy what he could carry in his arms? What kind of car would he drive so as to save on emissions or would he continue to walk everywhere? Would he drink from the water sources we have spilled oil in and thrown our waste into? As I read The Shack I was amazed at how the idea of God, in the flesh of Jesus, could be so awestruck by his own creation and quickly realized that my intentions this whole time had just been wrong. We are to look in awe of our little blue-green ball in the sky and treat it with kid gloves. I was just thinking about my own health and perhaps that of my family. My concern stretched a little less than the house across the street.

God could have been no more clear about this than He was in the Old Testament. Leviticus 25:4 lays out His desire for us to maintain a land sabbath and leave the land uncultivated every seventh year. Every 50th year we are told to give our property back to its original owner, return to our original families dwelling place and discontinue sewing or reaping anything. God’s desire for us and our role on this earth is a cyclical one. We are products of our environment and it is a product of our behavior. God intends for us to recognize the gift of Creation and hold fast to it by living an intentional and responsible lifestyle.

The idea is not necessarily plastic bags or reusable hemp sacks. It is not gasoline vs. electric. The idea is are we in constant praise of a God that could create such an amazing landscape and allow us to dwell on it? And if so, what are we each doing to maintain it thereby praising Him?