Here in Oak
View we’ve got a few more raised bed boxes to build and some drip lines to
install, and then we will have completed our garden infrastructure. We had a good crop of onions and garlic from
the winter, and the tomatoes, chile, melons, tomatillos, squash and five kinds
of heirloom beans are all growing, and the fruit trees are almost ready to
harvest. We keep learning about soil,
seed-saving, and watershed-wise methods of growing food. Thanks to a trip to the Channel Islands with
local friend Eric Hodge, we’ve been making lots of ceviche and fish
tacos with the slabs of fresh white sea bass he caught spearfishing.
Visitors this month included Maree Crabbe
from Australia; John Jensen, his wife Raquel from Long Beach, and
their Australian friend Chris; several of the Abundant Table Farm women;
and the BCM board
for a meeting. Elaine and I were
both interviewed by seminary students about “alternative ministry.” We’ve been reading and discussing the history
of the Russian Revolution in preparation for her trip to the Ukraine in
October. The last third of the month
was taken up by U.S. Social Forum in Detroit, where we worked with Word and World colleagues to facilitate
a Sabbath Economics track (for more info. see www.ussf2010.org). We
also participated in a Mennonite Church
U.S. Interchurch Relations conference in Wichita.
At
the beginning of October Elaine departed for her long-awaited, two and a half
week 
We’ve processed lots of tomatoes and
chile, canning salsa and spaghetti sauce (
Elaine and I 
Elaine and I got back at the beginning of the month
tired, but with the sense of good work done in the 
The Bartimaeus Institute 2011 will be held in 