goodbye + new site

Today, this day that my little brother would have turned 23 years old, I'm undertaking a personal challenge to celebrate his brief existence and lasting impact on my life. 

On November 15th of every year, I will mark his birthday with something meaningful, something personally significant, something -- anything -- in honor of Brad ♥

This year, due to the extraordinary talent of Brooke Glaser, I'm thrilled to announce my brand new website to mark this day. 

A true merging of my rural roots with my urban existence. 

www.chicagocraftivist.com

As of today, this space will no longer be active.
Please update your reader subscriptions accordingly or sign up for email updates.

Please join me at my new site to continue together on this journey. I will meet you there.

Announcement + Moving

I've been working with the talented Brooke Glaser to build a brand new website home. This space will be pretty quiet this week as we prepare to launch the new site. As soon as it's up, I'll be back with our new address.

Stay tuned.

Fridays + Wendell

Those who use the world assuming

their knowledge is sufficient

destroy the world. The forest

is mangled for the sale

of a few sticks, or is bulldozed

into a stream and covered over

with the earth it once stood

upon. The stream turns foul,

killing the creatures that once

lived from it. Industrial humanity, 

an alien species, lives by death.

In the clutter of facts, the destroyers

leave behind them on big story,

of the world and the world's end,

that they don't know. They know

names and little stories. But the names

of everything are not everything.

The story of everything, told,

is only a little story. They don't know

the languages of the birds

who pass northward, feeding

through the treetops early

in May, kept alive by knowledge

never to be said in words.

Hang down your head. This 

is our hope: Words emerge

from silence, the silence remains.

2007 V by Wendell Berry from Leavings

Frontyard Homestead + Seasonal Rest

last of swiss chard + green tomatoes // lonely lettuce plant that the chickens promptly ate // our meager spinach that met its fate in chicken gizzards

As my canning efforts are winding down inside the house, our frontyard homestead saunters toward slumber as well. But not without a few tweaks to our raised bed set up.

Jimmy and I had many conversations about this space that we've cultivated for food production. We've made changes every year, but still haven't felt that it's as efficient as it could be. My solution was removing the borders of the beds and direct sow into the ground, supplemented by the loads of organic compost we've added. We would plant in a more traditional row method. He countered with the reasons we created raised beds in the first place, that we can't be sure of the soil underneath, that we created barriers between the ground and our compost to keep our food safe, that these reclaimed blocks allow the bed to be maintained easily.

In the end, we comprised as good married couples should :)

We agreed that using the block borders are intentional and will help keep the chickens out of the space next season. So I opted to extend the beds with the blocks. I extended each bed about 2-3 feet toward the fence. It gives us more growing space, makes use of the unused land between the fences and beds, but allows us to keep walking paths in between. I also added one additional bed in the front, adding blocks to what was our potato patch this season.

The chickens were quite the help, eating all manner of bugs and worms plucked right from the earth. I topped the beds off with a layer of coffee chaff as mulch and called it a day. I have on final bed to mulch, but the chickens are still munching on the swiss chard so I'll let it go for a few more days.

How is your garden winding down for the season?

Last Harvests + Cranberries

I canned my very last batch last weekend. Upon waking, I strolled to the kitchen in those early morning hours to preserve the cranberries my mother-in-law brought me from her annual trip to Wisconsin. I put in a rather large order this year as we plowed through the cranberry + jalapeno jam of last autumn. This jam came together so quickly, using this recipe, though I opted for more jalapenos and less sugar. 

It's this time in the kitchen, this slow dance from garden to sink, that will forever remind me of fall. Boiling canning pot, jam-covered utensils stuck across the countertops, bags and buckets of tomatoes + peppers spilled across the floor. Whereas school beginnings used to elicit excitement of new beginnings, preparing these foods for my family now dresses the path for winter to come.

Our shelves are stocked with various jams, tomatoes as sauce, juice, and ketchup + pickles from last season and relishes + apple sauce, a new tradition.

What did you put up this year?

Chicago + Obama + 2012

scott // tim // kyle and mike // results watching // elizabeth warren celebrating // tech center // contemplation // buffalo bar // daniel and lorena // tim and kaela // madeline, joe, and wes // loyola social justice and social work grad students (and alumnus)

voting is powerful and empowering, a few tears shed each time I enter my polling place. it's who we vote for, yes, but also the experiences and beliefs and desire for a great existence for all people that bring us to that place.

yesterday, I posted this which adequately summates my political views and passion for justice ... 

equally thrilled and humbled that so many of my friends and family share my enthusiasm for civic engagement, today and all year long. 

equally thrilled and humbled that so many of my friends and family share my commitment to the progression of justice and of basic human rights ... that we can all, equally, access marriage, health care, birth control in various forms if and when we choose to use i

t. that we support our children enough to educate them, our troops enough to stop killing them, our earth enough to stop destroying it, our bodies enough to fill them with good, sustainably grown food.

may we be mindful enough of the world we want to live in that our engagement doesn't stop at the polls, that we vote each day with the lives we live ♥

and so, after work and a refreshing yoga class in Albany Park, free because I voted, I bussed it over to the Heartland Cafe in Rogers Park to watch the election results roll in. sharing the evening with some of the best people I know, in Chicago's strongest community center for political engagement and activism, Illinois (immediately) and the country (eventually) went blue.

I read his memoir in 2006, braved the Springfield cold for his presidency run announcement in 2007, cried tears of joy post-election in Grant Park in 2008, and quietly celebrated four more years last night. it's been an incredible ride, Mr. Obama.

Grampa Frank

My eldest aunt recently posted these pictures of my grandfather that I had never seen before. My mother's father, he was born Frank Albert Myers in 1936 in Canton, Illinois. The youngest of eight, he was the first of all his siblings to be born in a hospital.

with a sister // adolescent // with my grandma and the first four (of eight total) children, my mother's on my grandma's lap // colorful

Diversion + Fresh Food

My first successful attempt at diverting food from the landfill.

In My Kitchen + Groceries

I felt a bit of pride this week as I crossed the following off our grocery list because we make them ourselves ...

granola

pancake mix

tomato juice

apple sauce

BBQ sauce

jelly

ketchup

pasta sauce

pickles

salad dressing

yogurt

Sunday Inspiration for Week of November 4th

recycled, handmade toy owls on etsy.

our catholic worker friends went to live at the Possibility Alliance for the month of November.