Harvest Time

I looked at my wheat today and noticed that most of the heads were bending down.  So I tested a grain and it was firm and crunchy, and I figured that it was time to harvest.

I figured that harvesting was definitely a two-man job, so Michael obligingly stepped in as my helper to get everything cut and tied.  I was telling him earlier today about needing help with the project, and I sang, "Will you help me harvest my grain?  Will you help me harvest my grain?" Then I said, "See?  You have to help me because if you don't I'll have to sing that song from the Disney cartoon and then you won't get to eat any bread when I'm done."

To which Michael replied, "I'm gonna need to see this cartoon before we go any further."

It turned out that he helped me even without seeing the video, so that was lucky.  Anyway, as we all probably know, the old-timey way of harvesting grain is with a scythe or a sickle, which basically just cut down the stalks and then you lay them together and bind them.  The reason I wanted Michael's help was so that he could do this:

He'd just grab a bunch of stalks and then I used long clippers and just clipped the bottoms of the stalks and we'd do an entire row like that.  Once we had clipped a whole row, Michael would hold all the stalks together while I tied a string around them to make sheaves.  Here's what my handy website says about that:

The next step is to bind the grain into sheaves, each about 12 to 14 inches in circumference — a bunch you can hold comfortably in your hands. Bind the same day you cut the wheat. It’s nice to have two people taking turns cutting and binding. You can bind with cord or baler’s twine or even with some of the wheat stems, twisting them in a way that holds the bundle firm.

So we just bound each row into one sheave and moved on, and the whole harvesting process took about 20 or 25 minutes.  Here's what all of my sheaves looked like when we were done, aren't they pretty?

And here's what my plot looked like when we were through, just a little bit sad:

The next step of the process, curing, sounds easy enough:

Curing the grain. Stack sheaves upright in a well-ventilated, dry location safe from grain-eating animals. Our ancestors stacked sheaves to make shocks in the field, but with small quantities, it’s easy to bring the sheaves in out of the weather. The grain has been cured when it is hard, shatters easily and cannot be dented with your thumbnail.


I have a little work shed in the backyard so I propped my sheaves up in there.  I really don't think they have far to go to get cured and once that's done it's time for threshing and winnowing.  Apart from preparing the plot last fall for the seeds to go in (pulling up weeds, pulling out roots, and digging rows), I'm afraid that threshing will be the most labor intensive part of this process so far.  I have a feeling that I will have to wait until I'm really frustrated and I just want to beat the hell out of something.  Because that's what it's going to take!  So if anyone has an bad news they've been waiting to give me, now's the time. =)

P.S. Now that things are harvested, there are a couple of things that I wish I would have done differently:
1. I wish I had made my rows farther apart.  I think I did them so close together because I had so much seed (and tons left over), and I was trying to get as much in as possible, but it really made weeding difficult.
2. I would lay down a layer of newspaper between each of the rows to discourage weeds from growing between them.  I did consider using some weed killer this year, but I just felt weird about putting down harmful chemicals adjacent to something that was going to potentially grow and possibly feed my baby.  I'm sure that a lot of foods we eat daily are grown in exactly this way, but when the power was in my hands to put those chemicals there or not, I chose not to.

My tribute to the 4th of July: Amber waves of grain!

Well,  in the last few weeks my wheat made the magical change from pale green to lovely amber... or at least pale yellow.

This little guy is still working on shedding that green color.
You can do it!

As beautiful as it looks, it's still not ready to harvest. I found a website that does a good job of describing when to harvest:

"As you admire your wheat stand, you’ll notice in midsummer that the color of the stalks turns from green to yellow or brown. The heads, heavy with grain, tip toward the earth. This means it’s time to test the grain. Choose a head, pick out a few grains, and pop them into your mouth. If they are soft and doughy, the grain is not yet ready. Keep testing. One day the grains will be firm and crunchy, and it will be time to harvest."

I "tested" a grain today, and it was soft and doughy.  Once it's finally ready I'll have these steps left: harvesting, binding, curing, threshing, and winnowing.  The only one that intimidates me is threshing.  I've read some suggestions as to how to do this on a small scale.  One suggestion I like is to stick the sheaves in a pillowcase and bash the heads against a brick wall.  The grains are supposed to fall out of the heads and then they're ready for winnowing.  I'll be taking photos of all of these steps as I do them...  I just sure hope those grains come out.

So my little wheat plot went from its humble beginnings last fall:

To today in early July:

I don't know about you, but I find that just amazing.  Mostly because I didn't expect it to work so well.  But everything has been going well so far, let's hope that it stays that way!

Wheat Update: Is it alive?

Everyone has been asking me about my wheat.  How's your wheat?  Did it survive the winter?

The answer is YES.  Behold:

 

It survived, along with a bunch of weeds that grew up in between the rows making everything almost indistinguishable.  The light-colored tufts you see in the picture above are the weeds.  Here are my first efforts at weeding, in which I pretty much just give the weeds a haircut:

I took these pictures in early May, so these pictures are a little old.

I still have to weed about half of the plot, but between work and a toddler and a husband who isn't awake during the day, it seems impossible.  But little by little, hopefully it will get done. 

Well, I started feeling guilty for giving you pictures from a month ago, so I went and snapped some just now.  Here's what it's looking like today:

Amazing, right?  Even a bonehead like me could grow them.  I've also got all sorts of other little miracles popping up in the planters on my patio:

Broccoli

Green beans

A melon (I'm hoping for honeydew but I'm not sure)

Herbs, I think Basil and Parsley

Zucchini

This is the first year that I've ever really tried to grow anything, and I'm sure not everything will work out, but I'm learning a lot (for instance: the plants like to be watered EVERY day... huh). 

I got Jane a teeny, tiny watering can so she can "help" me water our garden.  The first time I gave it to her she didn't let go of it for 40 minutes.  She sure is doing a lot of growing herself!

Feeling good

I just picked up my first Bountiful Basket of the season (I stopped getting them for the winter and what we shall refer to as the "semester of hell"), and I'm feeling pretty good!  I got 3 artichokes which are $2.50 at the store right now - that's $7.50 right there.  Not to mention the lettuce, corn, tomatoes, pineapple, blackberries, onions, cantaloupe, cucumbers, mangoes, apples, and green bell peppers.  Not too shabby for $15!

Plus I just watched this commercial on someone's blog, and it made me really happy.

Book Discussion: Love Wins

I read an article online today titled "Pastor loses job after doubting hell's existence."  This pastor had put a link on Facebook supporting a book written by Rob Bell called Love Wins.  There's a youtube promotion of the book that is really controversial, where the author describes a Christian art show featuring a quote from Gandhi.  Someone had attached a note to the piece saying: "Reality check: He's in hell."

The article goes on: "In the book, Bell criticizes the belief that a select number of Christians will spend eternity in the bliss of heaven while everyone else is tormented forever in hell.
"This is misguided and toxic and ultimately subverts the contagious spread of Jesus' message of love, peace, forgiveness and joy that our world desperately needs to hear," he writes in the book."

Obviously, the traditional Christian idea of hell isn't quite the same as mine as a Mormon, but I still think these are really interesting questions that Rob Bell is exploring.  He's looking at everything he's been taught and openly questioning some things that don't seem to make sense, and trying to reason out what he believes to be true.  I'm not putting this discussion on here as a way to justify my own beliefs, I just really admire this man for trying to find the truth even when it exposes him to so much criticism and scorn from his peers.

Here is the youtube video of the book promotion.

Well, it's official

I weigh less now than I have in the last 5 years.  Since I was 21.  Yay!

I hope you don't mind this celebratory post.  On December 15th I decided to start a long-term weight loss goal, and I'm committed to going until at least June 2011.  (What was I thinking starting 10 days before Christmas?!)  So I'm almost halfway through now, and I've lost about 16 pounds, putting me - in this last week - lower on the scale than I've seen since 2006.  You can see my weight tracking in the chart on the right.

The hardest part about this was committing to doing this at all, and doing it long-term.  I dithered over the course of six months because honestly I didn't really feel that bad about my weight.  I know good people for whom body weight is a very emotional struggle, I've read stories about the agony people have felt as they desired so strongly to change their body size, and I can understand.  For me, it really wasn't an emotional issue which is why I think it took me so long to decide to do a diet.  I finally did decide to do it because I realized that it's not too late for me to look and feel pretty.  I hope that doesn't sound really superficial.  But while I haven't felt bad about my body, I haven't really felt pretty, either.  So it would be nice to feel that way for a little while before babies and age and whatever else change things again.

So what am I doing?  Just eating 1500 calories a day.  That's pretty much it.  Some days it's more and some days it's less.  And every once in awhile I sit on the couch downstairs and finish off all of the chocolates in the house while watching a sumptuous literary adaptation.  Did I mention this was a long-term goal?  The biggest change has just been learning to resist things, or to take things in moderation.  Stopping after one portion (not always successful), have smaller portions in general.  I have tried to eat better, too, having more fruits and vegetables, and I've also added in a bit of exercise, but the main thing is I'm just not eating as much.  I still have a cheeseburger every once in awhile, but it's only  every once in awhile, and I go easy on the rest of my food for that day.  I don't have enough self-discipline to be really fastidious about all of this, and I'm not really into feeling miserable about my life because I don't get to have any pie.  I still have pie, I just have a tiny bit.

Anyway, that's what I'm up to lately.  It's been slow going, but I'm always quite happy if the numbers on the scale aren't going down, at least they're not going back up.  Just maintaining these low weights is a nice thing, too!

For all you art history buffs

You guys remember that I majored in Art History, right?
Yeah, sometimes I forget, too.
Just kidding.

I miss it, I miss working with and studying art.  One of the few connections I still keep up with the art history world is a really excellent art history blog, Alberti's Window, written by a friend of mine who is teaching the subject up in Washington.  I'm subscribed to a few art history blogs but I like hers the best, she always has something interesting to say and is really thinking about the work she comes across and current issues and discoveries in art.

Well, you can imagine my delight to find out that my senior thesis was mentioned in yesterday's post on her blog!  It makes me feel so special!  I'm going to take it as evidence that my art history soul is not dead.  Thanks, M, for the mention, and keep up the great blogging.