The messy weather a couple of weeks ago gave us a nice bonus. Laird was not able to get Jo to the train in Quincy on the Tuesday morning she was due to leave because of poor road conditions. As a result she was able to spend most of the week with us and left for New Hampshire on Saturday morning to resume school. We will see her again in early May when she comes for our Land Day celebration.

I promised in the last column that I would give you our current reading selections that we shared with each other on Gigi's birthday. Stan read from Thich Nhat Hanh's book "Anger". This focuses on ways to transform anger in yourself and the world. Michael gave us an insight into the lives of Baltimore Orioles from "Silbey Guide to Bird Life and Behavior". Gigi read a funny piece from the novel "The Ya-Ya Sisterhood". Cedar did a dramatic reading of Dr. Seuss' "Green Eggs and Ham" and Jess chose a selection from "The Celestine Prophecies". Renay read a charming story about an mouse who lost his pants from Arnold Lobel's "Mouse Tales". I finished up with a poem about a pesky fly from an anthology of Asian-American women's writing called "The Forbidden Stitch".

We are definitely moving into the beginning of the growing season. We have started a number of flats of various spring vegetables as well as some flowers. Michael has several flats of brassicas going , I have my first round of lettuce seeded, Gigi has early greens and flowers in the works and Bekka has started on her sweet onions. Renay has also seeded some flowers to plant.

Gigi has begun the discing of the gardens and has the North Garden ready to go. Bekka has already

sown some fava beans in that area and the rest of us will be begin planting in the next week or so, depending on the weather(as always!). Michael has been working on the perennial onions, raspberry and aspargus planted on the east side of the Dharma Garden. We will finally be able to harvest the asparagus for the first time this spring. We can hardly wait.

We have been enjoying eating some of the overwintered veggies in the gardens that are making their spring comeback. Gigi has provided us with spinach and lettuce from the cold frames for some lovely salads. We have had several meals from the parsnip patch at Dharma and the parsley, cilantro and leaf celery are producing again, too. We are still benefiting from the large crops of potatoes, onions, garlic, winter squash and sweet potatoes from last season.

Another food source for us is our poultry flock. We have had an abundance of eggs the past few weeks which has manifested in quiche, omelets, potato salad and other good things. We processed our extra roosters, older hens and turkeys last week. Most of the chicken was canned and the turkeys

went into the freezer.

Bekka went up to Iowa on OCIA business last week and had the opportunity to visit a worm composting business while she was there. She brought back brochures and a sample of their product and told us about the operation over lunch a couple of days later. Michael and I did extensive worm composting when we were market gardeners and Gigi is trying to get the process started here this season. This is more information and skills sharing that expands the possibilities of what we can do here at Sandhill.

Another sign of the season is our first fair of the year. Stan went to Kansas City on Friday afternoon to do the Farmers Exhibition over the weekend and visit a friend. This fair is focused on promoting local food production and alternative crops.

Gigi attended a conference on women's issues in Missouri that was held in Kirksville this Saturday.

It was done as a teleconference between groups meeting in different parts of the state.

We hosted a group from Knox College in Galesburg, Illinois this past Friday evening through Saturday afternoon. There were fifteen students and three professors from a program called "The Green Oaks Term". Green Oaks is an old farm owned by the school that has been turned into a interdisciplinary center with classrooms and living accomodations. The students are together for ten weeks studying different aspects of the land and community.

The group came over from Dancing Rabbit in the early evening for supper and then socialized with us

during a "sorghum labeling bee". They camped overnight in our orchard and toured Sandhill after breakfast. They then did a high energy "go" helping us clean up pruning debris from the area around the White House, mulching the currants, stacking sorghum wood, and clearing away the brush that resulted from our tree cutting at Sugar Shack in preparation for the steam boiler project. After lunch, they had to head home to Illinois since it is a long drive. We really enjoyed having them here and look forward to hosting future groups from Knox College.