Living in Hell

Hello all!

I cannot believe it has been FOUR months since my last posting. But when I think about what has been happening for the last four months, it makes sense. Let's just say that my faith in reusing and recycling has been severely tested this past quarter.

It seems that the sleeping bag that I purchased second-hand at a thrift shop for my week-long permaculture outdoor workshop was infested with bedbugs.

A couple of weeks after my trip, the kids and I began to suffer from small, red, itchy bumps on our torsos and arms. I cursed the day we rescued our cat and treated the house and him immediately for fleas. I felt horrible using the chemical treatment, but have had them before and knew I had to contain them before they overtook the house. A week later when the bites didn't disappear, but got worse, I knew something wasn't right. I had heard about bedbugs before but didn't believe I needed to worry about them. Besides, everything I had ever bought used I washed right away and hung outside to dry on the line. I was so confused. I read a little about them online and looked for pictures of them. So far, I hadn't seen any in our house, but I needed to know what to look for. Sure enough, after a few more days I found one dead on smashed on the strap of my bra which was hanging off of my door handle!! Immediately, I called the pest control company I have always used for ants in the past and explained the situation. They came out that afternoon.



(Photo courtesy of bed-bugs-handbook.com)
An adult bed bug, a bit bigger than a grain of rice

 It has been four months since that first treatment. That pest control company came SIX more times. Still, two of us continued to get bitten. I assumed the bugs must still be in my son's room and my room which was why we were still getting eaten alive. (It cost $400 dollars for the treatment which included a thirty day warranty.) I almost passed out when I heard the cost. Little did I know that they were extremely reasonable compared to all the other companies I would contact. After my bug guy had come a total of seven times with no luck, I finally looked up "Bed Bug Exterminators" online and called one named AAA Bedbugs. They were located in Chicago. Just the fact that they had the word "bed bugs" in their title made me feel better. They would have to know how to get rid of these little monsters. After finding out that they charged a $45 inspection fee plus over $150 per room but had a sixty day warranty, I made an appointment. The technician (that's what their called now, not "the bug guy") came out that day and sprayed the two bedrooms  with "cryonite." It is basically freezing them upon contact.

Well......that same technician just left my house about an hour ago.
For the FOURTH time. He came back after doing the two bedrooms and sprayed the whole house. (at over $150 per room, remember) He has used the cryonite again, he has sprayed toxic pesticides. He even set off those awful "bombs" in the house. (This, I just recently found out is the WORST possible thing you could do, as it causes the bugs to delve deeper into their hiding spots to get away.) I have thrown out my mattress and box spring, my son's mattress and box spring and our vacuum cleaner. I have thrown away comforters and blankets, towels and clothing. Books, toys, stuffed animals, posters, rugs, shoes...you name it.

We have been living a nightmare for the past four months. We continue to get bitten. I currently have about thirty old and new bites on my belly, back, shoulders and upper arms. My oldest woke up with fifteen bites on his upper arm yesterday and poor B has at least fifty bites all over him. It seems that T, the youngest doesn't react to the bites. I have only found one on him the whole time. The bites itch like a mosquito bite and bleed quickly. The itching can last from one to three weeks. B has scars from the places he has scratched so much.

These mother*!#*!'s can hide anywhere. They particularly like linens and wood, but have been found in clock radios and picture frames before. Everything that is too big or cannot be laundered has been sealed in black garbage bags and placed in the garage.

I spent three hundred dollars today at Walmart on mattress encasements, a steam cleaner, bed bug pesticides, gloves, face masks,  big rubbermaid storage containers,  rubbing alcohol and MORE laundry detergent. I am going to vacuum, steam, spray and scrub the crap out of every surface in my house. I will throw out my couch if I have to, I'm so desperate.

The worst part is, I cannot even donate any of this stuff. It could have bed bugs and the last thing I want to do is pass this on to another family.

I consider myself fairly close to a bedbug expert by now and found out how they got in. I mentioned the sleeping bag earlier, and washing linens and clothing should kill bedbugs. However, it must be washed in EXTREMELY HOT water--at least 120 degrees. Also, you must PUT IT IN THE DRYER as well. The heat from the dryer also kills all stages of bedbugs. When I brought the sleeping bag home, I was trying to be environmentally friendly and economical. I used COLD water when I washed it and hung it outside to dry. Those little critters must have been laughing at me as they swayed to and fro in the breeze on the line in my backyard.

At night, I dream of washers and dryers, spinning non-stop. I have nightmares of bites I cannot reach, or fingers with no nails to speak of.

I have shown the kids how to use a long serving fork as a back/torso scratcher for those hard to reach places.

We live out of plastic bags. I do loads and loads of laundry every day. Our pillows have been washed fourteen times. They aren't even pillows anymore, more like lumps of fabric that used to be soft. The blankets and comforters have holes in them from getting snagged by the top of the washer. The boys are down to four pairs of pants and five shirts each because it is easier that way. When we go to someone's house we wear clean clothes and don't bring anything with us.

I hope you can forgive me for my blogging absence. I just haven't had the heart to tout the "reduce, reuse, recycle" mantra lately and I haven't had the time to, either. If I have learned anything so far, though, it is that one can live upon very little--that material possessions really don't mean that much....especially if they are infested with bedbugs.

Inspiration



I'd like to use this post to share some of the ideas and pictures from my recent permaculture course. I hope they will inspire you to learn more and practice some of the principles in your own yard or community. 

 UNCOMMON GROUND

Uncommon Ground is located in Rogers Park. This restaurant is SO cool. They have their own farmer! He takes care of the rooftop gardens, parking lot beds, rooftop beehives and excess veggie oil which is given away for biofuel. The restaurant makes it a point to use mostly locally sourced food and utilizes what they grow on their property as well.

WATERS SCHOOL

One of the places we visited as well was Waters School on the Northside. One amazing parent has transformed a broken-down, worn-out school yard into a beautiful area where both school children and members of the neighbohood work together and build community.



This is part of the school's side of the garden. Classes tend this side during the school year, while community members with plots on the community garden side agree to take care of them over the summer. 



 The beds below follow a sort of "keyhole" bed design allowing for greater edge and winding pathways.

THE NOWICKI'S

Our final destination was to Ron and Vicki Nowicki's house in Downer's Grove. They built their house in the seventies, with the intention of living as sustainably as possible, being sure to include passive solar design and growing as much food as possible on their own property-which meant, God forbid...no lawn!!! I have to say that their property is more beautiful than any meticulously maintained suburban lawn I have ever seen. 

They have a wood burning stove which is what provides for most of their heating needs and are proud to have yearly energy bills which are less than some of us pay in one month. The neatest thing about their home, though, is that you would never know you were living mostly "off the grid." Their home is comfortable and modern, with conveniences we expect in most of our own houses. This special couple definitely has some secrets to share with the rest of us looking to tread a little more lightly these days. Thank you, Ron and Vicki!



Vicki uses a special umbrella to protect and create a beneficial microclimate for new plants.



Herbs, vegetables, native prairie plants and fruit trees all work together to create beneficial relationships for wildlife, the plants and the people who use them.

Part of permaculture is creating relationships that create balance. Whether it be with plants, animals or human relationships, the goal is to have all the separate pieces support each other repeatedly and in multiple ways, providing failsafe systems.



Perma-what?

Many of you know I took an eight day workshop on “Permaculture” recently. I travelled to Stelle, IL and was immersed in it from 8:30am until 9:30pm each day. Lots of people have asked me what permaculture actually is and I've been trying to come up with a simple, short explanation. However, because permaculture is a blend of lots of different principles, I'm having a difficult time. Luckily, though, a friend and fellow student has posted an excellent definition on her blog and I'd like to share it with you so you get a better understanding of what I actually did for those eight days.

On her blog, http://www.adventurefarm.blogspot.com/, Deanna Lawlor writes this:

'“Permaculture” was coined by two Australians, Bill Mollison and one of his students, David Holmgren. Originally, the word was a contraction of “permanent agriculture” however, as the permaculture practice evolved so did the meaning of the word, which is now mostly understood to mean “permanent culture.”'


'Most of us practice parts of permaculture already...with the choices we make in our daily lives. For instance, if you are composting, growing some of your own food, buying food at the farmer's market, supporting local businesses, walking or biking to work, or foraging for food; you are involved in a piece of permaculture. When you consciously start to pull these pieces together and design your life around the principles of permaculture, you are practicing it.'

I would add that any efforts to reduce your dependence upon finite resources, volunteering or sharing with others and working on building community in your area are also parts of the permaculture model. Permaculture is about caring for earth, caring for people and sharing surplus with everyone. The part which intrigues me the most is the fact that we can take the principles anywhere on the planet and help communities overcome poverty and despair, simply by teaching them some basic proven methods of growing food and obtaining water. It is pretty amazing to see whole villages in third world countries go from barren deserts to lush, green food forests.
Deanna and I are teaming up and will be holding workshops in the Chicago and St. Louis areas starting in January 2011. I know I can count on friends and family to be my “guinea pigs” and let us know how the workshops are going!

My Yard:

The boys have been busy helping me “permaculturize” (my own term!!) our back yard since I returned from the course. We've hauled leaves from neighbors lawns, dumped woodchips from the tree trimming company doing work down the street and collected animal feces from a teacher friend of mine with a zoo in her classroom. All this organic matter is being piled up on an old cement slab in my back yard which used to be the floor of a shed. After piling up a few feet of organic matter and giving it time to decompose, I should have soil healthy enough to plant in. I am also building a raised bed next to it for a couple of fruit trees and other beneficial plants and shrubs.



The beginning of the raised bed



It looks like an overwhelming mountain of my neighbors' yard waste, but all that organic matter will be healthy soil eventually!

We “inherited” Lucy, our new lop-eared bunny from a neighbor. She's sweet and adorable and produces EXCELLENT fertilizer for my compost pile! I got the rabbit hutch used on craigslist. You just pull out the bottom drawer where all the feces drops and pour it onto the pile. I made sure to place her hotel—I mean hutch on the south side of the house where it will get lots of sun. There is also a microclimate, or pocket of warm air in that area most of the time.

Lucy's luxurious home

LUCY

We started “vermi-composting” when I returned from the course. We had always done regular composting in the backyard, but now we have added red wiggler worms to a plastic bin full of air holes with newspaper and kitchen scraps to get richer compost in the spring. (Hopefully) I am still trying to get the correct amount of water, newspaper and organic scraps balanced and I think I might need some more worms. Anyone got some laying around they'd like to share?

Meet our fifty new family members

Some of my other ideas are to dig a small pond in the backyard to attract more beneficial wildlife and prevent water run-off. I'm also going to get another 55 gallon rainbarrel to harvest more water. In my future dreams, I'd love to have a graywater system from the kitchen, washing machine and bathtub. I've also tried very hard to talk the boys into a compost toilet.....but that is going to take some convincing!

This single rain barrel fills up in a couple of minutes during a good rain storm. If my village would let me, I'd get a 500 gallon one.

For more information about permaculture visit:

http://www.midwestpermaculture.com/
http://www.permacultureproject.com/



How Do You Make a Tissue Dance?

Put a little "boogie" in it. Hah!!!!!!!!

I only bring up this topic because I have had more boogers in the past week than in the past ten years. I'm not sure if my nose is supposed to produce this many boogers, because now that I've had the deviated septum fixed it is normal, or if the excess crusties are a side effect of the surgery and will eventually go away. I can tell you though, that there were some pretty amazing ones right after the procedure. Who knew snot could be so interesting?

The coolest thing about my nose now is that I can actually breathe through it! I used to get up four to five times a night. For so many years I just believed I had a bladder problem. Ever since the surgery I am sleeping eight to ten hours straight without ever waking up. It turns out I didn't really have to pee,  I just couldn't breathe.

Another benefit I've noticed is that I no longer feel like I'm going to pass out during the pranayama breathing in yoga. You are supposed to breathe rhythmically through one nostril at a time, exhaling in a forceful pattern. Unfortunately, by the third round I was usuallly gasping for air through my mouth and eliciting stern gazes from the instructor. I can now proudly say I am an expert at pranayama. :)

I'm still waiting for the surge of energy I was hoping I would experience now that I'm getting so much oxygen to my brain. Even though I'm not feeling the need to run any long distance marathons, and I couldn't tell you what happens when I workout, (cause it's been awhile) I do feel more of a sense of alertness when I'm out on my walks. Maybe I'm just enjoying the fall weather and happy to be able to smell the pumpkin bread cooling on the stove.

Welcome Back........

Don't ask me why I'm welcoming you back when I've the one who's been gone. I just can't get the "Welcome Back Kotter" theme song out of my head.

I'm having major writer's block.

What a bounty!



Belive it or not, I canned these veggies! I heard a woman on NPR explaining how to make "Tomolives" with green cherry tomatoes and decided to give it a try. http://www.mrswheelbarrowskitchen.com/ They smelled amazing. The recipe suggests using other veggies like jalapeno peppers so I pickled two jars of those.  N loves jalapeno pickles, so hopefully these will live up to his expectations. Don't be surprised if you receive one of these jars as a holiday gift in December!



Because of the threat of frost tonight, I pulled out all my plants and here's what I found.



 Above are my herbs: sweet basil, rosemary and lavender. I'm going to bring them in the house over the winter to try to keep them alive. First, I have to figure out if I want to "clean" them to get rid of pests, or just replant them altogether.






Please, please, please ripen.........

The pumpkin is from our garden. It's tiny but cute. Of course, the bigger one grew through to the neighbor's side of the fence and I don't have the heart to ask if we can keep it!!  The butternut squash is from my across the street neighbor who has the greenest thumb on the block.



Stay tuned...

Hey everybody. Sorry I've been slacking off on the entries. Had nose surgery and am only just feeling normal again. Can't wait to share about the kayaking trip I took with Kim. We are definitely outdoorswomen ready to take on anything after that experience! Check back soon for the latest news.........