All went well visiting Docs today. We’re set to check in for Hope’s procedure at 8am Thursday morning. Should be in recovery by noon. Updates to come…

Thursday afternoon update:

The procedure went really well. So well, Hope wasn’t even admitted to the hospital! She’s doing awesome, as we’re recovering with some family near Rochester. Plan to head for home tomorrow so long as all goes well til then.

We’ll be back for the next surgery sometime in late January or early February. Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes–they really meant a lot to us.

Sunday Update:

Hope is doing super. She’s had very little pain, and we’ve had to just about tie her down to keep her from playing too hard. she had a slight reaction to some of the stuff they cleaned her with in surgery prep–just a rash. Back to school on Monday. All is well! We’ll be heading back to Mayo for round two in Jan or Feb.

Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes. It really mattered. You can check out some pics of the adventure here.

We missed the Harvest Moon, but his weekend was worm harvest time. (It was actually well overdue, but who’s counting.) That means Zoey and I sorted the worms from the worm poo, then mixed up some new bedding to tuck those red wigglers in for the winter. We also expanded, adding another worm house, which makes it three total now. It’s really hard to separate the teeny tiny babies from the good stuff, so I’m letting it sit in a tub for several weeks, hoping those tiny worms get bigger and I’ll be able to pull them out of there.

Here’s the new bedding recipe, since I know you were dying to get your hands on it:

• 1/3 peat moss
• 1/3 soil (with some organic matter in it)
• 1/3 shredded brown leaves
• enough water to make it most and a bit sticky

I replaced shredded newspaper (an Uncle Carl trick) with the leaves, thanks to a tip from a worm-lover I met in St. Paul in April. It keeps the bedding more airy, and breaks down to give ‘em some extra snacking. I bought myself a little toy last week–a leaf vac and mulcher. Jon and Nicole got some help bagging their 10 million leaves this weekend…

In case you missed it, Halloween was Saturday. Trick or treating started for us at about 5pm, and wrapped up around 8:30. That’s crazy long, but when you go trick or treating in the country, stuff takes a while. We had a witch, a fairy princess, and a box of popcorn heading out of our house this year. All costumes made from stuff we already had, except a bit of face paint. (Not pictured: me after Zoey painted my face last night.)

And finally, we’re in the midst of a construction project. With baby on the way, it’s time to finish up the basement and add a couple bedrooms. Thanks to help from Brooks and Dad, I have it ready for sheetrock on Wednesday. One step this weekend was tearing out the temporary wall at the bottom of the stairs (we reused everything but the sheetrock). After I smacked a little hole in the wall just to startle Colleen, the girls’ eyes all got huge and a chorus of “Can we try that!?” cam soon after. So, take a look at this video to see the demolition crew in action.

OK, it’s time to talk climate change. I know it’s a touchy topic for some bartblog readers (and I love you anyway), but let’s just get something clear: climate change is happening, fast. And it’s mostly our fault.

All the really smart scientists say so, and so did South Dakota legend Tony Dean. And experts say it’s worse than we first thought, especially those who study the poles first hand (like Minnesota uber-explorer Will Steger). If we keep up the status quo, our changing weather will be particularly painful for lots of South Dakotans, like hunters and farmers (and people who like to drink water). So enough about some sort of debate about wether climate change is for real. (It’s as silly as a “debate” about evolution.) The only worthwhile and super-important debate is how we (as in humanity) should do something about it. There, now that’s out of the way…

Leaders from all over the planet will be gathering in December at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, Denmark.  One of those leaders will be my friend and intern–if we all pitch in to help get her there.

Jamie Horter works with me at the Sioux Falls Green Project. She’s also a senior at Augustana College in Sioux Falls. Jamie was picked by Will Steger to be part of his foundation’s Expedition Copenhagen, a group of Midwest youth who will travel with him to the Climate Change Conference next month. Jamie has been interacting with kids and grown ups around South Dakota, gathering up hopes and dreams for our state’s future. She’ll be our messenger in December, talking about stuff near and dear to our hearts here in good ‘ol SD. Things like our place in the clean energy future, and our love of the land, rural communities and agriculture (see her video on YouTube). You can get more details on a blog post I wrote for the Green Project here.

Please help Jamie get to Copenhagen. She’s too shy to ask you, so I will. We need to raise some bucks to cover her travel expenses from South Dakota to Copenhagen and back. Her travel is not covered by Will Steger, and she’s a college student. You can drop a dime or two here, or give me a shout. Every dime will be used to help Jamie connect us to the talks in Denmark December 7-13. If you can’t chip in, that’s OK. Just help me spread the word, and this link: http://jamiehorter.chipin.com. I promise she’s way worth it.

We can’t all go to Denmark. If you live in the Midwest, please connect with Jamie to share your message. If you live somewhere else (or not), there’s a really cool project out there gathering up hope from all over the world and plastering it on the leaders who will attend the conference in Copenhagen. Please share your dreams and hopes and fears at Hopenhagen.

Above is a shot of one of the awareness campaigns Jamie recently helped organize. Check that stunning little activist in the colorful hat on the far right!

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds, ala Jaimie

Step 1: Carve the hell out of a few pumpkins. Make them fun and scary. When you’re digging the “guts” (or “brains,” depending upon your perspective) out of that soon-to-be-jack-o-lantern, pile them up in a clean bowl for sorting. Then, sort out the seeds and place them in another clean bowl. Be sure to compost the remaining stringy stuff. I fed some to my worms, but I’ll save the picture for a non-food post.

Step 2: Here’s Jaimie’s BIG SECRET: don’t wash the seeds. You need them to be wet, and washing just wastes that groovy pumpkin flavor goodness. We clean them up a little, but a bit of orange stringy stuff here and there just adds character, and they have that perfect stickiness when unwashed. We used the seeds from three kid-sized pumpkins, which ended up about four cups worth. Jaim added around 3 Tablespoons of EVOO (that’s extra virgin olive oil), some Mrs. Dash and some dried garlic granules. Don’t ask how much, ‘cuz she don’t know. As Grandma B always says with her bread recipe, “add just enough.”

Step 3: Fold it all together real good, to coat the seeds with EVOO and seasonings. Now spread the seeds out on a baking sheet. They don’t need to be single layer, but close.

Step 4: Sprinkle the seeds with some brown sugar. I would advocate for local-raised honey here instead, but we’ve run out and my little sis hasn’t brought us another tub full yet. (Hint, hint.). Now toss the pan in the oven at 350 for about an hour, maybe a little less. Again, I don’t now exactly how long they were in there–just until they are done. I do know that I’ve never seen my wife bake anything at any other temp but 350. Maybe she should have done some sort of thing for the 350 Day of Climate Action? (Btw, Hope got famous on Saturday at the Falls Park 350 Action.)

Step 5: Enjoy. We store them under a lid in the orange container you see in the picture above, and keep it on the counter. I doubt this batch will see Friday.

Posted in Food Tagged: Food, pumpkins, recipe ]]> http://bartblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/28/awesome-roasted-pumpkin-seeds/feed/ 1 joebart IMG_0871 http://bartblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/27/short-names-and-pumpkin-art/ http://bartblog.wordpress.com/2009/10/27/short-names-and-pumpkin-art/#comments Tue, 27 Oct 2009 17:40:27 +0000 joebart http://bartblog.wordpress.com/?p=1654 ]]>

From Mrs. Edwards, the (fabulous) first grade teacher:

“Do you know why Mesa would have started signing her name ‘Mesa Bart?’ “

And, some jack-o carving in the kitchen Monday night. See more of the process on our Flickr site.

I came across danah boyd’s website today. She doesn’t capitalize her name, or the word I. She even legally changed her name to danah michele boyd, without caps. This is an idea with room in my heart.

Even though it stuns and/or upsets regular folks with capitalized names, danah charges on. She does it to honor her mother (you’ll have to read about visual balance as a consideration in choosing danah’s name–”Danah” looses its balance), and she does it because capitalizing names and first person pronouns seems self-righteous. It puts “I” above “we” and “they.”

Names are just one label–one way of describing our self–they’re certainly not us. We’re each and all so much more than a name or adjective. And most of us never even choose our own name anyway, right? Names are like genes handed down from our parents–same as my blue eyes and brown hair and bad knees.

I’m with danah. Here are several variations of my name, you be the judge:

Joseph Bartmann

Joe Bartmann

joe bartmann

joe bart

jb

Lowercase wins. It does have balance, and humility. I’m with danah–I love my name in lowercase. It gets better with each simplification moving down the list, eventually landing on just the initials. I guess many kids like fixing their name to all kinds of places and stuff. I’ve always been fascinated by those initials “jb.” There’s just balance and simplicity in there that can’t be found in “Joe Bartmann.”  And, there’s more.

Lowercase is more beautiful, easier to read, and more flexible. It is visually appealing, artistic, creative and hip. It’s more stylish and minimalist–even more “fashionable,” as my niece might say. It feels more designed; more architectural. I love it’s attitude and it’s innocence.

crazy, huh?
jb

“It seems to get more confusing each time I return. I am not getting closer to a conclusion. It just is what it is. My photos are a witness, not a solution. They are the dark and the light and every struggle between…

I want people to understand that what they see in these images is a result of a very long and very calculated oppression. It’s convenient that we can now step back and say: ‘Oh, no! Look. They are doing it to themselves! There is nothing we can do!’ Very convenient for us.”

That’s Aaron Huey on his gripping photos recently published by the New York Times in “Behind the Scenes: Still Wounded.” Aaron is a white photo-journalist who went to Pine Ridge reservation right here in South Dakota five years ago for a photo assignment, and couldn’t leave. His pictures, and the interview published by the Times, are revealing, depressing, hopeful and a slug of other emotions at once.

He went to Pine Ridge as another white journalist looking for a story. But he found himself called to just be there, instead of looking for the shots to take back to the city. His posture as kind and open-minded observer has given him a perspective most of us would never see without looking through the eyes of the Oglala Lakota. He’s unpeeled much of the bias and judgement that usually comes with any view of South Dakota’s own Third World Country.

I’ve long wanted to do something to help. I have no idea what, if anything, that might be. I’ve asked friends who call the rez home, without falling on an answer. I feel called to be there for some part of my life–it whispers to me like an unknown lover off in the distance, soft and mysterious and persistent. And I do not go.

Jaim and I had a long conversation about this tonight after I read Huey’s interview, and the dozens of passionate and wise comments left on the Times site by other readers who’s hearts were grabbed like mine in one way or another.

What is our responsibility? This is the question that I cannot shake. By “our,” I guess in part I mean all of humanity, and in part I mean the rest of us here in the Dakotas, not living on Pine Ridge, or Standing Rock, or any other impoverished rez. On my last trip to Standing Rock, I was treated like an outsider, because that’s what I am. Just another wasi’chu. I was invited to look in, but only from the front walk, and only by my white tour guide. It was convenient to go back to my home and worry no more.

Yet, I am Lakota. If I am human, then, as wise philosopher Parker Palmer says, nothing human can be foreign to me. We are one body, right? I am the chief stripped of his feather bonnet, the warrior sent to starve in a camp, the mother murdered at Wounded Knee, and the 3-year-old daughter of alcoholic and impoverished parents. I am the life and rebirth of the sun dancer, the drummer at the pow wow, the hopeless tribal councilman, the local community organizer, the traditional medicine man, and the teenager about to cut my wrist. I am the latest photo-journalist to pass through and the youth group building a house and the professor come to study a broken people. I am also the treaty-breaking congressman, the American genocide, the well-intentioned missionary, the manifest destiny settler, and the mighty nation who has forgotten its sins.

And, I am a blogger who prays you will see and read and contemplate “Behind the Scenes: Still Wounded.” Ignoring this devastation can no longer be convenient for South Dakota.

(Thanks to Madville Times for sharing the NYT piece.)

"Real Haitian Zombie"

OK, so it’s nearly Halloween. I know this because last night  I went with my kids to Reading Rally while donning a werewolf mask. So it seems like zombies are on the top of pretty much everyone’s mind these days.

I mean I saw a lame Thriller interpretation on Dancing with the Stars tonight, the dudes at Rock Garden Tour did a whole show on zombie plants, there’s a zombie movie out (October staple, I guess), and a while back I happened upon this shocking footage on the Real Zombies of Haiti. (See the how-to video below, if you’ve always wondered how to make a real zombie.) It’s even possible I’m a zombie right now, since I’ve fallen back into insomniac mode as of late.

The good news is this: I have a sure fire, fool proof method to make sure you never end up wandering the night streets moaning with arms outstretched. Sound the bell, this is big.

Organ donation. It’s so simple. Give away your organs, eyes and tissues when you die, and there will be nothing left worth zombifying. Hey, you get to rest in peace AND several other people get to live, thanks to you. And it’s really easy to become a donor here in South Dakota (and most other places too). Next time you renew your drivers’ license, just let ‘em know you want to be a donor, and they’ll put it right on there. Until then, you can get a snazzy little sticker to go on your license by filling out an easy form here. You can also download a family notification form here so everybody knows you don’t want to become a zombie.

• Right now over 100,000 people–men, women and kids–need a transplant to survive.
• Every 11 minutes another name is added to the national organ transplant waiting list.
• Yet, about 18 people die every day from the lack of available organs for transplant.
• And, zombie mobs really suck.

Find more info on donating life in South Dakota or any other state at Donate Life America. And read about 10 confusing organ donation myths from Mayo Clinic (hint: it’s almost surely not against your religion). Please join me in the fight against zombies by making your wishes to be an organ, eye and tissue donor known.

Pronounced Freeeeeedoooommm!!! Screaming like William Wallace in Braveheart (you remember, before Mel went psycho off screen and tanked his reputation…).

Jaim and I have been wearing war paint for four years now. You don’t see it, unless you go shopping with us, or listen to us budget every month (and hold emergency budget meetings once a week or so), or listen to either one of us when the other (or one of the kids) comes up with some silly spending idea… We’re debt free today.

Yes, except for our home mortgage, we owe nothing. No more student loans, credit cards, car loans, or hospital bills. Not even any couches or TVs on “no payments or interest for 36 months!” Not one red cent owed to anyone. It took us four years on the Dave Ramsey plan, budgeting and saving and scrounging, and the last payment to XLS Student Loans went out of the bank today.

How much did we pay off? Well, I’m not at liberty to say yet. I’ll tell you it was many many tens of thousands. More than most houses cost here in our little village. Paying for college, a wedding, computers, cars, credit cards, furniture, building a new house when we couldn’t afford it, kids getting sick–it piled up out of control until it was crazy big and we didn’t even realize how big it had climbed.

Then one day in September, 2005, when our bank account was overdrawn, we had bills to pay, and no idea where the money went, we decided enough was enough. We tried to make a budget, and found the expenses kept outweighing the income. Then we started adding up all the money we owed–21 different debts in all. We were devastated and without a clue (and I was supposed to be the business dude!). Later that week, I happened to be switching through the radio channels in the car and landed on a talk show about money. It was love at first listen–I felt like Dave Ramsey was talking directly to me.

Dave’s message is about telling every penny what to do before it gets spent. On paper and on purpose. He outlined a plan called the “Baby Steps” that rely on focussed intensity and discipline to get debt-free and stay there. Forever. I bought Dave’s book and read the whole thing in one night, then Jaim and I started listening to his show on podcast and on the radio. Hearing folks just like us (and lots of people in a much bigger jam than us) call in every Friday and scream “We’re debt free!!!” became so inspiring for us. We’d talk about the show and share tips we each learned most nights.

So, I bought some personal money software to keep voracious track of our checkbook, bills and other accounts, and we promised each other we would stop borrowing money and commit to paying off our debt by following Dave’s plan.  We cancelled and cut up every credit card and saved up $1000 for an emergency fund (that’s Baby Step 1), and we made a detailed budget with every penny for every month, one month at a time. The first few months really sucked, but then we got good at budgeting (and at making adjustments to the budget as things came up) and it became almost a game. We kept track of every single penny we spent, we began using cash instead of plastic for things like groceries and household stuff and our fun money (the little bit of cash we each take every month to just play with), and we really cut back on everything we could.

Once we had a thousand in the bank, and had some practice with our mad budgeting skills, we hit Baby Step 2 like Wallace and his kilted army charging over the hill. We temporarily stopped investing, switched to minimum payments on everything, and focussed all of our money and energy on knocking off one debt at a time. Once the smallest one was gone, we moved on to the next, then the next, until it all started to snowball for us.

Sometimes we felt like throwing in the towel. Much of our friends and family thought we were crazy for seriously thinking we could be without debt. We even took a few vacations–both real get-in-the-car-and-go-somewhere vacations and some “Dave Ramsey vacations.” That is, we took a month off in a way–we loosened up the strings and paid off less debt for a month here and there, so we could use cash to buy something or go somewhere. So, this took us longer than it could have. Four years is a long time to really buckle down. We’d see a light at the end of the tunnel, and then life would happen, and we’d owe $800 for the ER or $1200 to fix the car. But we stuck it out, and now it feels really good.

So what now? Well, we’ve promised each other we’ll never borrow money again and we’ll always keep a strict budget that we both agree on every month. That means we won’t have all the toys and new cars and “stuff” that a lot of people around us have. It means we’ll only buy things when we can actually save up and afford them. And we’ll pay with cash. It also means we’re moving on to Baby Step 3: boosting that emergency fund big enough to cover six months of expenses. Since the baby is coming in April, we’ll still be in major save up mode til then at least. After that, we start investing like we really mean it, and we stay smart on our spending. Then we’ll save up for the girls’ college, and work on paying off our house about 20 years early. Soon enough, we’ll be able to do fun things like give away lots of money. We celebrated our debt free milestone by writing a (big for us) check for $1000 to our local community foundation this week, and we’re going out for a celebration as a family this weekend.

If you think debt is just something that always has to be part of your life, no matter how much money yo make or how much debt you have, I promise you’re wrong. It’s all about changing your behavior–learning to pay less stupid tax. Check out Dave’s website, or find him on the radio. I’d offer to lend you our book, but we gave it away long ago. If you have any questions you think we could help with, shoot away.

–> Get the Baby Steps (PDF alert).

This is the fifth and final part in a series of writings from my Grandmother’s recent death. Today I share portions of the talk I gave at her Wake service. I felt very prepared, and emotionally out of gas, going into the service. I was expecting to have no trouble whatever reading what I had prepared–I had shed all the tears that where in me. Following a great eulogy given by my uncle Dan, I headed to the podium. And then, as my cousin Carey says, I got “leaky.” I couldn’t even get out the first word. This totally surprised me, and I ended up reading it in between lip biting and tears, and ad libbing much of it. Here are some of the things I had written down:

Intro

My aunts and uncles asked me to share some memories of Grandma from all of my cousins tonight. So, much like Grandma usually hung around in the background, I’ve been sitting with a notebook, jotting down little stories here and there as cousins and aunts and uncles and everyone shared them, planning to assemble all those memories and share them with you here tonight.

But I’m not going to.

Those memories and stories we’ve all been sharing with each other over the past week, while surrounding her in love and sending her off, or over tears and laughs since she finally went home, couldn’t possibly be as meaningful to the rest of you.

So, instead, I want talk to you about love tonight. As I was observing the past week as it unfolded, one thing became very clear: love was everywhere I looked and listened. It was the one thing that shone through everything—all the moments, all the emotions, all the memories.

The last few days of her life, Grandma could hardly speak. But she did often gaze deep into the eyes of whomever was holding her hand at the time. And later, when her eyes just wouldn’t open any longer, she would still squeeze that hand so tight. The kind of love I felt each time I saw it was unique and powerful. It was an embrace of love and gratitude for the whole family, no matter who was there to be the instrument in that moment.

Love is why, those who could be there, spent so many hours surrounding Grandma’s bed in her last days and hours. Love is why, those who couldn’t be there with her, spent so many hours thinking of her and worrying about her. Love is why we’re all here tonight. We’ve gathered to celebrate our love for her, and to remember and honor her love for us, for God, and for this church and faith.

St. Paul once wrote to the people of Corinth that love is patient, and kind, and holds all things and endures all things. I think we’ve seen that he was right.

Love is

And I think we’ve also seen a love that changes, and adapts, a love that is  joyful and also full of sadness. We’ve seen that love is rugged and resilient. We saw that she can sometimes be surprising, and even anxious. We’ve seen love being selfless, and love focusing every last drop of her energy within. We’ve seen love’s appreciation, and sometimes, love’s stern glare. We certainly know that love is Irish. We’ve seen love being busy, and love being still— OK, we hardly ever saw her being still…

But we did see that love is protecting, and love is nourishing. That love can heal, and love can let go. That love can forgive, and love can wait as long as it takes. We saw love strong as an ox, and love frail and tender. We’ve seen love hiding and bashful, and love overflowing in the open. We saw love give life, and we saw love in death. We’ve seen that love can be separated, and love can be, finally, reunited…

We’ve even seen love in swishy pants.

So, love can be so much. Love is her, and love is in each one of us. St. Paul also said something else about love: Love never ends. I’m pretty sure he’s right about that one too.

Since a few people have asked for it, I’ve also put together this series, minus the contextual paragraphs, into one downloadable pdf. You can get it here: Pain and a Pen collection PDF.