Sego Lilly

The Sego Lily, of the Liliaceae family, Calochortus nuttallii, is my newest edible discovery.

This flower has bulbs that taste like potatoes and seed pods that taste like young peas. It also has a deadly look-alike, the Death Camas, so I am including the study of the the Sego Lily into our current lesson of Prepare and Pray.

This was our longest camping trip so far.  We left early last Thursday morning and didn't make it home until late afternoon on Sunday. So, much good came out of this trip. 

I learned:

• how to better gauge our water needs
  
  


• how to ration water
  
  


• that we need more water for bathing, washing, etc.
  
  


• that it would be nice to have a portable solar shower

I also decided that I need to plan a better menu for camping and learn to cook and use whole foods and foods from our food storage more, instead of hotdogs, chips, etc. 

And I need to add mouse traps to our supply list.  We have camped up there around 8 times this spring and we have never had a mouse problem . . . until I let my husband go up there alone with a couple boys last weekend. He did a great job leaving Earl in tip top shape, but he made one mistake that kept me up almost every night this last trip.  He left FOOD in the motorhome! Open boxes of cereal at that. 

I kept waking to scurrying and little noises and sure enough, found a bag of cookies with holes chewed in it.  I threw those away and put all the food in the pantry by the door. And in the morning I found mouse droppings in the cupboards and drawers.  And now, I knew why there were black rubber specks in the cupboard - one critter chewed on my pan handles.  

I picked up a live trap from the hardware store in town the next day and caught one that day. And needless to say, I am glad we brought the cat. She is such a good one.  I took the stove top off (where it was getting in at) and she sat there on the counter and waited, what seemed like forever, but she knew what I wanted from her. I fell asleep and woke up to Snowball, the kitten, playing with a dead mouse.  She ate the entire mouse! Ew. It was gross.  I left the trap with a small slice of swiss cheese, peanut butter and a small piece of cookie in it. . . AND removed ALL of the food before we left! What an adventure. 

Luke and Jordan did a good job clearing timber and building up our woodpile this trip. Luke bought Jordan his own chainsaw, and he was so excited.

There is an area where the road curves around to go to our cabin site, and they cleared some trees and raked up sticks and fallen branches and designated this as Creekside Park. We are naming areas of our land, like the Robinson's did in Swiss Family Robinson. A small seasonal creek runs through the park, so this will be a pretty sitting and playing area. 

Our plan is to develop 2 acres where we will build a cabin, garden, and raise some chickens and goats someday. The back 20 acres, we are planning to create a wildlife habitat and food plots. I am reading Grow 'Em Right; A Guide to Creating Habitat and Food Plots and am exploring how to create food plots and sanctuaries for wild game. 

And here is Falconhurst, Jordan's fort in-the-making. It is quite a large structure that he built with trees that had naturally fallen and created a tent like structure that he is filling in with branches to create a shelter. 

He even made himself an outhouse (which will have to be moved since his fort is in a dry creek) complete with a square holed toilet - for now - but he says he will be on the lookout for a toilet seat.  His fort is at the far right corner at the top of our property, so we cannot see it from our camp, but he can hear us when we whistle. :-) 

Here are a few pictures from a hike we took to Woodbine Falls.

I will post more pictures on my homeschool blog as a part of Prepare and Pray Lesson 12.



An update on our cabin plans - the inspector informed us that we cannot have a septic system after all due to the setback distances from the creek.  I am thankful for this door being closed. Really. I wanted a composting toilet and a grey water system all along. :-) We are still looking into a rain water catch system and asked for that in our quote from the contractor.  We also priced materials and would love to buy some materials while the prices are so low.

I have decided that I am not going to go up every weekend to work. I am getting behind on my work at home. We are all staying home this weekend because Luke has soccer camp next week and needs to be prepared.  I need to go through truckloads of stuff for a garage sale and work on homeschool stuff.  I encouraged Luke to make a few future trips with just the boys. I think it would be good for them. :-)