Category Archives: make a difference

so you want to plant some seeds…

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A lot of people have asked me lately, “Is it time to plant?” and “What should I plant right now?”

Here in Arizona, we are coming out of the dregs of summer. If you were dedicated, you may still have some plants in your garden that are thriving: peppers, chiles, eggplant, okra, and melons or squash. The rest of you have a bunch of dried up sticks. But never fear! It’s time to bust out the shovels and rakes once again! It’s time to plant all the things!

What do I plant?:

-leafy greens: including lettuce, kale, spinach, swiss chard, celery, mustard, bok choy, arugula, parsley, cilantro (all of these grow GREAT in pots too, so if you are one of those people with no actual “garden” then plant these (seeds are fine) and stick them in full sun.) You don’t need to cut the head either, you just pull the leaves off the plant and it keeps making more! Neverending salad! Also, swiss chard is an amazing one to have because not only is it a good looking plant, but you can eat the leaves in a salad or saute them with butter and garlic. I find the leaves to have a nice umami flavor-it’s a bit salty.

-broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower: And if you usually don’t like these, it’s probably because you’ve never had it fresh. These particular vegetables get really bitter when old. So give it a go.

-root vegetables: carrots (rainbow variety is fun!), parsnips, radishes, turnips, BEETS!!!!

-snowpeas and peas

-onions, leeks, garlic

 

How do I plant them?:

You need to ask yourself some questions:

-Where do I have FULL SUN? This means sun all of the day? None of this shady area of the yard nonsense or morning sun stuff-winter vegetables need ALL OF THE SUN.

-In this sunny area, will a garden bed fit or am I going with pots?

-How much money do I have? Starting from seeds is the cheapest way to go. But, you get the most production from plants starts. (Also, in order to get Brussel sprout production, you need to start with starter plants. Trust me, the season just isn’t long enough in Phoenix for the plant to develop sprouts. Garden beds can be as expensive and elaborate or as basic and cheap as you want. You will need to and compost and soil amendments to your soil. And a can of earthworms doesn’t hurt either. You can get your soil tested to be super scientific if you are into that, but I’m really lazy, so I would just dig up that part of the yard and add in as many bags of compost that you can afford.

-Drip system or hose watering?

 

Once you figure out what and where, it’s how:

Next, is the actual shoving seeds into the ground part. This sounds easy, but it actually takes a long time. It’s super fidgety. Go get yourself some wooden shims or stakes and a sharpie too so you can label all the things.

-Open your packets with scissors. (organic seeds are way awesomer, so buy them from a nursery or the internets) Tearing the packets open gets seeds caught in them.

-You pretty much follow the planting instructions on the packet. (But the general rule is the tinier the seed, the closest to the top of the soil it goes.) Almost every seed will sprout, but not always. You plant and bunch of seeds, you wait and wait until you think nothing is ever going to happen, then they all start coming up and you have to “thin” them. This means, you have to rip out a whole bunch of sprouts so as they grow into plants, they don’t crowd each other out. Expect this especially with carrots. Those stupid seeds are so tiny, and if you don’t accidentally spill half of them, you’ll lose your mind at another point and simply start sprinkling them down anyway.

-Water water water. Seeds in the ground=watering three to four times a day. You have to keep the soil moist until the seeds sprout and the roots develop. Once that happens (they look like little plants, then you can back off on the watering.

 

From here, it’s a matter of thinning and weeding. Any questions?

interview series! jeff moriarty!

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Hooray! My interview series is back by underwhelming demand! This first interview* is actually the last interview from the previous series. I, uh, couldn’t manage to gather my thoughts enough to post it last time, and Jeff was so gracious about helping me wrap it up to post this time! So thanks Jeff!

Jeff Moriarty and I originally met through The Internet. I think. He’s pretty famous on the Phoenix scene because he constantly works to make the metro area a more creative place built on community. He’s been a founder or an organizer for several really cool events like Ignite Phoenix, Social Media Club, and ImprovAZ. If you heard about all those people riding the light rail here in Phoenix in their knickers or the flash mob dressed like Where’s Waldo at Tempe Marketplace , you can blame Jeff.

 

 

Jamie: Tell us a little about yourself.

Jeff: I have two knees that work well. I have a back and neck that don’t, due to car crash when I was younger. My hair has never killed a man. I believe in change, in motion, in exploration. Savor the world around you, but don’t take it too seriously. Find something new, for as much as you know there is infinitely more about which you have not a clue.

 

Jamie: “Not taking your world too seriously,” why did you develop that philosophy?

Jeff: Not taking the world seriously isn’t a philosophy I cultivated with intent. I got a dose of reality when I was very young, and it made me very sullen, quiet, and bitter. I kept chasing that darkness until I finally started to laugh. Laughter is about pain. It is a primal noise we make to each other, like monkeys hooting in the treetops, when we find a shared element of the human condition. Look at any joke, any funny story, and you will find at its heart a story of someone being embarrassed, hurt, confused, mocked, or otherwise suffering. Laughter is how we release that fear, for ourselves and others. Once I saw that, it became hard to take the world seriously. It’s not like any of us are going to get out of it alive.

 

Jamie: For someone with so public a presence, you are very private. Why?

Jeff: I just don’t think there is that much interesting about me worth sharing. Plus, because very little offends me I have a tendency to upset people with some things I say and do if I’m not careful. So I’d much rather explore and share with other people. And make them laugh, of course.

 

(photo credit: Joe Abbruscato)

 

Jamie: Tell us an imaginary story about how you met your wife.

Jeff: It was my last assignment. The Sensei had promised me. Few Ninja were allowed to walk away freely, so I suspected a trap. The assassinations went well, as did the bank robbery, the government overthrow, the cooking of dinner, and the counting of all the grains of sand on the beach. For others, perhaps difficult, but such is the value of training. When the clowns finally came, I was ready. Their noses and flowers, the honking and squirting, it was a sordid affair. But at the end, covered in meringue though I was, I stood triumphant. The woman who was to be my wife saw it all. An innocent bystander to the carnage of the Big Top Smack Down, and she did not flinch. I knew then I would marry her as the first act of my newfound freedom. She ran fast and far, but I am tireless and I know mind control.

 

Jamie: Which do you like better: Ignite Phoenix or Improv AZ? (And you have to pick one so we can start a controversy.)

Jeff: I like Ignite Phoenix better than ImprovAZ because it allows people to showcase their passions, but I also love ImprovAZ more than Ignite Phoenix because it pushes people out of their comfort zone and makes them someone new. I like recursion, because it is recursion, and also recursion.

 

(photo credit: Ruth Carter)

 

Jamie: What has been your favorite Ignite Phoenix presentation ever. (And they are not like children-you can have a favorite!)

Jeff: Not trying to be evasive, but “favorite” is tough with Ignite presentations. There are funny ones, insightful ones, powerful ones, brave ones, well-presented ones, creative ones, influential ones, etc. One might be Luz Galusha-Luna’s “Typography as Personality” that she gave at the PodCamp Ignite we did. Wish the sound was better, because she did SUCH a good job conveying her passion outside her field.
Another favorite is Michael Wasserman’s talk about The Humanities in the 21st Century. Many people didn’t think this sounded like a very compelling topic, but Michael’s articulate, insightful view about the neglected role of the Humanities in modern education completely captured the audience and is one of the best Ignite Phoenix talks we’ve had.  But if I had to make my Favorite Playlist, it would probably be about 16 or so in there.

 

jamie: batman or superman?
jeff: I’m heterosexual, so I would not date either one.

 

jamie: please share an internet link (or two…)

jeff:

Bread People

Kim Jong Il Looking At Things

KHAAAAN!

 

I sat with Jeff this afternoon to get a couple of shots for this interview, and it was a beautiful conversation. I was reminded why I started these interviews in the first place. Jeff is a special person. He has these intense eyes, and he doesn’t flinch. And incredibly expressive hands. I like Jeff even more than I did this morning. I hope after reading this interview, you know what I mean. And feel free, as before, to ask Jeff your own questions in the comments.

Also, follow him on Twitter.

 

(*One thing you may notice about this next series is that I decided to use capitalization because it is fancier. And I am nothing if not fancy.)

laundry detergent

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i like doing laundry.

i like ironing.

i can use it as an excuse to knit and watch the television.

well, you can’t knit and iron, but you get the idea.

anyway, i made my own detergent the other day using a recipe that ashley posted.

it was pretty easy, and once made, i poured it into my old laundry detergent container with the pour spout.

the nice part is saving money, and using the individual ingredients for other uses.

next i’ll be making homemade dishwasher detergent once my old store bought runs out.

grande seda

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phew!

i finally finished the grande seda project by mirasol.

it’s a lovely horizontal cabled shrug/vest.

i used the recommended yarn called wach’i made of cotton and silk.

the pattern suggested a frog closure but i will probably stick with a shawl pin.

mirasol is a fantastic company in peru doing community projects.

they create beautiful yarn and write lovely patterns.

check out more about mirasol yarns and the community centers they build here.

interview with emily

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I met Emily when I met her parents Jim and Joy. She’s the younger sister of Hannah, and she has two more younger sisters as well. Emily is a firecracker. She’s tough yet full of passion. She isn’t afraid to tell you what she’s thinking and I know this girl is going places. I enjoyed our interview, and I encourage you to share your thoughts or ask her questions in the comments below.

JM: Please tell us a little about yourself.

ES: i am almost sixteen (finally!) and i am a sophomore at a high school i love. i moved to this school from a dinky little charter school in Gilbert. the academic portion of the school was not up to par (and some of the kids weren’t that great either). i like to read and i do it constantly. writing is one of my favorite past times and i like to think I’m really good at it. i like school not just because of the friends I’ve made but because of my really cool teachers and just the feeling of being a part of a big school. i am in the ASL (American sign language) club and i am trying to find ways to become more involved in my school. i have a dog who is my pride and joy. she is such a character and i love her so very much. i like to sing and music is very important to me. i use it as an escape from my surroundings. walks are my favorite medicine and i take one whenever i can. I’ve been told that i always look upset and angry but I’m actually a quite serious person. i think a lot about everything. i am a very loud and opinionated person and i have no problem telling people what i feel. i am always there for my friends and i am (a lot of the time) the person they come to for help. i like being there and comforting them, and helping them through whatever problems i can. i may not seem like it sometimes, but i am a very compassionate person.


JM: Why did you choose to be in the ASL club?

ES: i’ve always been interested in learning a new language and i have yet to come upon one that is really interesting to me. i like the idea of knowing someone who can speak the same language as me but in a different way, like sign language. so i’ve begun with the group and next year i can take the actual class.


JM: This is the middle of your first year at a new high school. But you didn’t go to one of the feeder junior highs, you decided to leave a small charter school. Tell us about how and why you made that decision, and how has it panned out?

ES: my mom and i had been talking about me going to mountain view for a long time. it’s close to home and its where my mom used to go so she was a little biased. after my last year of junior high at a charter school in gilbert we decided that i would not be going back; mainly because the academics were not up to par. after a lot of struggling (on mostly my part) we decided mtn view would be the best place for me. it has worked out better than i expected. i fit in well and i have lots of friends. i enjoy doing all of the true high school things like joining clubs and going to football games. it’s a perfect fit.


(photo credit: Hannah Schroeder)


JM: You have a good relationship with your parents. What advice would you give to other kid’s parents if they wanted to have a good relationship with their kids?

ES: the reason i get along so well with my parents is because my parents are very open and that helps me to be open with them. they are very understanding and helpful and they do their best to not bring me down or get mad at me for my mistakes. they do their best to help me up, dust me off, and prepare me for the next big crisis (as a teenage girl i have a lot of those). parents just need to remember that every kid is different. they can’t hold their children back from who they want to be. and they can’t be condescending. children need help sometimes but parents can’t hold their hand throughout their whole lives. let go and let the child live and screw up. if parents hold on too tight their relationship with their children will become complicated and strained and that’s not good for anyone.


JM: You’ve been involved with some social activism in the last couple of years. Could you name a group that you are involved with and why you believe in the cause?

ES: i have been involved in some social activism. invisible children and laundry love are two of the organizations i have been involved with the most. laundry love is an organization my parents came upon that helps those who cannot pay for their laundry. my family, along with some other family friends, go to a local laundromat once a month and pay for people’s laundry. i have gone to a few protests and i always enjoy standing up for what i think is right. sticking up for the underdog is a priority of mine and when i feel like someone is being treated unfairly i will confront the situation head on. like when the person in charge of a peaceful protest is yelling at a pastor who made comments about our president and gay people. yes that has happened before. :) people are people and we all need to be treated like what we are, human.


JM: What is Laundry Love?

ES: laundry love is an organization that my parents found out about from one of their friends. we go to a laundromat the first friday of every month and we pay for people’s laundry, whoever shows up. it’s been lots of fun and the people i’ve met are really nice and happy to share their stories.


JM: what do you think of those television shows about teen mothers and fathers?

ES: i find that the shows about teen parents are not trying to over glamorize the idea of becoming pregnant at a young age, like most of our society today. while giving them their own tv show and paying them may give others the idea to get pregnant and on tv is a bad idea, they don’t try to show that it’s a good thing. the tv shows show how complicated life will really be for everyone in the family. so yes i like them, but people may not have the best of intentions when trying to get on the show.


JM: Do you have an internet link you’d like to share?

ES: the only link i would like to share is for to write love on her arms. this organization is very important to me and has helped me a lot throughout the last 2 or 3 years. i want people to learn more about it and realize what they do and how they are helping people.

http://www.twloha.com/

to write love on her arms is a non profit organization that helps teens and adults with addiction, depression, and different forms of self mutilation. they have people you can email and talk to and if you go on their website you can share your story. the staff even travel and speak at different cities around the nation. their purpose is to create a community of people who can all talk and share stories and just be there for each other. sometimes sharing your story and admitting you have a problem is the hardest and most helpful part of the journey.


(photo credit: Hannah Schroeder)

interview with hannah

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I met Hannah because she is the teenage daughter of my friends Joy and Jim. Hannah has become a friend of mine. She is smart and beautiful, and I can’t even begin to tell you what a creative and gentle soul she is. I have faith in the future because of her.

JM: Please tell us a little about yourself.

HS: I am currently a junior at Gilbert Classical Academy, a college prep school.  And when they say college prep, they mean it.  I can definitely say that the amount of work that is given to college students does not faze me at all, it is the idea of the adult-like maturity and responsibilities that I will need to quickly adapt to while living by myself that is scary.  As you can tell, college has probably been the number one thing on my mind recently.  (Or at least somewhere in the top five).  I do not intend to go to school in state after I graduate.  No, it is not that I have a problem with the local schools, in fact, they’re actually not bad.  I have lived in Arizona my whole life and I almost feel that if I don’t leave when I have the chance, I will be stuck.  And plus, I want some seasons other than summer.  For college, I want to either go into the field of education or global public health…anything that has to do with helping kids.  I love kids.  After I get my BA or BS (whichever it happens to be…still in the process of deciding if I want to take a more artsy or medical route), I plan to join the Peace Corps.  From there I think I will decide if I would rather get my Masters and continue on in my field on my own or stay with the Peace Corps.  And somewhere in there, there will be a marriage and babies but that’s not necessarily something that can be planned.

That’s academic/goals side of me.  I also enjoy music; listening and playing.  I have been playing the cello for seven, going on eight years now, took bass guitar lessons for a couple years because it’s similar to the cello, I am a self-taught, amateur guitarist (don’t expect me to be a prodigy – I’m not), and recently I’ve had a fascination with trying to learn piano.  The only instrument that I can read music for is the cello.  All of my musical endeavors were started due to a sort of domino effect – the cello triggered the bass, the bass led to the guitar, the guitar led me to the piano.  And none of it would have happened without my mom.  When I was going into fourth grade, my mom told me that she had always loved cello music; loved the way the cello sounded.  She wanted to play it when she was younger, but her teacher was mean, so she quit.  And that was it for me.  That year I joined the orchestra.  And my very first year, I hated it.  At first, I couldn’t understand how to read the music and I had to learn all my songs by ear, which really frustrated me.  Of course, my mom wouldn’t let me quit.  And thank God for that, because I would have quit in a heartbeat.  It seemed unfair then, but I look back now and realize what a pivotal point that was for me.  If it hadn’t been for my mom, I would never have thought to play a musical instrument.  Ever.

So…there’s a little peek into the inner-workings of Hannah.


JM: You are a creative person. Since I’ve known you, you’ve explored music, painting, and photography. What does art mean to you?

HS: For me, art is a catharsis.  It is expressing the elements about yourself that cannot be communicated through words.  It’s my stress reliever; my hobby; It’s in my genes.  It’s always on my mind.  I view my world as a photograph – I am always trying to see the image in front of me as I would through my lens.  I want to see the objects in front of me as the finished product in my head before I even pull the camera towards my eyes or put the pencil to paper.

Art is life.  It is in everything everyone does all the time.  Everyone does things in a different way…to me, that’s art.  To take something – an essay topic, a room, a pair of shoes, a piece of paper, a website, a sandwich – and put a little bit of yourself into it is art.  People are beautiful, and to take an object and make it show the elements of your unique beauty can only be defined as art.  Art’s in everything and everyone.  It is everything and everyone.




JM: You are a social activist. What drives you to care about others when so many teens are driven by popularity and the “mean girl” culture?

HS: For me, it’s difficult to understand why anyone would be motivated by the “mean girl” culture.  It might be genetics; my parents are caring people.  It could just be the way they were brought up, and likewise the way I was brought up.  My parents always told me 1. to treat others the way I would like to be treated, 2. to put others first, and 3. would you like it if I did that to you?  Of course, this all stemmed out of the “conservative Christian” way of life that they had at the time, but the lessons are still valuable and important to me.  So naturally, I grew up asking myself if I would appreciate it if so-and-so was mean to me, and acting on those thoughts versus whether or not what I was about to do would make me happy.  I can really appreciate the example my parents set for me when the church wasn’t able to.  Some of it is just being willing to acknowledge my own hypocrisy and that of others, and trying to deal with it instead of turning a blind eye.  It’s amazing to me how a church Sunday-school can teach children songs about wanting to be sheep (followers of Jesus) versus Pharisees, yet turn out the biggest batch of Pharisees I have ever seen in my life.  It’s amazing how people can claim to follow Jesus – the guy who hung out with hookers, tax collectors, thieves, murderers and the like – yet so strongly oppose those very people – the out-casts, the different ones – that he had an explicit love for.

But back to teens…I’ll be honest, teenagers are selfish.  Possibly the MOST selfish people on the face of the earth.  American teens, that is.  Or teens from any other country as privileged as America.  And we’ll try to deny it, but it’s so obvious that the only person on our minds is ourselves.  We’ve never had to work for anything, thus automatically assuming we deserve everything, and never appreciating that which we do have.  And I think this goes for a lot of adults too.  To me…something seems amiss with this whole mentality.

Some people see activism as a negative thing, which is something that I all together do not understand.  How can the desire to help people be bad?  I may be a “bleeding heart”, but at least I have a heart to bleed from.  I don’t know…sometimes it seems that it should be common sense and common decency to treat others the way we want to be treated, to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes, to care about people.  I know for a fact that if I was a little girl in Africa who had contracted HIV and I knew there was someone out there rich enough to pay for my vaccination, I would want them to do so.  I think we all need to go back to Kindergarten when we were taught to share with others, to be kind, to use our inside voices (notice how many people that get air-time are extremists?), to treat others with respect, and to be kind.  Obviously, we didn’t get it the first time.


JM: can you attach a drawing or a photo that you’ve created?

HS: Sure can!



JM: Would you like to share an internet link with us?

HS: How about…5 million links?  Just kidding, I don’t have THAT many, but I will have to narrow it down quite a bit…how about my top five?

http://www.invisiblechildren.com/about

http://www.endhumantrafficking.org/about

http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf/about/aboutus-home

http://theywilldie.org/

http://www.toms.com/our-movement/
Funny story about the first link.  I was just perusing photo bucket, looking for pictures of Africa for a school project/presentation type thing when I came across a picture that said children are born with these arms (picture of arms) not these (picture of guns).  This really piqued my interest, so I typed in the web address that was in the corner (invisiblechildren.com) and read all about it…it’s incredible, really.  As an American, it’s so hard to imagine that people live like that…anyways.  You just have to check it out.  Educate yourselves…the websites for those organizations are EXPONENTIALLY cooler than Facebook can ever dream to be.



I want to thank Hannah for taking the time to answer my questions and be so open and honest. Please feel free to ask her any questions in the comments below.