My little greenhouse

          

     As the spring equinox energies emerge, the days get longer.

     
                  The earth warmer.

                        The cool air, and the hot play tug o-war creating mini bursts of wind swirling unsuspecting tumbleweeds into the air.

                        As the seeds are planted.

                        As they grow.

                        Something in the trees, the earth, the air, the sky, the grass, the birds, emerge.

            Our souls are warmer.

             Light feels whiter.

            The earth feels gentler.

             You can see the earth's aliveness everywhere you look.

            It's always been here.

            Though eyes may have not seen it.

Springtime equinox. The balancing of light, and dark.

            The worms, and grubs start moving about, and so do the birds.

            Me too.

            Spring is trying. But the wind, and the cold, and the warm battle it out, pulling and tugging. Spring...no winter...spring...winter...

            Unsure....

            I feel it in myself. The hibernation of winter, and life flowing back into my leaves.

            The clouds have been spectacular, some days. Beautiful, puffy.

            The next day, murky, cold.

            Some days it's so hot it feels like summer.

            But many days it's just cold, and windy.

            On such cold days, I like to seek refuge from the wind in my little Apocryphal house for plants. My little greenhouse tucked away, hidden and looking like a chicken coup from the outside.

            Green, and lovely, and warm, and living on the inside.

            The other day, I planted some tomatoes, basal, chamomile, lettuce, and random flowers, and seeds I gathered over the summer. And now many are popping out of the ground. If they make it, it's anyone's guess. Mostly, I'm happy to see green.

            In the corner I have some pomegranate seeds sprouting up. I had forgotten I had planted them months ago. I guess they decided it was getting warm enough to poke their heads out.

            My black cat, bug, likes to come and ask me to let him in the greenhouse. As he has good feelings associated with my little space.

            He has been my honorary mouse scout. He knows it's warm in there, and last time I put him and my other cat in there, puma. Within seconds, he pounced on a mouse, and played with it until the other cat, gobbled it up. Gulp.

            I love my little greenhouse.

            It is my sacred space---my little ashram. I covered the walls with white plaster, and a mix of fine silica sand, much like I imagine the Pyramids to be made of.  It is green, and white, and warm, and a perfect, hidden space.

       

     It is a habitat for mice, and cats, and plants, and feral things like myself, that prefer peace, and earthy wild things. The chickens will peek at me through the windows, and wait for me to cut them some grasses. Sometimes they are lucky. Sometimes not.

Though it scares me sometimes, thinking how close my plants are to the greedy chickens.

But the mice....oh.

            I would prefer that the mice did not like it.

             I decided I needed to restore balance to my little greenhouse so the mice don't eat up my sprouts.  The mice had had made nests in my pots, and burrowed into my dormant turmeric tubers. I didn't realize how serious it was getting until I realized they were creeping through my grass, living in all the cracks and crannies, gobbling up grain I was soaking overnight for my chickens to eat.

            I had made a little bucket trap, that spins, and caught several, and fed them to the chickens. But it wasn't cutting down on the population. 

            I detest the use of any kind of poison. So to restore balance, I brought in the help of two of my cats. And they were very happy to help out.

            With me, I brought my little singing bowl. And sat, cross legged on the grass, and let the mice know it was time to go. My cats concentration seemed to get stellar.

            I watched my cat watch a mouse that was hiding in my little, ity, bitty, cooker oven. (not lit) It was just hiding in there. The cat, and the mouse were both looking at each other. Both flickering their whiskers. Both in the same still zone.

            And I, the goddess of the whole affair, looked on, with my singing bowl playing, and my cat's tail twitching, and the mouse's eyes glistening.

            It felt strangely primal, and right.

            The mouse ritual.

            They had taken over my sanctuary.

            And I was giving them fair warning.

            It was time to reclaim my space, to set firmer boundaries.

            I wanted my sprouts to grow in peace.

            The cats did a good job.

            I left them in there for a while, and came back and found a pile of furry cat puke.

            The little coats of the mice.

            As morbid as the whole affair, they had restored balance to my sacred space.

After which, I mixed up a big pile of cement, sprinkled it with peppermint flakes, as mice don't like peppermint, and sealed off all their many holes they had burrowed beneath the walls.

    I celebrated, and planted some seeds.

 Though one little mouse just does not give up.

            He burrowed beneath my cement.

Foggy picture from the humid greenhouse

            I came back. And filled in the hole.

            The next night, he burrowed another hole beneath that.

            So more cement.

            Yet again, he went around it.

            I came again and filled it in.

            I don't know how many times I did this.

            Then he found a loose spot in the cement and pushed through that, making a teeny hole---a perfect cave.

            The little poop turd!

            So I filled that hole with rocks, and cemented it again!!

            He then went round and dug a different hole creating another cement cave on the opposite wall. 

            So yesterday, I went round the greenhouse, and filled in the hole from the outside.

            I'm not sure what else to do about it.

            I'll have to check to see if he has gotten through again. Yesterday I noticed one of my watermelon sprouts was missing a head.

            Last year I had some lovely squash seeds they ate all up. So I'm not going to give up either.

              Not only that.

            I have flats of lovely grain sprouts that I like to cut the tops off and juice. So I don't want any mice creeping around through their tufts. I love my grain sprouts.

            I love drinking green juice.

            It's like eating liquid sunlight.

            Chlorophyll.

            Yum.

         

   I have some I've sprouted in the house. Mostly because I love looking at the grass in the kitchen.

            I like having greenstuffs in all my spaces. It makes my heart happy. It seems appropriate, because earth, and heart both have the same letters. So it stands to reason growing things --- or just by looking at them brings calm, and peace.

          

            To make my own delicious green sunlight. I use sprouting flats. Or some garden flats with holes them. In my garden flats I put dirt at the bottom, for the seeds to grow---so they don't grow mold quite as fast. The flats I fill with dirt go in my green house. And I get a few trimmings out of them before I have to start again.

         

   The sprouting flats in the house, use only water. They grow mold pretty fast. But the grain also grows fast, as well.

            To make the indoor flats. I first soak the grain in water until I see their shells bursting. Then I lay the sprouted wheat out on the flats, and put water underneath--in the water wells. And make sure that they stay moist until they send roots to the water.

      Once they've reached a good height. I snip them with scissors. Wash the greens. And put them in my blender with water. Then I use a strainer and strain out the juice.

            Then I add a teaspoon of stevia powder for sweetening, and some lemon juice and stick it in the fridge.

            It is some good juice.

            It feels alive, and full of good chi.

          The sprouts are getting tall and shaggy again. ( I have zero idea why my font has changed) Anway I hate to snip their tops of, as I think they are yummy for my eyes to look at. I usually give them a very slanty haircut. But choices have to be made, especially if you enjoy the green for the eyes, and green for the juice.  That is probably what I'm going do after writing this. Though I dropped a heavy item on my foot this morning, and feel like I might have broke/sprained some part of it. And I'm not sure how long I want to stand on it. But we'll see how much I want to drink fresh green juice.