I made it into a New York Times article today about going without air conditioning. Check it out!

Summer is flying by

I can't believe it's July already!

Most of my work ends up happening on the computer, so when I'm not at work I don't feel so much like computer stuff, so the blog is suffering. Especially with so much gardening to do!

There has been a lot going on in our lives though that is worth blogging about. June was a busy month. I went to Jefferson City for the Missouri Poverty Summit, for stimulating discussions and presentations about the issues surrounding poverty and ways we can continue working to end it. We drove out to Parker Farms for the annual CSA get t0gether, and then one more time to fulfill our delivery duties. (CSA means community supported agriculture.)

Last week (the week that was 10 or more degrees over the average for June) I got to get out of this office for the week and paint houses. Jewell and the Center for Justice & Sustainability sponsored the Matthew 25 Project for which we partnered local groups from different racial, economic, and religious backgrounds from throughout Kansas City to join together and paint houses for some folks who couldn't afford it, thus preventing them from getting ridiculous fines from the city. Yes, the city writes citations for having chipped or peeling paint. I know because we currently have an outstanding citation on our record! We'll let you know how that works out for us.

Last weekend Trinity and I headed to St. Louis for my 10 year high school reunion. It was great to see so many old friends from high school and catch up with what everyone's been doing.

The highlight of the last few weeks has been the KC Center for Urban Agriculture's Urban Farms Tour. We went to a couple of seminars about different aspects of urban gardening/farming, and visited a few city farms too. Our wheels are spinning with crazy ideas of turning our backyard garden into a working farm business, and we've even been looking at empty lots in our neighborhood for expansion! Just to whet our appetite a bit, we have planted way more sweet potato slips than we could ever eat on our own (if they do well), so we might have some sweet potatoes for you to buy this fall. We'll see!