March Meeting: Make your backyard welcoming to wildlife

Carol Buie Jackson, the owner of Bird House on the Greenway in the shops at Piper Glenn, believes we are losing our relationship with nature and with it, the understanding that how we live impacts the world around us. She said her goal is to get people to reduce the grass in their years and create more natural areas with native plants to support our native wildlife.

Birds are the canary in the coal mine as indicators that the environment is out of balance, she said.  Habitat loss is the single biggest threat to wildlife, yet we continue to clear cut land for development, removing the natural habitat for the wildlife.  Concrete is a contributing factor to drought as the water runs off vs. soaking into the ground and replenishing the ground water. 

Grass is the single largest crop the US grows – 40 million acres.  By using a regular gas powered mower for 1 hour  it produces the equivalent pollutants of driving 650 miles in a car. 
Wildlife needs four things to survive:
* Habitat – trees, bushes and other plants
* Food – each bird, animal, butterfly and insect is dependent upon different food sources
* Water – clean water at different levels. Note: water in bird baths needs to be changed every other day. It takes 3 days for mosquitos to form in standing water. Changing water every other day will help eliminate mosquitos
* Shelter – birds nests, houses, underbrush for rabbits, wooded areas for snakes. They need a safe place to raise their young, where mother birds can see predators coming

The biggest thing you can do: Reduce your grass and plant native plants. Find a list of native plants at ncwildlifenetwork.com and ncwildflower.org.

Want to watch the butterfly life cycle? Plant parsley and watch and wait for a caterpillar to begin eating it (the Eastern Black Swallowtail love parsley). Capture the caterpillar and place it in a glass jar with holes in the lid with a piece of the parsley. You can watch the caterpillar create the chrysalis and then the butterfly will form.

Want more information? Carol's website is http://smelllikedirt.wordpress.com.

February Meeting: Top Tips for a Fresh Start

 

Melissa Zook with Fresh Start Nutrition shared her top tips for a fresh start at eating healthy, losing weight and more. A lot of the information she shared was on the handout or this page of her website but here are a few highlights that weren’t included, along with links to some of the products and recipes she mentioned.

• Detox diets. Nobody really needs these, because your liver and skin do everything. If you want to try one, try cutting out caffeine, alcohol and processed and packaged foods. Read Melanie’s other recommendations on doing a soft detox diet.

• Constantly look for ways to add veggies to your diet. Add them to soups, oatmeal, smoothies, snacks, etc. Put carrots and celery sticks on your sandwich. Frozen are just as good if not better than fresh.
• Green smoothies and popsicles. Her favorite recipe includes mangos, banana, fresh baby spinach (not frozen) and plain yogurt (not vanilla) Her go-to machine for smoothies is the Vitamix. Freeze them in push-up silicone ice pop makers.
• Oatmeal with a twist. Make a big pot on Sunday, put it in the fridge and take out some every day and add different things to it. Frozen blueberries are great for cooling it off. Other variations: pumpkin, nuts, dried fruit and pumpkin pie spice. Peanut butter. Chopped up frozen pineapple and coconut. Or make half of it with eggnog. Avoid instant sweetened packages.

• Why her family drinks 1% milk. Some whole foods advocates drink whole milk because it’s less processed, but she still worries about its high saturated fat. Because you need fat to help your body absorb vitamins, your body won’t absorb the extra vitamin A and D that it needs if you drink skim milk. So her family drinks 1%. The alternative milks are fine, too, but look for ones that are calcium and Vitamin D fortified. Some people also avoid milks with carrageenan, which is found in many soy and almond milks.
• Why she uses mostly glass storage containers. Even if the plastic is BPA free, plastics are polymers made form chemicals and you don’t know what chemical will be in the news next. 
• Mango ice cream. One of her family’s favorites, you simply mix plain greek yogurt, honey and frozen mangos in your vitamix or blender. Another favorite mango treat: mango popsicles, made by blending V8 fusion, mangos and carrots, pouring them into stainless steel popsicle molds and freezing.
• Eating organic. Stretch your food dollar by choosing organic wisely. She buys dairy and many fruits and veggies organic.
• Juicing/juices. You end up with a lot of sugar and miss out on all the good fiber that you need. No one needs juice, not even kids. If you do give it to them, make sure it’s no more than 4 ounces and water it down.
• Why you probably don’t need more protein. Most Americans get double the protein they need. It’s in almost every food except fruits. Avoid protein bars, which tend to be processed and tax your liver. You don’t need protein drinks either. (There may be an exception if you’re a professional bodybuilder or a marathon runner or something)
• On portion control. Use a smaller plate and never eat straight from the package.
• Spoil your dinner. It’s actually better to have five to six small meals a day so go ahead and fix yourself or your kids a healthy snack.
• The perfect snack. You need a healthy fat, protein and fiber. That way you will have your blood sugar under control, plus you’ll feel sated and satisfied. A few examples: An apple with a handful of almonds, a banana with peanut butter, hummus and red pepper. More ideas are on her site.
• Plan your snacks. Plan in advance and have them available at work, in your car and at home. She keeps clear bins – one in her pantry and the other in her fridge – filled with pre-portioned healthy snacks.
• Choosing peanut butter. No Jif or Skippy. Nothing that has “partially hydrogenated” in the ingredient list (that’s trans fat – the worst). Smuckers natural is good. She goes organic because the kids eat a lot of it and they grow underground, so they absorb a lot of pesticides. You can also make your own by throwing some peanuts in the blender.
• Supplements you need. Most women need a good multivitamin, omega 3s, probiotics and vitamin D. She sells supplements she believes in for kids and adults.
• The best oils. Use extra virgin olive oil (not light) or canola oil (if you need it to be hot) to cook with, real organic butter to have flavor. Avoid vegetable oil and corn oil.

• Other stuff on her site: Her favorite items for a healthy kitchen, her dark chocolate walnut oatmeal cookie recipe and her make-ahead mixes for creamy soups, homemade chocolate syrup, whole wheat pancakes and more.

Bonus Meeting: Making giant, lighted holiday ornaments

Bonus Meeting: Making giant, lighted holiday ornaments

 

Maybe you saw them hanging last year from the trees in Jill and Matt Jones' front yard, or maybe you've seen them in other parts of town: these illuminated holiday balls look gorgeous during the holiday season!  In Greensboro, where Jill is from, they are so popular that many streets are lined with house after house of lighted Christmas ornaments.

On Sunday, Nov. 4, Matt Jones taught about 20 members of the club how to make them. And it was easy!!  For those of you who missed the workshop or who want to make more, here's how to do it:

Materials:

A 4-foot length of chicken wire (1" mesh)

A pair of work gloves

Two strands of 100-count mini Christmas lights

Wire cutters

3-prong, outdoor adapters

Outdoor extension cords

Instructions: 

1. Trim a 4-foot length of wire from the roll.

2. Form the cut ends into a cylinder, overlap by a few inches and begin twisting the cut ends together.

3. Next, close one end of the cylinder by folding in three or four sides, similar to how you would wrap the edges of a gift, and twist their edges together. Then do the other side of the cylinder. You can use small cut pieces of wire to hold pieces together if necessary.

3. Keep molding the wire until it resembles a sphere

4. Loop the male end of the first strand of lights through the wire, secure it with a simple knot and  wrap the lights around the ball, trying to cover as much area as possible.

5. Plug the second strand into the female end of the first strand  and finish stringing the lights around the ball. Tie off the female end of the lights to secure it in place. 

6. You may want to leave a long end hanging off to connect to another ball wtihout an extension cord.

7. To get it into the tree, tie an extension cord to a heavy object and throw it over a branch. Then plug it into your first ball and hoist it up.

There's also a video here on how to make them.

We're looking forward to seeing all of your holiday balls this year in Govenor's Square!!!

October Meeting: Arranging bookshelves, mantles and coffee tables

October Meeting: Arranging bookshelves, mantles and coffee tables

Bronwyn Ford of Bronwyn Designs gave an interesting and insightful presentation at our October meeting in how to arrange bookshelves, mantles and coffee tables. A few highlights:

Bookshelves 

• Don't forget books: The No. 1 thing you need to have is books. Just vases and candles and pictures doesn't look real. Books add color, texture and height.. If you want to fill it up with books, great. Otherwise, you can fill in the extra spaces with interesting things.
• Other stuff to have: Bookends, paperweights, vessels (bowls, vases, boxes), framed photographs, 3D items and artwork. 
  
• Add depth: It's great to have some things toward the front of the shelves and some things toward the back. Artwork leaned against the back is fantastic for this. Also, pairs of things work well. 
• Have varying heights.
• Consider painting or using wallpaper on the back of your bookshelves. It really makes them pop.  
• Consider hanging artwork or mirrors on the front of your bookshelf
• Pull things together that are similar. Maybe it's a bunch of white things or things that are silver, or choose two objects of the same bright turquoise. 

Coffee Tables

•  A tray or basket: This is the No. 1 thing you ened to corral things like remote controls and magazines. Especially important if you have a soft coffee table.
• Choose objects that look good from all angles. No framed photographs or things that have backs. Good choices: Coffee table books (use them to make a pedestal for your bowl), vessels with something in them, pillar candles, ceramics, a magnifying glass (looks great on top of a pile of books) 
• Create groups of three.

Mantles 

• Pick a theme. Is this a country house or more modern?
• Basic steps: Center a large piece on the mantle. One one side, place items of varying height. ON the other side, add a vessel with some weight like a big vase. You can stop there or you can layer some framed pictures in a cluster on one side and balance the opposite side with a group of boxes.
• If you have a TV, either don't put anything on there or put a pair of vases on each side.
• In your fireplace, some ideas: pretty birch logs, a ton of candles of different heighs, a pretty screen, a big basket with dried hydrangeas

Other tips

• A great place to find beautiful boxes is Metrolina Tradeshow Expo, Sleepy Poet on South Boulevard or Cotswold Marketplace

 See Brownwyn's entire Powerpoint presentation, with all of her tips, here

Still have questions? Check out Bronwyn's website or reach her at 704-968-5099 or info@bronwyndesigns.com.

September Meeting: Fall Planting & Pruning

Trevor O'Reilly of TnT Lawnscapes, a landscaping and lawn care company that focuses on organic methods, was back to talk to us about fall planting and pruning. A few of his tips:

• Now is the time to aerate and seed your lawn. Because of our clay-like soil, aerating is essential for the health of your grass. 
• Do a soil test. It's not as hard as it sounds. Simply pick up some boxes at your local extension agent (the closest one is probably at 1418 Armory Drive off 7th Street), fill them with soil from your planting beds and your lawn and mail them in. You'll get back a report that tells you about the soil in each location and what it needs. (Hint: If you have trouble reading it, Trevor can help.)
• Plant new shrubs and trees in the fall, not the spring. All the Garden Centers have beautiful flowering shrubs and trees in the spring, but planting at that time of year is tough if you don't have an irrigation system. New plants often don't survive our hot summers, Trevor says: "Not watering for a week during a Charlotte summer can kill young trees and shrubs." A better idea? Plant in the fall or even in the winter, as long as the ground doesn't freeze.
• Don't just drop your new plant into the ground. Make sure you dig a hole at least twice the size of the root ball and mix some good stuff (peat moss, soil conditioner, sand) in with the clay. Also, don't forget to break up and loosen the root ball with a knife to encourage the roots to grow into the soil. If the plant has a burlap root ball wrapped with twine, just leave it on there; it will biodegrade. If it has a cage, put the root ball into the ground first, and then cut the cage.
• Winter is best for transplanting. Have some plants you want to move? Prune them first to ease the transition, and then do it when they're dormant in the winter. Dig out the biggest root ball you can and then follow the guidelines above. If it's a particularly big plant, you probably need heavy equipment and it may end up costing you less simply to remove it and buy a new plant. 
• Remember, plants grow. When you get a new plant, read the tag! If it says your Loropetulum will grow to be 8-feet-tall and 8-feet-wide, it really will grow that big, Trevor says. So don't plant it two feet from your house!
• Pruning Rule-Of-Thumb: Don't take off more than a third at any one time.  But you can take off a third this year and another third next year.

Here are two more resources that Trevor recommends:
Planting Techniques for Plans & Shrubs: http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/hil-601.html
Growing a Fall Vegetable Garden: http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/hort/hil/hil-8001.html
  
Have more questions or need someone to do the work for you? Call Trevor O'Reilly at 704-661-5697 or email him.

April Meeting: Making Compost

Drosera Capensis

Trevor O'Reilly of TnT Lawnscapes, a landscaping and lawn care company that focuses on organic methods, taught us about composting. Composting creates and improves soil and reduces land waste. A lot of what we throw away could be composted; a third of landfill waste is compostable.

The first step to composting is figuring out where you are want to put your compost pile. It can be as simple as a pile in the backyard or as fancy as an expensive roller composter. There are two methods for composting: hot and cold. Hot is faster and more complex; it needs to be in the sun and should stay wet to maintain heat. The cold method is slower and easier. To build a simple bin, start with larger sticks on the bottom to create air flow. Layer dry and moist yard waste; the yard waste needs to have nitrogen (weeds, grass, greens, rinsed egg shells) and carbon (pine needles, fall leaves, cow manure). You need to flip it as the leaves stick at the bottom. The next step is to collect items to compost, such as vegetable scraps from your kitchen (no meat) and yard waste (weeds are okay but unless they have started to produce seeds, though may want to avoid avocado seeds as they will grow and suck up all the nutrients). Trevor collects his kitchen scraps in a kitchen compost bin; it has two charcoal filters to reduce smells. He also uses a drosera capensis, a carnivorous plant that eats fruit flies, which tend to pop up around the scraps. Composting can take 3-4 months to produce usable compost but usually the average is a year. However, despite the work and patience, producing good nutrients for your yard that are natural and inexpensive have long reaching benefits.

March Meeting: 365 Nights, A Memoir of Intimacy

Charla Muller was our March guest. The author of 365 Nights, A Memoir of Intimacy, which chronicles the year that she promised her husband sex every night for a year as a gift for his 40th birthday, and the stronger marriage that resulted as they made intimacy a priority. After the year was over, Charla met a book agent who encouraged her to write the story about the memorable year. When the book was published, she was interviewed on Oprah, Today Show, The View, and NY Times, among others. She shared with us her "Five Lessons Learned" as a result of her "year" and the resulting media attention.

1. Intention is Everything: Charla read an article once that said that if you could take a snapshot of your day, you would see what is most important in your life. Before "the year," her snapshot would have included everything except her husband. Part of what inspired her gift idea was that she wanted to make her husband the center of that snapshot again; intimacy was a way of having a meaningful connection.

2. Why Not Me?: When Charla's book editor first approached her about writing the book, Charla didn't see herself as the kind of person who could write that book. However, she discovered that it is okay to dream big and have big things happen to you. We can let so many outside things define who we are supposed to be (i.e. body image, social expectations) that we are easily convinced that we can't accomplish our dreams.

3. Boldness with Balance: Her husband agreed to let her write the book with the counsel that she write a book that would honor marriage and their faith. His counsel became Charla's mission statement and anchored her decision-making in determining what was appropriate to share in the book and what should remain between the two of them.

4. We All Need to Have Our A Team: The "A Team" is our list of go-to people, the ones who will help us to handle the hard parts. We need to surround ourselves with affirming people and not with "life-suckers." At the same time, we need to be affirming people and not "life-suckers" too.

5. Kindness Counts: After enduring snide comments and glib remarks, Charla learned how powerful words can be and resolved to improver her own communication as well. During "the year" Charla and her husband also learned how powerful kindness is in helping intimacy, that it is easier to want to be intimate after doing thoughtful things for each other outside the bedroom. Charla enjoyed the daily kindness that existed in their marriage and loved being the center of her husband's attention, and it was something she wanted to maintain after "the year" was over.