A Weekend of Mixed Emotions

Good morning!

Boy, it's been a tough weekend here on Statia.

On Friday, we had a meat market on the island and the Botanical Garden put up a stand where we sold, aloe, neem tea spray (insecticide, but all natural), papayas, squash, oranges from Dominic, herbs, and plants. We did really well and we also purchased some nice meat. There was a produce stand of all locally grown fruits and veggies. I got a sugar baby watermelon, a canteloupe, and a cucumber. It was all delicious and there were more fresh vegetables there than I've seen in three months!

We had a barbeque on the beach on Friday night where we cooked hamburger and steaks. It was really yummy and we all had a good time. We decided to go out that night to one of the local restaurants. When we got back to our car about an hour later, our belongings had been stolen. 3 laptops, 3 cameras, 2 ipod touches, speakers, my hard drive, cash, backpacks, and all the power cords to everything. We filed a police report in hopes of getting our stuff back. We also walked and drove around the island yesterday looking for discarded items that were not useful. No luck yet, but we're not giving up.

On Saturday, we went to St. Kitts! It's an island we can see from the garden. We took a boat over and there was ten of us in total. We crossed over the Atlantic side of the island and boy, those waves were rough! We got across and then leisurely motored into the harbor. The island seemed to stretch on forever as we went around it. On Statia, you can see from one end to the other from almost everywhere. On St. Kitts, that is not possible! It's so big! 36,000 people live there too, that's the most people I've heard of in three months! It was really exciting to go onto an island where they had shops and a wider restaurant choice too. I got some sandals, a purse, sunglasses, and a tunic top. We came back to Statia that evening; it was so nice to have a day trip off the island. We all really enjoyed it and had a nice time.

Oh! I've been working on a sculpture in the last week! I've been building a dragon fly out of scrap metal. It's going to be about six feet long. I'm really excited to see how it turns out. I'll be working on it this Wednesday and hopefully it will be done soon!

Exciting Things!

Well! We've had a very productive day today.

We did maintenance on the maze in the Children's Garden and now it looks fantastic! We also found a pig den in the maze so we're turning it into a hangout/hideout area.

I sifted about three wheel-barrow fulls of compost and now it's lush, rich soil for us to use in our plants. I also harvested a luffa! (Picture soon!) I took it off the vine, smacked it on the ground, and peeled the skin off. Then I washed it under high water pressure and now it's out in the sun drying. It's very cool and fibrous and it smells a bit like seaweed in a sushi shop at first. Kind of salty yet sweet. Now it smells like a squash. Soon it will be used for washing!

Kyle, did some awesome work up in the Chill Out Garden area. He's trimmed all the trees up, raked up the dead leaves and sticks, and worked on some of the walls. He built a tire swing in there today and we had loads of fun on it!

Fruit Garden in all of its glory!

Kyle on his masterpiece.

Ella, Kyle is pushing her.

Me on the tire swing :]

Claire on the swing.

Kyle standing in his completed work, the Chill Out Garden.

Pineapple bed in the Fruit Garden. All weeded out and newspapered! We just picked a pineapple from here this morning. Delicious!

This is Mingus. I found him this morning. He's about four inches long and an inch thick at his thickest. He puked on Kyle's gloves and pooed on our bench. He's a bad caterpillar sometimes but we still love him. ;]

Getting close to exactly three months!

I am closely approaching the half-way mark of my time here on Statia. On the 26th next week I will have less time left on island than I have already spent here. It's been fun and challenging, and I'm always up for a challenge.

This past week we have been in the fruit garden all week. We weed whacked everything, pulled weeds and vines off all the walls, weeded out the pineapple beds and put newspaper down in it, and weeded around the pomegranates. It looks like a whole new garden up there and it's wonderful!

On Friday, we had a beach clean on Zeelandia. We picked up 105 kilograms of trash, that's around 231 pounds.

This coming week we will be spending some time up in the Children's Garden and one day in the Fruit Garden to finish off. There's a meat sale on Friday, we will be selling papayas, squash, herbs, and plants there too.

This is the chicken coop! We're working on catching some chickens this week.

The luffas that Heather planted. They are only a few days old here.

The same luffas, now they are big and have things to climb on!

Hoping your week is productive and fun!

Luffas!

A luffa, picture taken today, January 18 2011

I just wanted to show some of the progress we've made with the Luffas, it's incredible how quickly they grow!

Day 80-Something

Hello again!

It's been an exciting weekend here on Statia.

We got a new trails intern on Friday, her name is Sapphira. She's from England. She is excited to be here and we're excited she's here as well!

It rained a bit on Saturday so we chilled out relaxed.

On Sunday Kyle, Ella, Jean, and Joe went down to Corre Corre (the beach near the garden) to see if they could get some lobster. Kyle came really close a couple of times but no luck. He's got a new Hawaiian sling though, so he should be able to get one next time.

Once they all got back we found a pig in the garden. It looked like a teenager pig so we got Foxy dog to give a scare and chase it away. The pig wasn't having any of it and he turned around and tried to bite Foxy! So we ran him down onto the driveway and had him cornered (probably, not the best idea in hindsight), then he charged me and tried to bite me too! So I ran screaming in the other direction. Once he ran down the drive again, he tried to charge and bite Ella. After the pig was good and angry, he headbutted his way through the fence and out of the garden. It was a great laugh and good exercise for the day.

In the evening we had a barbecue. We had ribs, hamburgers, turkey/chicken dogs, and veggie burgers with sweet corn. It was all delicious. After dinner we had a bonfire as a sort of farewell for Joe. It was really fun, we burnt a lot of cardboard and had sparklers.


Back to work today! Maintenance Monday. Weeding, weed whacking, and pruning. I'm coming upon three months here on the 26th and then my 21st birthday in two weeks! Hurrah!



Missing everyone at home!

A view of the Phase One Sensory Garden

Pictures!

This is a flower called Snow on the Mountain. It blooms at Christmastime and it's beautiful!

My scratched up legs after I got a little lost on a hike in the Northern Hills and tried to crawl over thorn bushes up to my shoulders.

Camping on the road to Venus Bay.

Luffas! These are the new ones that Heather planted.

View of Venus Bay from a hill we were hiking on.

I'm Not Sure What Day It Is Anymore!

It's the new year!

I have not written in quite some time so it's going to be a fairly lengthy blog.

To start, I passed the two month mark of my stay on Statia over the Christmas holidays. I'm now in to my third month here. Time has gone by quickly and I'm enjoying learning new things and working outside everyday.

In the Vegetable Garden we have growing/grown five squashes. They are mid-size and we're going to cook one this week. We also have three luffas growing and two of which are quite large. Heather, a volunteer, planted a whole bed of luffas just before she left and in no time we'll all be washing off with luffas fresh from the garden! It is edible, but if dried, it can be used as a sponnge.

We've planted two papayas in the Phase One garden across from each other. They are doing well and will be a nice addition to the Taste Arbor. A few pigs got into the garden this weekend and snuffed up some of the paths. Hopefully, we'll be able to keep an eye on them and chase them out before they cause too much damage.

We've cleared out an overgrown bed in the Children's Garden and grass is starting to grow back instead of invasive vines.

The Christmas Holiday was nice. I made lasagna from our family's secret recipe. I did a meat and a veggie one. They were delicious and we ate lasagna for the whole weekend! I talked to all my family on Christmas Day, it was nice to hear from them all! The swells were quite big over the holiday which was perfect for body-surfing...or being knocked over and dragged back to shore. :]

We are currently building a chicken coop behind the Vegetable Garden. It is made out of paletts and chicken wire. We plan on catching some chickens this week. Then we will be able to feed them our scraps. They will help us with the compost and also give us eggs!

We are getting a new intern on January 14th. She will be the Trails Intern and take over for Joe.


Missing all of you at home! Happy Holidays!