Memphis Democrat
April 6, 2009

Hello again from Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage! Ted here with the latest.

It's a cold snap here in northeast Missouri at the moment. The fruit trees have been tentatively moving toward flowering, taking a good measured pace with the alternating mild and cool temperatures we've had. I can see pink on the peach buds, and the little pear and apple flowers thinking about opening, but thankfully none have done so as we weather several nights of hard frost. This is the time of year when I'm ready for nice warm temperatures, but knowing the possibility of more frost, I'm glad we haven't had the exuberant warmth that gets plants excited prematurely.

We have an informal group here known as Ye Aulde Barn Raisin' Society, which meets erratically to help with various communal and personal tasks throughout the year. This past Friday we convened as Ye Aulde Barn Movin' Society. When Dan's shed arrived at Dancing Rabbit more than a year ago (brought the mile or so from Red Earth Farms strapped to large machinery), Dan had spent most of his preparations on the foundation posts for his house, which came first (strapped to the same large machinery). The shed was set down without much preparation in his garden.

Having now developed his garden more, and also with plans to build his new house this year, Dan now wanted his shed to be elsewhere. Several methods of attaching long timbers to the structure were tried, mainly to allow lots of people to get their arms under the load. When we finally got the sixteen or so folks ready to lift and counted off, the shed proved too heavy to budge much.

Never ones to give up, we turned to a new plan involving some posts as rollers, to move the shed Egyptian-style. With lots of grunting and plenty of cooperative communication, not to mention our efforts to avoid smashing beds of garlic and newly emerging rhubarb, we finally managed to get the shed to its new home 20 feet away and rotated 100 degrees or so. Whew! Cooperation works.

The first major influx of visitors arrived this week as well, with one large class from Truman State and another group called the Burning Kumquats from Washington University all visiting Saturday for tours. The Kumquats stayed overnight, had lots of conversation as well as a bonfire and sing-along, and departed Sunday morning. Our first three-week visitor session begins in two weeks, so we're busily preparing for that as well, signing up to lead various workshops, cook shifts, and other events.

Other signs of the high season are everywhere, from the busy gardeners prepping beds and tending young sprouts in windows and greenhouses, to multiple conversations overheard about various parts of the many construction projects soon to be or already underway. So much possibility in the air.

Also on Friday I understand baby Jolyon made his debut at the weekly kid playgroup, and I saw Amy up and around and even outside Skyhouse for the first time since before the birth. I've only seen the little one a couple times briefly, but I'm sure there'll be more opportunities as the weather warms and he gets a little more accustomed to being in the light of day.

Saturday morning we managed our first game of Ultimate Frisbee of Spring, with Red Earth Farmers and Sandhillians joining the fray. The wind made it a little chaotic, but I believe we were all glad to be running around in the sunlight after a long winter. We're expecting to have as many as ten work exchangers on the farm at any given time this summer, and there'll be more at Red Earth along with interns from Sandhill, so I'm anticipating a good year for frisbee after struggling to get enough people together for games a lot of the time last year. No better way to get the kinks out after long hours of gardening or construction.

After several months' delay, the Food Network finally aired "My Life In Food: Living Off The Land" Saturday evening, featuring Dancing Rabbit for about half of the show. Nobody here has cable, so we didn't see it, but we've heard from other folks who did, and we saw a modest spike in traffic to our website. Later this month there'll be another TV event when some of DR's kids feature on Nickelodeon. Stay tuned for more info!

Dancing Rabbit will host its first regular Saturday tour of the season this Saturday the 11th at 1pm. Please call ahead if you plan to attend. See you there!

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