Memphis Democrat
October 25, 2001

We've grown! Even as the number of people here have decreased, the number of members made a big leap forward. Just last week we only had nine members, but now we have twelve! Members are people who commit to being here for a long while and help with the responsibilities of running our community. We held a special membership meeting and accepted three new members. Susan and Erik are most recently from Colorado and have been living here since the early spring deciding whether they wanted to commit to staying here. Tom was our first intern, three and a half years ago. He came back a few months ago with everything he owned, pretty sure he wanted to be a member. We're so glad to have them all! Last but not least, Susan Brown went from provisional to full member at the same meeting. The first six months folks are members they are provisional, as everyone adjusts. And if its working out after six months, we accept them as full members. One of the interesting tidbits we figured out at the end of the meeting is that the average age for members now is 37. Yay!

We had the special meeting just before folks scattered to the winds. Cecil, who has been working tirelessly since we came to Scotland County five years ago, left to spend a month in the United Kingdom traveling and relaxing. Susan and Erik drove to Colorado to pick up their remaining possessions from the storage unit there.

Its been pretty quiet on the farm. Sandhill has been really busy with their sorghum harvest and several folks have been going over there to help. Mark and Megan attended a fair as sorghum salepeople in Fairfield, IA for them to help out too. But Fairfield sounded like fun and a total of seven people packed into vehicles and headed up to Iowa for the weekend. They sure had beautiful weather for it.

The Edina Town and Country group picked a beautiful day to come by for a tour, too. They gave me as much information as I gave them, I think.

Someone gave us a bunch of black walnuts. I'm not sure who because they talked to Cecil and then he left for Europe. But thanks, whoever you are!

We're working on winterizing our gardens and mulching weeds to kill them to so we can plant more areas next year. If you have rotten or broken strawbales that you can't use anymore, we'd be happy to take them.

We used good sturdy bales to make a temporarily enclosed building in the outdoor kitchen. It looks like an unfinished strawbale house, complete with windows, doors and wood stove. Folks who don't have houses are going to use it as a heated space in which to live and sleep this winter. In the spring, we'll take down the bales and make it a kitchen again.

Dancing Rabbit Ecovillage is a nonprofit and a residential community that demonstrates ecological sustainability in Rutledge, MO. We have tours the first and third Saturday of the month at 1pm and the next tour is November 4th. Please call first at 883-5511.

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