We watched Evan Almighty last evening. It's a bit of a quirky movie but with a great message and certainly feel good viewing. Evan Baxter played by Steve Carell runs for Congress on a platform of "Change the World". After he wins, God, played by Morgan Freeman asks Evan to build an ark.

Though he does build the ark and it is put to good use, the ending message is that ark really stands for "Act of Random Kindness". It's how we can each change the world. And, ironically, it goes back to another post Be Kind, Not Right.

Nourishing herbs are filled with vitamins and minerals and feed our bodies on many levels. They are mild and are not prone to causing side effects. My favorites so far are nettle, oatstraw and chickweed. I make infusions from them and have been drinking them for about a month now. I find I have more energy, feel less depressed and feel motivated in my life again.

To make an herbal infusion, place one ounce of dried herb in a quart jar and pour boiling water over the herbs to fill the jar. Place a lid on and let sit for 4-8 hours. Strain the liquid off and keep in the refrigerator.

I spent the day in the greenhouse yesterday, cleaning up the aquaponics system. It is amazing to have plants growing lushly in November and finding lots of ripe peppers and tomatoes. They do seem to love the environment in there.

Some other items weren't doing as well. We have a lot of humidity in the greenhouse as a result of the aquaponics system. I knew this was likely to happen as our winters are more wet than cold, typically. A lot of the cleaning was removing the bottom leaves that were decaying, as well as the salad greens that were beyond their prime.

We decided this past winter we wanted to have chickens. We ordered our girls along with another woman so we could choose our flock. We received our four girls on the first of March and Dolly was among them. She was energetic and the first to start chest bumping with the other chicks. The goal? Likely to be the top chicken as they worked out the pecking order.

We use paper everywhere... paper towels, paper napkins, toilet paper, kleenex. The list goes on and on and unfortunately, all that paper isn't really sustainable. This last spring we watched a documentary about rain forests being cut down and replaced by forests of trees to make our paper products. It's still forest, you might say. However, the needs of these trees are very different from what was cut down. And, the result is water shortages and contamination for those living in the area.