soil nutrition

If we ever move and want to buy a house again, we've learned that getting a water test done is essential. When we got our soil test back for the second year of being here the analysis showed that boron and sodium levels kept increasing and were nearing toxic levels. Why were they so high? Our well water. So...using the hose or our fancy drip irrigation system is suddenly not an option.

That means we've been hand watering everything using water from the farm, transported in a huge barrel on the back of David's truck...

Orion is my "filler-upper"

...which then gets transferred into a barrel in our garden, thus enabling me to fill up my cute little yellow watering can.

What once took me 5-10 minutes to check everything and make sure the soil was moist, now takes me over an hour every day and more on Sundays. I get to walk back and forth for refills. (More on how we are going to resolve that later). On the bright side - at least my arms are getting stronger and my legs are getting more tan!

I get really tempted to just use the hose and get the job done but my conscience won't let me. On Tuesdays we invite Jane over for supper and then David, Jonathan and her listen to a farming lecture. I hear bits and pieces as I get the kids ready for bed and it sounds way over my head. What I have gleaned though is that your harvest all depends on the nutrition of the soil. Believe it or not, buying organic doesn't guarantee that you have a more nutritious vegetable. It only guarantees that you DON'T have a toxic vegetable. That's why you can get a tomato from the store and it is tasteless and if you grow one in your back yard it makes your mouth want to dance.The one grown in your back yard has more nutrition and therefore more taste than the one grown on a commercial farm. If you want nutritionally dense food, your best bet is to grow it yourself!

The kids are helping me harvest lettuce

It makes me think of the soil of my children's heart. There are two lessons that stick out to me. First, if I want them to bear delicious fruit as they grow older (patience, kindness, self-control, love, perseverance, etc.) I need to sacrifice what is convenient for what is best. Like yesterday, I got a phone call right after lunch. The character training I'm focusing on right now with them is work ethic. It's their chore to clear and wipe the table and wash the dishes. But it takes a lot of coaching and I didn't want to get off the phone so I just did it myself. I know one time of "getting off the hook" from doing their chore is not going to make the difference in them being hard workers or not, but it's all those little decisions combined that factor into their "soil nutrition." Or like the other night we were running late on our evening routine so I was going to just get them to bed and then tidy up the living room by myself. David intervened and said I should make them help before they went to bed. I was so exhausted from working outside in the sun all day and hadn't drank enough water that I didn't want to risk any conflict with the kids trying to get them to clean up. They are generally pretty good with cleaning up but there's always the possibility that in their tiredness and my tiredness something small and easy would turn into something bigger and harder. My husband was right though. I had them help and we were done in a couple of minutes. 

Parents frequently pet and indulge their young children because it appears easier to manage them in that way. It is smoother work to let them have their own way than to check the unruly inclinations that rise so strongly in their breasts. Yet this course is cowardly. It is a wicked thing thus to shirk responsibility; for the time will come when these children, whose unchecked inclinations have strengthened into absolute vices, will bring reproach and disgrace upon themselves and their families. They go out into busy life unprepared for its temptations, not strong enough to endure perplexities and troubles; passionate, overbearing, undisciplined, they seek to bend others to their will, and, failing in this, consider themselves ill-used by the world, and turn against it.  {CG 178.1} 

Secondly, I need to make sure that the fountain of my heart contains no toxicity. 

Everyday it's like I'm watering my little saplings and although it looks the same, not all water is same. One thing that I've been trying to be careful of is irritability - especially during a certain time of the month ;) I've found this quote especially interesting regarding that.

  Sometimes when fatigued by labor or oppressed with care, parents do not maintain a calm spirit, but manifest a lack of forbearance that displeases God and brings a cloud over the family. Parents, when you feel fretful, you should not commit so great a sin as to poison the whole family with this dangerous irritability. At such times set a double watch over yourselves and resolve that none but pleasant, cheerful words shall escape your lips. By thus exercising self-control, you will grow stronger. Your nervous system will not be so sensitive. . . . Jesus knows our infirmities and has Himself shared our experience in all things but in sin; therefore He has prepared for us a path suited to our strength and capacity.  {Child Guidance, 246} 

So, although my husband and I were disappointed when we found out our well water had toxic levels of boron and sodium, at least it is providing an important object lesson to me. First, when it comes to making the decision between what's convenient and what's best, I hope that I routinely and habitually chose what is best. Secondly, I pray that as I exercise self control I will grow stronger, my nervous system will not be so sensitive and I can maintain a calm spirit and not poison my family with fretfulness and irritability.