HUGS International : Homestead and Urban Garden Society

"Inadequate income and persistent poverty have always been the most formidable obstacles to asset development.... If every dollar is going to necessities, saving and investing are impossible."            ~ Betsy Leondar-Wright et al. I don't know about you, but the top three expenses in my household every month are debt, housing, and food -- in that order.  So imagine if I never had enough earning power for banks to extend credit to  me in the first place; I wouldn't be able to accrue debt, so my biggest expenses would be housing and food.  Now imagine I didn't make quite enough to cover the cost of housing and food, or made just barely enough to cover those basic needs... the first fever or cough that starts going around can easily wipe out any meager savings I've managed to stash away. When there isn't enough money to go around, families are faced with two options: increase their income, or decrease their expenses.  The best practice is a combin

I hate the thought of having to go back to work tomorrow.  I've had a reprieve from the stress, disrespect, and idiocy because a co-worker backhanded my ovaries repeatedly in order to kill a bee that landed on my shirt.  This resulted in a flare-up of myofascial pain in the pelvic floor muscle, making it excruciatingly painful to sit up or walk around. It did, however, allow me time for reflection.  My vision for HUGS has become very clear, and as I've relaxed at home I found the motivation to actually get started!  That's huge for me!  I'm no stranger to entrepreneurial ideas (the last one was a co-op model for growing and manufacturing chocolate in Haiti... or maybe it was the ammo subscription service...) but this is the first one that is easy to execute AND something I'm excited about! A domain name was purchased for the blog.  Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter accounts have been created.  I'm starting to check out the local farmer's markets to resea

I used this recipe for my first attempt at bird seed ornaments.  Okay, well not that recipe *exactly*... I tried using my mama's cookie press to form the shapes, but the gelatin just gooped out all over the counter -- it was a disaster.  But I didn't give up!  I just grabbed the closest candle holder and turned it upside down on a pile of goopy bird seed and pressed it into something like a shape.  The principal was the same, but the picture doesn't do them justice... they're so much uglier in person I gave them to my mama!  For my second attempt I went to the dollar store and bought actual cookie cutters.  Those came out much better, but I was so *not* confident I didn't even bother saving space for the thread hole.  Turns out wrapping the outside of the ornament tightly with twine in an attempt to hang them up will only cause them to crumble, so no pictures of those. The third attempt is setting now.  This time I used straws to act as a place-holder for the