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Preserving for both my husband's family and mine was a family affair. The whole family helped picked the fruit, then clean, can and eat! Our extended families were part of the preserving tradition. Our preschool children are involved with all stages of the process too. We have fruit trees and a vegetable garden. We can plums, cherries, peaches, pears, applesauce, jams, pickles, tomatoe sauce and stewed tomatoes. We freeze blueberries, strawberries, blackberries and peaches. We dry some fruit and tomatoes and have even tried beef jerky. A couple of our neighbors can too. Older and younger, men and women. We share extra vegetables, fruit, recipies and jars.

We have moved to another level in local produce and sustainability by having our own "backyard chickens" for eggs.

posted 4 years, 7 months ago
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I always thought that a college education was sold as a bargain or contract: get one and you'll make enough money at your job to pay off the eduction. With the cost of education over the last decade, I think it's no longer a good bargain. I graduated from college twenty years ago, my husband 15 years ago, and I received a law school degree 10 years ago. Despite paying off our undergraduate loans early, I will still be paying on my debts when my children start college. Without school debt, we could have bought three or four houses, instead we have only been homeowners once. The processes of school loans encourages students to take more debt than is necessary to pay for tuition/expenses. We have to be picky about what jobs we can take and haven't been able to truly do public interest work and follow our dreams. I chose private schools so I my education would be recognized across the national market place. Again, I think that bargain is not a good one and would encourage my children only to go to community or state schools. I think some children shouldn't go to college at all given the poor bargain in today's market place UNLESS they don't go into debt to go to school. We plan on helping pay for our children's education and having them wait until they can go without borrowing. We received no help from our parents and it has been a difficult intrusion on our marriage to carry such debt.

posted 4 years, 8 months ago
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I live in Wilsonville near the old state hospital. The new development, Villebois, is required to have housing for the mentally ill. I attended a meeting a few years ago about that housing. At that meeting, I welcomed the housing but spoke about the vital need for services to be in place before the housing: bus service, pharmacies, doctors and stores. Unfortunately, none of those services are in place although it appears some group treatment homes are in place. I believe the provision of services makes the housing safer.

Ginger

posted 4 years, 11 months ago
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Michael Zacchea, a marine who helped train the Iraqi military, brought his interpreter over to the states. It took over a year for all the paperwork to get done to get him here. Now that he is here, he has no work or interest from the government despite his skills and military clearance. Why isn't the State Dept, Pentagon, or CIA hiring these Iraqi refugees? Why is the quota at 500 a year?

posted 5 years, 1 month ago
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I am an attorney, mother, Christian and liberal. My husband and I have chosen to give birth to all three of our children at home and to treat our children, at times with only naturopathic medicine. We are behind, by choice, in our children's immunization. We make decisions based on scientific or lack of scientific evidence, treatment sucess and what is comfortable to us as parents. If something would have happened and a child were to have died during being born at home, how would a prosecutor know we had made a choice based on religion or not? Further, what is the percentage of children who die from infections recieved in a hospital versus infections not treated by antibiotics?

posted 5 years, 1 month ago
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