Each time we have been at Ruby’s we have received a large amount of food. Some of the items were frozen chicken, hard boiled eggs, scrambled eggs, shredded hard boiled eggs, tater-tots, tater logs, French fries, potato puffs, a case of tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, onions, frozen diced mushrooms, frozen diced peppers and onions, yogurt, coffee creamer, half and half, potatoes, bread, buns, cookies, jello, pudding, relish, pizza crusts, pepperoni, canned vegetables, orange juice, trail mix, breath mint candy and more. This list is so long I cannot imagine that the list could possibly be longer but I am sure that I am missing items. Many of these items we get an entire case but the quantity and availability on all items varies because it is entirely dependant on what items are donated to Ruby’s.

The experience at Ruby’s is interesting. Registration is from 8am to 9am. First you walk in and fill out a clip board sheet of paper with your contact information, and how many people are in your family and sign the waiver that you are not paying for the food but actually making a donation to the non-profit which goes toward the cost transportation and warehousing. Then you wait in line while everyone makes their donation, gets their number, and gets registered. After you have your number there is then a waiting area where you wait until your number has been called. In the waiting area there are prayers and gospel ministry. They call off about five numbers at a time for people to go through the line. Ruby’s likes you to bring laundry baskets, totes, or boxes to put into your cart to collect your food. There are boxes available from some of the packaging of the food for those who forget. I usually forget! :O)

more asparagus
broccoli
cauliflower
more cucumbers
kohlirabi
more lettuce
onion
parsnip
potatoes
basil
chives
dill
oregano
rosemary
garlic
sage
tarragon
Apples
Cherrys
Plums
Rasberrys
Blueberries
Grapes
Strawberries
Country Gentleman Corn

But my 100 by 120 foot yard can realistically hold a very sizeable garden. (and a few chickens and rabbits hopefully this summer). I already purchased seeds in January 13th! Thats an early start! Ruth and I decided that this year we are going to try to start seedlings indoors this year. I have not done that since I was 10 years old so I am very excited about that. It is almost as exciting as an incubator.

We are in Zone 4b which has an average annual minimum temperature of -20 degrees to -25 degrees. I wish I could remember this for more than 5 minutes at a time.

In 2011 we had purchased a CSA subscription from http://oldenproduce.com/ so we had fresh fruit and vegetables every other week in addition to our small garden. I want so badly to provide my family with enough food from our garden to feed us entirely for a whole year from local food grown within a sixty mile radius of my house. Preferably within a 10 mile radius of my house.

We purchased seeds for vegetables and flowers.

 This is the list of things that I want to plant this year:

Asparagus
Green Snap Beans
Yellow Wax Beans
Beets
Broccoli
Carrots
Cauliflower
Cucumber
Kohlrabi
Head Lettuce
Leaf Lettuce
Muskmelon
Onion
Parsnip
Pea Pods
Sugar Snap Peas
Multi Colored Peppers
Potatoes
Pie Pumpkins
Radish
Rhubarb
Yellow Zucchini
Black Beauty Green Zucchini
Butternut Squash
Roma Tomatoes
Watermelon

Basil
Chives
Dill
Oregano
Rosemary
Thyme
Marigolds
Garlic
Sage
Tarragon

Apples
Cherrys
Plums
Rasberrys
Blueberries
Grapes
Strawberries

I know its pretty short isn’t it. LOL!

Our last frost date is early June. We are to plant in rows running east and west. The tallest vegetables on the North Side.

In September 2010 we signed up for Time of use level 1 which means during the day from 7am to 7pm electricity is 19 cents per kilowatt. During the night it is 9 cents per kilowatt. The time of use only applies Monday through Friday. Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays are automatically 9 cents per kilowatt. We have delayed the use of the water heater and dryer during the day and save that mostly for nights and weekends.

Electricity is more expensive to produce for the power companies during the day because all of the businesses are using large amounts of electricity during the day. The more electricity that is being used at one time the more expensive it is for them to add more power generation.

This project did save us some money in the last year but if memory serves me right it was only like $150.00 If we would have used level 2 electricity we would have saved much more than that so we are now enrolled in level two for Time of Use.

Level 2 is 5 cents per kilowatt during the day and 25 cents per kilowatt during the night. I can’t wait to see the savings over the next year!

We went into the store. there was not a single phone in the building. There was a 2 hour wait in line to get a rep that could tell us nothing other than they will get phones that work eventually. and that if we left there would be early termination fees on all lines. $200.00 per phone. my family had 5 phones. Call their 800 number I waited for 45 minutes on one occasion and 90 minutes on another occasion and nobody answered their phones. this was supposed to be 24/7 customer service.

we went to us cellular they said that you have to transfer cell phone providers between 9am and 5 pm Monday through Friday because there is only one person doing the number porting.  we did that. risking a $1,000 in early term fees because we were missing calls, etc… they sent us a bill for the early term fees. I called again waited 30 minutes on the phone and someone answered. they said we had to go into the local office. The local office said we had to drive 60 miles to the corporate office. My mom drove to the corporate office. While there the guy at the front door asked what she wanted. She got a piece of paper with TONS of codes on it that were not understandable by a customer. Obviously this entire form was for internal usage. But my mom was instructed to send it in anyway.

I called the 800 number asking for help with the form. Basically he said he could not help me with it and that it is something that the customer needs to fill out. I called again and was told that the form was a waste of my time and we wouldn’t get the early term fees waived. I gave up and told my dad just not to pay the early term fees. My dad called them and they waived all of the early term fees and said that we owed $36.00. it is much worse than this actually. This is just half of it. but its enough for today.

I want to start out by saying that I built my first purely poultry website myself for free. I started with a $10 domain registrar and $6 a month for webhosting. When I started using zencart I pressed one button with Simple Install and zencart installed on its own. Then when it came to setting it up I needed help and found very affordable help on one of the websites where you hire freelancers. She was great for what she charged, but was not an experienced professional.

Here is Pro-webs. I highly recommend them for awesome development.

Their complete store is what you need to have the most successful business possible.

Pro Webs does not hold your hand however. If you need more help with setting things up than prowebs offers Zen Cart Guru is a person that will help you do anything.

Both of these will not write the text of your website for you. For that I recommend Dava at Smiling Tree Writing She helps me with my writing, facebook, newsletters etcetera.

If you choose any of these places make sure you tell them that Tyler sent you from Purely Poultry.

With website design and maintenance you get what you pay for. If you pay nothing you get very little, if you pay more you get alot more.

In general if you follow advice of someone you will get the same quality end result that your adviser created so far. When dealing with web-hosts you do not want Godaddy, or to use your internet service provider as your host. GoDaddy has all kinds of problems with websites! Your ISP should be just that, providing internet, they do not specialize and are not experts at hosting websites. Hostgator is what I have heard many professional web developers and designers recommend. It is what I use.

You will need to do a domain registration. You might want to keep that website. then you would need the domain to be transferred to you. If you are creating your own new domain you can just do your own domain registrar.

I highly recommend you go to the Small Business Development Center about the business. they will help you through the process of everything.

You can build your own site if you want. I started out building my own site and made MANY mistakes which everyone that is learning does. If you can afford to I would recommend using a professional like i had talked about in the previous email I sent you.

Frontpage is an awful program. Dreamweaver is much better if you are going to be doing the website yourself. Even if your not doing the site yourself it is helpful to have it so you can edit product descriptions and the like.

I hope that helps you develop your website!

Right now my least favorite part about it is that when I get up early in the morning to start work, I cannot turn the light on. Ruth is still sleeping so I cannot turn the light on because I would wake her. I have papers on my desk that I would like to be taking care of but cannot right now because it is dark in here. Once the day starts going I get involved with other projects and do not feel as though I have time to work on the mess of papers.

I start today with 2 Corinthians 10-13.

We should not be waging wars, because we should love one another. We need to demolish arguments that goes against the knowledge of God. We also need to punish every act of disobedience.

We have all been “led astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ.” I pray that this reading helps us stay on track.

Paul says, “I may not be a trained speaker, but I do have knowledge.” Well I am not a trained speaker, and I don’t have much knowledge either.

I pray that my businesses can be like the brothers in Macedonia, able to provide for missionaries to spread the gospel.

“Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light.” There are so many of these masqueraders today.

Just saw a fitting bible quote on Financial Peace University’s facebook page. “Be sure to know the condition of your flocks, give careful attention to your herds.” —Proverbs 27:23

It is strange to me that Paul says that he is boasting because I always take boasting as to be a sin.

Am I a servant of Christ? I am not sure that I am. I would like to be, but even Paul says he is out of his mind to talk as though he is a servant of Christ.

“I am more. I have worked much harder, been in prison more frequently, been flogged more severely, and been exposed to death again and again.”

I can’t say that I am more. I am less, I have worked much less, no prison, no flogging, and no death.

³⁰ If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness.

Well I must set some goals for my counseling session that starts in 50 minutes. Weakness #1 procrastination

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.

After all, children should not have to save up for their parents, but parents for their children.

We need to start saving up for Noah!

My counselor says I need to take charge of my family.

I think paul sums up his passage quite well. I will let him sum up my post.

¹¹ Finally, brothers, good-by. Aim for perfection, listen to my appeal, be of one mind, live in peace. And the God of love and peace will be with you.¹² Greet one another with a holy kiss.

Be trustworthy. Not procrastinate. My daily list of things that need to be done every day be done every day.

Give value to Ruth’s thoughts and feelings. Focus on improving myself not on Ruth. I want to have time together so that we can have time to share our thoughts and feelings. I think I will start sleeping 7 hours a day instead of 8 so that we have 3 hours together at night. Ruth has been writing her thoughts, feelings and beliefs so they would be viewed as more “true”. Possibly writing to eachother is a good thing. Ruth feels as though she does not have the energy to job search or find a job that pays better.

Be able to converse not just about my business with Ruth. Come up with other conversation topics and interests that we share. As a couple we need to find something else that we enjoy. We do enjoy gardening and cooking but did not fulfill our desire to do that this summer because our home renovations.