Heaven is in the Eye of the Beholder

This may seem like a strange title- and to be quite honest- it is.  But read along, then tell me what you think.

I pulled over a couple weeks ago to take these photos along the side of the road on the way home from the farmers market in Marana, looking West as the sun set behind the mountains of the Tohono O'odham Reservation, casting the last glowing light of day across a farmer's fields.

Then this afternoon, I turned off of the highway coming from town to the farmer's market at the Marana Healthcare center where I can be found most Tuesday afternoons, I saw a large sign in a farmer's field near the highway.  At first, I saw the word heaven on the sign, and thought it must be referring to a conversion to organics, until I turned straight on the road and got a good look at the sign out of the corner of my eye.

Across the top, the sign said, "We're moving earth to bring you heaven."

And at the bottom: The shops at Tangerine.  Tangerine being the road that intersects the freeway there.  While I would love to see smaller, organic farms infilled with the communities they serve replace the large factory farms, I definitely DO NOT want more shopping malls at every highway off ramp.  Not that anyone asked me, but it makes me even more determined to move forward with the sustainable farming project!

Well, I hope we will all do our best to support our local small farmers and keep our food system more secure.  If you are growing and contributing to the local farmers market, we salute you, and hope you will continue to do so!  All the best to all of you, and here's to hoping those new shops will feature local goods at least!

My older sister is doing the Avon 2-Day walk for breast cancer in San Francisco. Cancer of all types have hit our family hard in the past several years, and despite being a single mother and police officer, she is taking on this walk. Pretty ambitious if you ask me!

Anyway, as you can tell, I am proud of her for digging so deep. As much as I would love to take on the challenge, the donations a participant commits to raise in an event like this have kept me at bay. To help in her effort, Patriot's Dream made the Take Flight Necklace and earrings set, which will be auctioned int he silent auction for her team fundraising. To help Heather's own goal, we are also offering a ten percent discount off your entire order to anyone who donates $25 or more. Just use the coupon code Take Flight at checkout, and I can check with her to validate the donation. How can you donate, you ask? Visit this link:

http://info.avonfoundation.org/site/TR/Walk/SanFrancisco?px=4801085&pg=personal&fr_id=1950

So please consider getting a few good Karma points to cash in. Make a charitable donation to help fight cancer, take the tax writeoff at the end of the year, and take the discount on the order of your choice at Patriot's Dream.