It's Been Awhile...

Oh, dear! It's been awhile hasn't it? I've taken a long break from my homesteading blog to nurture my history blog. Lately, though I've been wanting to post things about our homeschooling, gardening, and other such things. So I thought it might be nice to post here again now and then.

Some exciting homesteading updates - we finally got chickens! Out of 12 chicks we ended up with 4 roosters and 8 hens. Right now we're trying to figure out where to send our roosters because our neighbors have late hours and I don't blame them for not wanting an alarm clock at 5:30 am!

I've expanded my garden to 3 raised beds, put in asparagus, some thornless raspberries, and planted a fig tree. It's already got a dozen little figs growing and I'm so excited! The deer have left it alone too, which is a miracle. I even got some rhubarb to grow by accident. I quite gave up on it last year and I thought I planted the dead plant in the fall in my garden, but this spring my husband found a rhubarb plant in the compost and I have NO idea how it got there! Happy day, though! I've had a heck of a time getting rhubarb to grow.

We're also in the midst of some big home improvement projects. As we've stripped away the layers of time, it's been interesting to see the original beams and methods of construction in our 1900s house. It's slow going, but we're excited about getting the house closer to the way we want it.

Also, while we were in northern Montana for vacation I did a little photo shoot of farm equipment. It sounds a bit funny, but I love the look of industrial mixed with other things like nature.

I'm busy planning for our next year of homeschooling and I'm excited! We're studying American history with an emphasis on technology. Some field trip highlights: Robert Fulton's birthplace (invented the first working, practical steam boat) and the Daniel Boone Homestead with a functioning, original saw mill - both in Pennsylvania. We're also studying Physics this year with a fun trip to the Maryland Science Center for their homeschool week. Lots of fun planned for this year!

Well, that's a pretty good update. Happy Summer!

Get Into The Garden

I've had to trick myself into going into the garden. Last year, after moving into our new house in May, we rushed to get the garden plowed up and planted. And then I just let it do its thing. What I discovered, however, is that you can never just sit and let a garden "do its thing". If you do, without even realizing the weeds take over practically overnight, your tomato plants grow exponentially before you have a chance to pinch off any suckers, and your squash plants take over everything until you can't find where your pepper plants were. Let's just say my gardening plan was majorly flawed.

This year we're trying a different tactic. I changed my garden to raised beds using the plot markers, put down newspaper and a bunch of mulch and the biggest key: I told myself I had to spend at least 5 minutes gardening a day - I would not only be taking care of my garden, but I would also receive much needed exercise and therapeutic relaxation at the same time!

The amazing thing about the 5 minute promise to myself is that I rarely only spend 5 minutes. Most days I spend a lot longer digging, weeding, pruning, etc. But if I told myself I had to work at least 15 minutes, I don't know if I would feel as motivated to get out there, especially if the day was hot. 5 minutes though - I can do that!

So far, this method has been working great. Minus days that it's raining, I have been outside gardening way more than I was last year. Some days I get a lot done, other days I don't. But the point is that little by little I'm making progress and keeping tabs on what's going on with our property. One day I just spent hacking at an ugly bush by our front porch. Another day I dug up a miniscule part of our heavy infestation of daffodil bulbs and planted some along the front of our property by the street. (That was way more work!) Sometimes it's hard to grasp that little tiny efforts along the way add up in the end. The nice thing with gardening is that you can actually see the fruits of your labor fairly quickly. If you don't do anything, though, the weeds will let you know - that's for sure!

Raised beds using plot markers.

A massive carpet of daffodils. It's ridiculous.

The cute fuzzy little caterpillars (tent worms) that I suspect are responsible for deflowering our entire pear tree and some of our currant bush. Arrrrh!!! We definitely need chickens!

A pretty iris - this is the only one of this color on our property. 

Spring is Here

Spring arrived on our little homestead a few weeks early! Well, ever since January, the stubborn spring flowers have been coming up. We even had violets spring up in the beginning of February! So, to say our winter has been on the mild side would be an understatement.

Here are some pictures of our early bloomers plus a couple cute birds visiting our bird feeder:

Sweet little guy!

White Crocus
The first flower to appear (not counting the very early violets)
There are some purple ones blooming now!

Another bird visitor

My red currant is showing buds! Yay!

Daffodils growing like crazy in our yard.
Why the previous owner planted them here is beyond me!

A bulb I planted back in October. I can't remember what it is.

Daffodils!
(There are plenty)

Budding Bartlett pear tree

The strawberries are growing too!

We've had two snow storms since they've starting growing and budding, but it doesn't seem to phase them too much. Now I really need to get going on planning our garden and starting some seeds!

Happy Early Spring!

Watermelon Success!!

Yesssss!!!! And, boy, was it delicious!

Busy Busy

I have been busy. Perhaps a bit too busy. I tend to overwhelm myself. Last week we went to Larriland Farm and picked the last of the season's peaches and tomatoes. A few days went by and I finally canned the peaches in a spiced honey syrup (YUM!). I had a lot of syrup left over, so the next day I reduced the honey syrup a bit and canned the rest of it to use for other things.

Finally, today, I cut up the tomatoes and boiled them. When they cool down I'll run them through my food mill, boil them down a little more and then make it into salsa. I know. It'll be a thin, non-chunky salsa, which suits me just fine! I am not a fan of chunks. I might add a few cans of diced tomatoes for more texture and to make my husband happy. He likes the chunks. Why go to all this trouble? Because I didn't want to skin the stinkin' tomatoes! It was too overwhelming to think about and because of that the tomatoes just sat there with a few of them rotting in the mean time. So I did what I could cope with and I just cut them up and boiled them. Aaah! I feel so much better! I need to finish it today. I don't want to be canning on my birthday tomorrow!

I've also been busy working on a Regency corset so I can get started on making some dresses. You can read all about it over at my history blog.

My garden is overrun with weeds, but I have 6 watermelons growing about about 3 pumpkins! I've been planting some perennial flowers and some spring bulbs (not daffodils, thank you very much!) so it doesn't look so bare around here. It's slowly starting to look fairly presentable! I have visions of a well established herb and flower garden in the same tradition of well established, old-fashioned kitchen gardens like you see at historical homes. It'll take some time to get there, but it'll be a beautiful goal to achieve!

Keeping Busy

Yesterday the weather was glorious! There was a warm sun with a cool breeze - my favorite kind of weather. My kids and I went blueberry and plum picking at Larriland Farms which is now only 4 miles down the road! I almost went crazy and wanted to pick raspberries, but it was nearly lunch time and my daughter needed her nap, so I gave up that idea. It's hard work picking fruit! (and supervising children picking fruit. haha!)

The rest of the day was pretty much spent outside. We had a couple TV breaks for a rest, (My kids are only allowed to watch stuff on Tuesday or Thursday.) but for the most part my son busily dug up bricks, and I moved the compost pile, dug up more iris roots, weeded, and in general spiffed up the place. It was awesome to work outside all day! That's my kind of exercise. Yeah!

About a week or so ago, our family picked out a spot and dug a fire pit. We've had a few marshmallow roasting events already and there's another one scheduled tonight with a bunch of gals from church for a "girl's night out". I'm really excited! What I'm most excited about is that we were able to pick out the spot for our fire pit and just start digging! No permission necessary from anyone. I LOVE that about owning our own home.

Oh, you know what I discovered the other day? Our neighbor has the biggest, most beautiful OAK tree! Man, I've got the Knotty Oak Homestead, but we have no oak trees at all. Just pines and maples and a walnut tree. Even the giant fallen oak in our woods came from our neighbor's property and crushed our fence. But I took a picture of our neighbor's tree just to pacify myself. It really is very magnificent to look at.

Garden Work & Gravestones

We've been getting in a lot of gardening/yard work the past few days! We were totally oblivious to the weather and that we were working during the hottest week of the spring! But luckily, we have an official swimming hole around the corner from our house (lucky us!) and we took advantage of that on the 90º F day this week. A big part of the work involved tilling the garden. We were able to borrow a rototiller and my wonderful hubby tilled up the garden. 

I started digging up a needless flagstone path that ran from the house to the shed and made an interesting discovery! The flagstones were not flagstones at all, but gravestones, most of them with initials! (No, there is no one buried on our property, and no, the stones were not stolen from some pour souls' grave sites.) I think this is pretty sweet! We found out from our neighbor that the previous home owner brought them home. Apparently, they were only temporary markers and the cemetery didn't need them anymore. He repurposed them for a walking path, and I am re-repurposing them to pave paths around my garden! Now I have the initials facing up for all to admire the workmanship and there are a few gems in the group like one labeled "Father" and another labeled "Fred".

How we love Fred! :-)

I put Fred in a place of honor under a tree by our driveway.  He was broken in half and I couldn't use him as a flagstone as the lettering was at the top. What better way to admire him than under our tree?

      I transplanted my red onions to my newly tilled and composted garden, and planted some Mr. Stripey and roma tomato plants, sweet pepper plants, zucchini, cucumber, watermelon, basil, cilantro, and dill. I went to Southern Exposure Seed Exchange and got some hard to find Victoria Rhubarb root crowns (I have to get them in ASAP so I can have some rhubarb in a couple years), some Winter Luxury Pie pumpkin seeds, and some Pennsylvania Buttery Popcorn seeds! I'm still on the hunt for asparagus plants to get in this year. Then, a few days ago while getting my compost, we bought a Bartlett pear tree (we nicknamed him "Bartlett" for obvious reasons), he even has 3 baby pears growing!

              Ever since I tried red currants for the first time at the Logan, UT farmers market I have wanted to plant red currant bushes whenever we finally bought a house. Well, we've got the house and the property, I just needed to find some red currant plants! Well, an online search was quite frustrating. Most suppliers were British companies, because, after all it's a British plant. I did finally find one US supplier, but the availability was questionable. I went to our new town's farmer's market for the first time yesterday and you'll never guess! Out of the lonely 6 stalls, one was a man selling hard to find plants. He had some black currant bushes and I asked if he had any red. He had one, but was saving it for a lady. He told me if she didn't show up or if she didn't want it, he'd call me. So, I left and a few hours later he called and it was MINE! Woohoo! I love it when things just fall into place like that, you know? God must have known how badly I wanted that little red currant bush. We've nicknamed him "Spiffy Biffington" - a proper British name from P.G. Wodehouse, (Jeeves & Wooster, anyone?) and I'm going to get one of the many rocks around the property and paint a Union Jack on it to sit next to him. He'll be in his own little piece of England on our property. :-)

Baby red currants! Too bad that's all we'll get this year.

It's a little sad that we're naming our plants, but it's only because we don't have any animals yet! haha!
Another really sad thing - I was taking the weed eater to the weeds on the back edge of the garden. I had just finished when I saw movement. It was a big toad! Then, he slowly hopped again and I saw he was bleeding! I must have nicked him with the weed eater. The poor thing did his best to hop away. I'm not sure why he didn't try and get away before, but I must have just taken out his shelter, which for a toad was a good one. Lots of bugs made it their habitat too. *sigh* It just makes me so sad. I noticed another frog hop away when I was mowing the lawn a couple weeks ago and he had a close call too. Maybe I'll just have to start announcing to the frogs that I'm coming. I want them to stay around. We have way too many bugs! I need as many bug predators as I can get. Next up, I'm hoping to put up some bat houses and get some chickens to help out the frogs, although the chickens might like to eat the frogs too...

Living on Less

My daughter kneading some bread dough with me standing by to help.

I've always been fascinated with simple living and enjoying simple pleasures. But modern entertainments are very addicting and very hard to break away from, especially when everyone you know has the latest technology and expect you to know what they're talking about. (We've resisted the new smart phones and like using our prepaid cell phones, but for some reason the smart phones don't seem to be going away!) The hardest thing for us to get rid of is Netflix.

I ran across this interesting article that talks about living simply and a couple's story about how they drastically reduced their cost of living. It gets a little soap-boxy toward the end, but I think there are some interesting principles he discusses in there.

"How We Went from $42,000 to $6,500 and Lived to Tell About It!" 

Now that we finally own our little piece of land, we have so many better things to do than to be entertained by technology! Yesterday is a good example. We did a ton of yard work. We even got my garden tilled. Yay!

Other things I got done: I dug up a random round flower bed in the yard, cut out some sod from where I wanted our garden, and laid sod over the patch. We moved big rocks (and broke the wheel barrow - oops!), dug up daffodil bulbs, marked off a flower garden, and transplanted tulip bulbs. I set my 5-year-old son to digging up a line of bricks at the end of the gravel driveway by the house and he really got into it. He was so cute to watch - digging up a single brick, exclaiming how cool it was, and running over to the flower patch at the other end of the yard to lay the brick in the trench I'd dug to mark the bed off. Back and forth, back and forth he would go so busy, busy, busy. He loved it! After awhile he and his little sister were looking red-faced from being in the sun, so I sent them inside to cool off with some lemonade and to watch some "Busytown Mysteries". (alas, that blasted Netflix!) After awhile my son started crying, and begged me to let him go outside to dig up more bricks. Unfortunately, he had finished his job, but I was so happy that he liked the work. I think children need to work, just like adults do. It's so satisfying and rewarding and it can be so fun!

I need to think more about how we can realistically simplify our lives even more, because I know we have room for improvement and there's so many things that I'd like to do, but succumbing to entertainment has wasted a lot of my time. I need to take that time back!

On a side note, I found this site that had a neat list of homesteading magazines.

Healthy Eats for Kids

In recent years, I'll admit, I've developed a new soap box. What is it this time, you ask? Well, it's the kids' options on a restaurant menu. It's always the same: mac & cheese, pizza, or chicken nuggets. Yes, restaurants need to make money and feel they are forced to offer these things because kids are picky eaters. And YES my kids are some of the pickiest eaters that I know. But part of the skill of a chef is to take something people know and love and make it into something new and different right? Why can't they sneak in butternut squash with that mac & cheese?? Put spinach or zucchini on the pizza and offer fresh, homemade, whole chicken nuggets????? Don't answer those questions. Just let it stew. I've heard a good option is to order a lunch-sized portion of something off the menu for your kids. I just might do that next time. My son actually loves baked fish, non-breaded with just butter and some herbs. And this was a kid who it's taken 5 years for him to willingly eat chicken!

Okay, off the soap box now. This post is about finding alternatives for the same ol' same ol' that are healthy and delicious for kids. Every kid is different, and you know your kids best. These are some options that I have found that I am excited to try out. But first, here are a few tips I've learned:

1. Help your children grow some food.

My son was so much more excited to try basil on his pizza and as a pesto on pasta when he knew we had grown it ourselves and he had watched it sprout from a tiny seed and flourish as a wonderful smelling, beautiful plant. Also, my son has learned that there is nothing like picking your very own sun-warmed tomatoes or strawberries and popping into your mouth straight off the plant. Mmmm!

2. Involve your children in making their own food.

My son loves smelling all the herbs and spices I put into what I'm cooking or baking. Both my son and daughter love to measure and stir. Children naturally love to help and when they're able to stir, and knead, and make a mess (I've had to work really hard at putting my mess anxiety on the back burner!), they can take pride in having done something as big and important as creating their own snack or putting dinner on the table that the whole family enjoys. It's also fun bonding time with mom or dad in the kitchen which is usually the center of the home.

3. Have your food rules and stick with them.

It's taken my husband and I our entire son's life to develop rules for eating at the table. We're still working on it, and it's been a challenge with picky eaters. Some parents have the theory of "you have to eat everything on your plate" while others are more into experimentation on the child's part and they'll eat when they're hungry. I think we're somewhere in the middle. Lately, we've been having our son help with how much is going on his plate, so that he feels that he has some decision-making power there, but he doesn't get to choose what goes on his plate. I think educating him on what our bodies need for strength and energy has helped him understand that veggies, fruit, and proteins are more important than the dessert that may follow. It's a work in progress though. :-)

Whatever your feeding philosophy, I think when your kids know what is expected at the table, then meal times will probably go smoother.

Here are some great posts I found for kids' snack ideas:

45 Real Food Snacks for Kids

10 On-the-Go Healthy Snacks for Toddlers

25 Healthy Snacks for Little Ones

Also, I think having a few cookbooks in your arsenal can be a huge help. Here are two of my favorites:

Organically Raised: Conscious Cooking for Babies & Toddlers

Healthy Meals for Babies & Toddlers

One of my favorite ideas from the book Healthy Meals for Babies & Toddlers is for ready-made sandwich filling ideas. Most kids love sandwiches, heck, I love sandwiches and would try these super cool fillings any day:

Hummus
heaping 1/3 cup hummus
1 small cooked carrot, chopped
1 Tbsp chopped cucumber (you could substitute zucchini too)

Fruity Cheese Spread
heaping 1/3 cup lowfat soft cheese or ricotta cheese (I used neufchatal)
1 Tbsp. chopped pitted dates
2 Tbsp. chopped plumped dried apricots

Egg & Bacon
2 hard-boiled eggs, shelled and mashed
1 Tbsp mayonnaise (or Miracle Whip if you have my more refined taste buds haha!)
2 crisp-cooked slices bacon, chopped

A twist on the sandwich: my son loves a tortilla (white or whole wheat) with peanut butter and jam or honey and rolled up into a burrito. It's pretty good!

Appalled!

I am totally appalled that tomato season completely passed me by and I didn't even notice. I didn't hear anything about it, I was just clueless. Maybe it was because my own tomatoes were sad failures. I really have no idea I could be so out there that I could forget about tomatoes. And now, I am frantic about what to do!

For the past 2 years I've canned my own salsa. I don't even want to go back to the store-bought! I might throw a tantrum if I'm forced to. Home canned salsa is so amazing. It's so flavorful and delicious, even more so knowing that I canned it myself. (Even if I didn't add as much salt as I was supposed to and every time we opened a jar we had to add a teaspoon of salt. haha!)

Seriously, we're down to ONE jar. In my family, that is just not acceptable. My husband can go through an entire quart jar all by himself in one sitting. No joke.

But wait! I just realized... I have 2 cases of canned organic diced tomatoes... I know I didn't pick the tomatoes myself, I didn't meet the plant they were picked from, but they're already peeled and and diced for me... Yes! Redemption! My jalapenos did very well this year and all I need are some peppers and onions and I am set! Woo! That's makin' do, folks! Yesirree! I can breathe again knowing that we'll have a stock of salsa to last us another year. And hopefully I won't forget about the tomatoes next year.

P.S. Here's my salsa recipe.

Gardening in July

Lightning Bugs Love My Little Flowers!

We've been hit with a massive heat wave. It's not only been hard on me and my family, but on my plants as well. They're struggling along in their containers the best that they can. I have been a lot better with watering them every day than I was last season. With the heat wave we've also had a bit of a dry spell. I try to be conscious of my water usage, even living in a rain-rich state, and it makes me happy to conserve water even in little ways like reusing the water I use to wash my produce to water my plants.

A quick garden update: I pulled out my potatoes. They had cute baby tubers growing, but they were so infested with black flea beetles that I felt like it was too late to redeem them. I also didn't want to infect my jalapenos next door, so out the tubers came. And we had to clip off the runners for my acorn squash. They were taking over and it was getting hard to mow around/under them. The plant was never the same again, so I ended up harvesting two small acorn squashes and pulling out the vines. And I had to take out my cucumber vines. The leaves had gotten some kind of mold and the cucs weren't doing well. On top of that my tomatoes were getting blossom end rot from too much dedicated watering. So I had to pluck those off and start watering less. So sad! I am learning more every season. I'd say my green thumb is more neon yellow...

On the happy side, my jalapenos are doing fabulous. They are growing fat, green, and happy. (I've noticed that wasps really like jalapeno plants, but not much else does. Hmm...) I harvested my dill. I think it's done for the season. And I've made 2 batches of pesto with my basil. Note for next year: plant a whole bed of just basil. My son loves pesto pasta which is a nice surprise for me. I even made one batch half basil/half spinach and he didn't even notice the difference. {evil cackle} My strawberries have sent out runners and one plant even has a few more strawberries! Tomatoes are still growing, but no ripe ones. My Tumbling Tom tomato plant was looking sickly for a long time, but after some pruning and regular watering it has come back to life. My red onions in my front flower bed are finally coming up! I must not have been watering them enough. I tend to neglect watering the front for some reason....

I've seen some interesting bugs this season too like a baby praying mantis, many lightening bugs feeding on my little white flower ground cover, and tomato hornworm caterpillars (which I found out turn into the hummingbird moth. I even saw a hummingbird moth feeding on my morning glories and was so shocked! It looked so much like a hummingbird, I had to do a double-take!) There was also this totally bizarre round flat green bug with spikes all around its edge with a black head thing. It was kind of gross. When it comes to bugs I get a little queasy. I'm not sure what kind of a gardener that makes me, but at least I try! :-)

King Dill!

Herb Garden

Baby Purple Prince Tomatoes

Strawberries. I need to plant the runners in new pots...

Acorn Squash before it's downfall

An interesting caterpillar that adored my dill... the little booger.

The Garden

My happy dill is growing tall! 

My garden is going fairly well these days. My only insect problem so far is the black flea beetles which seem to adore my potato plants. I've tried a garlic tea, but I'm not sure it worked so well because it rained the next day and washed away all the garlic smell. I've heard planting radishes draw them away, but I have planter boxes, not a whole garden in the ground. I'll have to think on some new tactics.

My pickling cucumber plants are about 8 inches tall. It looks like my dill will be ready for sure! I've already hung and dried some dill, waiting for that happy pickling day.

I finally broke down and bought some gardening gloves after one too many times of digging dirt out from under my fingernails. Best $5 purchase EVER! I don't know what I was thinking all those years digging around without gloves. It's amazing the different they make.

I feel very lucky to be living in a more southern state. Already we have cucumbers, rhubarb, strawberries, lettuce and other odd produce at the farmer's market. The past couple weeks my family and I have been out to Larriland Farm picking strawberries and a boatload of sweet cherries. Hello, cherry pie filling! Oh yeah!

(However, I'm waiting on getting my Clear Gel in the mail. I had no idea they don't sell modified corn starch out here! How crazy is that!)

This Year's Garden

Strawberries, lettuce, acorn squash, maybe a cucumber?, dill,  rosemary, thyme, and basil. And potatoes that haven't sprouted yet.

Well, folks, here it is! My garden for this year. I've got some slightly high hopes for this one. I'm just hoping the birds don't make off with our berries before we get to enjoy a nibble. Not pictured is my hanging planter of Tumbling Tom tomatoes. It already had a ripe tomato that I picked the other day! Yippee!

Spring Happiness

Our farmer's market started last week. Hooray! It was cold and rainy, though, so the kids and I didn't stay long. I was very excited to bring home a large dill plant (for making pickles) and four strawberry plants that are supposed to bear all summer long. I am very excited for that!

We went again today and I couldn't help but buy a hanging cherry tomato plant called Tumbling Tom to hang from our back porch overhang. It even already has green tomatoes on it which means in a few weeks we'll have delicious fresh tomatoes! I think this year I'm taking a break from growing tomatoes. For some reason I have such a hard time growing them in containers. The past couple years have been dismal. I guess I just need to learn a bit more and probably rig up a drip irrigation line for the pots.

A Karakul Sheep

Also, last Saturday was the Maryland Sheep & Wool Festival - rumored to be the largest on the east coast. I volunteered to help with t-shirt sales. I seriously thought it would be slow. I mean, t-shirts? Really? Boy was I ever wrong! I got there at 8 am and the county fairground parking field already had a lot of cars in it. There was a line of people waiting outside the 4-H building where the festival gift shop was when I walked up. We had a cryptic briefing by the head of the volunteers, and at 9 am they opened the flood gates and the building was instantly full of waiting people. There were about 12 of us volunteers and we were busy pretty much the whole first 3-hour shift.

I was so tired after working that I barely had enough energy to look around the festival! haha! I did get to see some beautiful sheep and picked up a business card for a local felting company. There were bags of wool and skeins of yarn everywhere you looked! A few workshops were going on as well. I'll have to come up with a different game plan for next year so that I'll actually have enough energy to enjoy the festival. Volunteering was fun though. I wouldn't mind doing it again - especially since I got a free t-shirt!

:-) And when I left, the parking field was totally full of cars with people parking across the street in another field. Whoa!

Look at that beautiful curling wool from the Karakuls sheep!
(It's good for making rugs and ropes apparently.)

Getting a trimming.

This little sheep has 4 horns! I love the dual colors.

Happy Earth Day!

Today I decided to finally do some landscaping in the front of our house. The flower beds on either side of our steps (if you can call them flower beds) had only two oddly-placed evergreen bushes and nothing else when we moved in. We weeded it sometimes, but it mostly looked pretty pathetic.

The Spring bug bites me every year, and so I just couldn't take the bare ugliness of those beds anymore. So, my kids and I went to our local nursery and came home with 3 adopted small bushes (on clearance for $1!), some lavender plants, and a sweet-smelling flowering ground cover with white flowers. I budgeted $20 and came out really close, so I'm happy!

We also stopped at a Home and Farm store just to look around. It mostly had horse feed, bird seed and random odds and ends for gardening. Then I saw the chicken feeders. And the little chick feeders. Oh my goodness, I never wanted something more in my whole life than at that moment! I should say that sounds silly, but it's not really. Those little chicken feeders represented my desire to be self-sufficient, to live off the land and to work with my hands. Unfortunately, I had to sigh and walk away. We're renting a townhouse on a sliver of land with no fence and nasty little white dogs our neighbors let run around loose all day long.

Anyway, I digress. When we got home I tried to arrange my new plants around those darn evergreen plants, but it wasn't working. Those darn bushes! Then the obvious occurred to me: I didn't feel comfortable ripping them out and getting rid of them - our landlords probably put those in - but I could definitely move them. Woohoo! So I did. And am I the happiest little gardener on this side of the Mississippi? Yes I am! You'll agree with me when you see the before and after shots.

I also got clever with a half-bag of river rocks I had sitting in our shed. When I was done, it was a huge relief. I've been telling myself not to bother since we're only renting, but I finally just couldn't ignore that itch anymore. And now the front of our house looks right pretty!

Before - in the winter.
I know there's not much there, but that's really the way it was even in the summer.
Those darn bushes are so annoying there!

AFTER:

See, I moved the bushes back, and that one is now over in front of all that ugly wiring.
Whew! I feel better just looking at it.

The gap below the bushes is where I'm planning on a couple potato plants.

Space for another potato plant?

Happy Earth Day!

This Year's Garden Plan

Flowers emerging from the leaves.

Mt. Vernon, VA

Spring is in the air, robins are hopping around, and crocuses and daffodils are showing their faces! Hooray! I've tried to ignore the growing itch, but I couldn't. Every spring I get that urge to plant something that is so hard to ignore. But we've got some challenges this year.

1. We rent our townhouse.
2. The yard is slightly sloped.
3. Drainage is not very good.
4. We got attacked by caterpillars last year and I'm afraid for this year!!
5. This year is supposed to be the worst ever for stink bugs. (Where are the natural predators, I ask you?? Are stink bugs invincible?)

So, here's the solution I've come up with:
1. Build 2'x2'x1' planters that can be set on cinder blocks or blocks of wood.
2. Try out the amazing square foot gardening method designed by Mel Bartholemew so I can grow twice as much in a much smaller space.
3. Do not use mulch! (Black walnut wood is poison to tomato plants and I strongly suspect the stuff I got from a large home improvement store, which I will not mention, had that wood in there. My poor tomatoes!)

My plan is to line the bottom with gardening fabric, drill small drainage holes, put down a thin layer of sand, then some top soil and leaf compost. Woo! I am so excited!

Today, my kids and I made a trip to a locally owned plant nursery. They had the best deal on dirt and compost I have ever seen, considering I usually buy the bagged stuff from home improvement stores. Not only that, but I was pleasantly surprised with how helpful, friendly, and informative they were. They even had a pet rabbit my son loved looking at. Just another affirmation of how buying locally can be so much better! They weren't working for some corporation. They were working for themselves and they were locals and knew their stuff. I will definitely be going back there for my other gardening needs later on.

A Book to Recommend: Don't Throw It, Grow It!: 68 windowsill plants from kitchen scraps

When I was looking around at books for sale at the MEN Fair, this book just sucked me in. It was the quirkiest, weirdest book about growing that I'd ever seen. I had to get it, especially with the fun growing potential with my kids.

This book teaches you how to grow everything from peanuts to pomagranates to pineapples all from the seeds and roots and tops that you would normally throw away. (Did you know you can grow new leeks from the rooty ends you cut off?)

Each plant entry features the common name, the Latin name, plant type, growth rate, method of growing, light requirements, a detailed description of what the plant looks like, how to grow it and what the fruit tastes like. Throughout the book there are also interesting, related origin facts. The book is filled with fun, retro art drawings of the plants and the easiest plants to grow are marked with an "EASY" starburst. The text print is green with accents of darker green and bright orange used in the artwork. The green text is rather soothing on the eyes. A helpful index is also located in the back.

Chapters:

1. nitty-gritty growing techniques

2. plants from common vegetables

3. plants from fruits and nuts

4. plants from herbs and spices

5. plants from latin america

6. plants from asia

The only downside is that leeks aren't mentioned in the book. I think it's got a good overview of a lot of plants, fruits, and seeds you can grow from scraps, but obviously not all are mentioned. Some plants I've never heard of are mentioned, so while I don't know if I'll ever grow or eat them, they are interesting to read about. It would be nice if the book was spiral-bound as well so the book can be laid flat for easier reading-while-doing.

Overall, this book is a fun, funky read that gets me really excited about growing something on my windowsill this winter. It helps bring exotic plants to your own home and trying the plants described in its pages is an adventure waiting to happen! I think it would make a great gift for gardeners at any skill or age level. Check it out!

Nature Surprises Once Again

I am truly amazed at how nature can still surprise. I thought my tomato plants were dead and gone. But since I posted last about my tomato plants (and completely given up on them), they've made a real comeback! They've sprouted gobs of flowers and one tomato plant that had yet to sprout any tomatoes whatsoever finally has a beautiful little green zebra tomato dangling from a branch. (So that was what that plant was. I totally didn't mark my plants once I put them into the big pots.) I have new yellow pears growing and hopefully the nasty little caterpillars won't descend in droves like last time. I just hope these little nuggets of sun will have time to ripen before the first frost. Better late than never, I guess.

A Sad Little Garden

This year my little container garden was a huge bust. The harvest has been pitiful - 3 bulbous cucumbers and a handful of tomatoes with a few more a slim possibility. I've been plagued with caterpillars munching my yellow pear tomatoes, most of my plants have been dropping their flowers and all my tomatoes are malformed and small. I'm pretty sure they're been lacking in vitamins and minerals. I just haven't been up on feeding it to them. And the early start of severe thirst probably wasn't helpful. It makes me so sad! I guess I'm just not a good container gardener. I do much prefer stuff in a raised bed or in the ground. So, next year we're putting in a raised bed and I'll be much more prepared! I'll just have to forgive myself for being so neglectful this year. New baby, moving, you know. Stuff like that. Life. When the cold months set in, I'm going to start planning my garden for next season, order seeds early, and get to work early in the year. In the meantime I really am desperate to find someone who is desperate to get rid of their tomatoes. I really need to can some salsa for the winter. We can't live without it!

Garden Status

My poor little garden is suffering. My potted tomatoes took a hard hit when we moved because they were stuck at the old place for awhile and didn't get watered for a few days. They've made a small come-back and I harvested my first black cherry tomato a few days ago. It's mid-August already! Pretty abysmal harvest so far. We've picked all of 2 tomatoes. I think we just got a late start with the seedlings and planting them. There are a few tomatoes growing right now, and I'm hoping to have enough for a half-dozen salads before the chill winds of autumn kill them off. I just might be having a FRYday featuring fried green tomatoes. I guess that's not such a bad thing! Aaah, well. It's not like I had a baby and moved within 6 months of moving out here to Maryland or anything. ;-) There's always next year!