Adventures of an urban homesteader growing greens, preserving the harvest and tending a backyard barnyard
I remember very vividly that cold winter day when I came screaming into the house with muddy clogs. It was the day of the first egg… As I’ve mentioned before, I adopted my girls off Craig’s List, and unfortunately they had decided to take a winter break from laying shortly before I brought them home. I had all but given up when one day I
As I’ve probably mentioned before, I spent my winter months pouring over seed catalogs and various books on growing veggies in the NW. I wanted to maximize our space and grow as much as possible. Two resources were especially helpful in my planning: Portland Nursery’s Planting Calendar and Maritime Northwest Garden Guide which is produced by the Seattle Tilth. At work I use Excel a
This is just a quick post for those living in the Portland metro area. Portland City Repair will be coordinating a lot of really interesting workshops, many of which appear to be free, that range in topics but include permaculture subjects. Click HERE for their list of workshops. I wish I could attend some, especially the rain barrel one, but my weekend is looking pretty
In Toby Hemenway’s book on permaculture, Gaia’s Garden, he has a chapter called “Pop Goes the Garden”. I could only hope and pray that all the time and money spent would lead to at least some things living. But man – he was right! I just had to share some recent pictures of my hard labor coming to fruition. I am including pictures of my
After setting the stage, it was time to plug in the bigger pieces of the food forest. We went to One Green World out in Mollala that carries a great assortment of rare fruit and berry plants. They were great and very affordable. A couple hundred dollars later, and a sore back, the plants were in the ground by mid-February. Bosc Pear tree – 1x
I ride the bus to and from work, so I must have been a site to see in January and February. I would balance my travel mug in one hand and several seed and nursery catalogs in the other. After a few different sketches on Photo Shop, I landed on one final design that would allow for a future patio and raised garden beds. I
About a year ago, my sister Anne told me she wanted to get chickens. We live in a city. A small one, but a city none the less. I believe I promptly replied by telling her she was nuts. I’m not sure how long it took me for that thought to later sink in and start eating away at me. I realized I wanted chickens
I should begin by admitting I can be sometimes obsessive and neurotic. That in mind, we managed to buy a house last summer and it has become my new obsession. First it was tango. Then it was ceramics. Now it’s my house. Our house. Our poor little house was passed through a family that somehow produced four selfish and irresponsible crabby kids. The kids turned
