Category Archives: Urban Farming

Vegetables, flowers, chickens, landscaping, produce, small spaces

Blessed Saturday

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Been out working in my garden this beautiful Saturday morning. Moving containers around, watering, thinning, etc. All while still in my pajamas. 😉

Now I’m getting ready to plant some more bush beans and a few other things in containers. And finally pot the rest of the petunias which were supposed to be Princess Girl’s but she lost interest.

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Flower Girl has been helping me water.

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And eating some more carrot thinnings. 🙂

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It’s a glorious day here in the Pacific Northwest. I hope your Saturday is blessed no matter the weather where you are.

Maridy

“I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.” Psalm 121

My groupies

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I went out to feed the chickens this morning and decided to let them out of their run since I finally got some bird netting around my small garden.

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The three hens who were not busy laying quickly headed for the compost heap on the other side of the yard. I put some feed out for them in their run and made sure they had water, but I had forgotten to bring out the kitchen scraps. I brought those out and emptied them in the big tray in their run and then went to stand on the back deck admiring the wisteria.

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Soon, however, Scaredy hopped up an the deck with me. I shooed her off. Then Pepper hopped up. I shooed her off. Then either Sugar or Salt (don’t know which is which) joined the crowd, and I think Scaredy jumped back up as well.

What are these chickens doing? They hardly ever come up on the deck, and here they were, all very insistent to join me up there. Over and over, no matter how many times I chased them off.

And then I realized something.

Just to test my theory, I walked over to the compost. My three groupies followed me. I walked across the yard and they quickly made their way over.

What did I realize?

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That’s right, I realized I was still holding the scrap bucket!

The empty scrap bucket.

But they didn’t know it was empty. They kept waiting for me to empty out it’s bountiful goodness.

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So, I walked to the chicken run where I had already dumped the contents and in no time at all, the girls were happily munching on radish and carrot tops from the garden.

As I walked away with the bucket in hand, no one followed me. They had gotten what they wanted. My groupies no longer cared about me.

And that is as it should be.

PS, I posted this on Facebook this morning. Four eggs yesterday! First time having 100% lay rate since the young ones started laying. Hopefully that will become the norm. 🙂

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And look how dark those brown ones are. Absolutely beautiful!

Maridy

“I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.” Psalm 121

Fresh salad!

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Fresh salad, straight from our garden/yard. Yum! I needed to thin out the lettuce from the small garden, I picked some of the over-wintered-but-not-doing-so-well spinach from the big garden, and I found some dandelion greens in the yard. I had a head of purchased iceburg in the fridge and add to all that some borage flowers which just started blooming and you have a gorgeous salad almost too pretty to eat. Almost, but not quite. 🙂

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I love that dandelions are considered a weed, yet they are edible and good for you. And the borage is a volunteer which comes back every year.

Edit: For the health of you and your family, be sure if you are harvesting any wild edibles that they come from a trusted source not treated with any harsh chemicals! We don’t use any herbicides or pesticides or even any fertilizer on our lawn, so I know the dandelions are safe to eat.

It begins!

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I’m so excited. We got our first egg from one of our pullets. We received the chicks in November at about 3 weeks of age. I figured they’d start laying in April sometime. Looks like I was right!

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I just love the deep brown color of this egg. The only brown ones we've ever gotten through the years have been light colored.

Our English Game Hen (who is about 2 years old) started laying again a couple months ago after the winter. But she only lays about 4 eggs a week, and since she is Princess Girl’s pet chicken, the eggs were reserved for Princess Girl to eat. So I’m very excited to start getting eggs from our other girls for the rest of us to eat. With only 4 hens, though, they won’t produce enough eggs for all of us on a regular basis, but they’ll offset how many we have to buy. And we buy a lot of eggs!

Dreaming of the day when we have room for a larger flock. 🙂

Maridy

“I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth.” Psalm 121

Garden Update

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So, I went away for 10 days and came back to some radishes and lettuce ready to pick, or at least thin out (and eat the thinned one’s 😉 ). And just about everything too tall for the glass cover.

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Princess Girl was excited to pick some of her radishes, even though she’s not even sure if she likes them.

I’m not quite ready to leave the garden completely open to the cat, though. He likes to curl up in the warm sun, right on top of my baby onion plants. So, I’m thinking I’ll put another level of boards up around the garden and raise the glass that way. Then we can continue to let the chickens roam free too. Yeah, the chickens would decimate the garden right now. In fact, they were out and about while I was checking on the garden this morning and were VERY interested in what was in that box!

In other news, the spinach in the pots on the deck are doing much better than the boxes on the fence. I’m thinking the fence boxes might be holding too much moisture. Need to drill a few holes in the bottom and see if that helps. And I need to trim the honeysuckle already. It grows so fast, but I knew it would. Hmmmm, looks like I have some gardening work ahead of me tomorrow. Ahh, shucks! 😉

 

Harvesting Green Onions

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I went back to that park where the wild oinions are growing.

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All of that "grass" is onions!

I picked a large grocery sack full and brought them home. Kinda weird to be walking through the neighborhood with a bag full of produce which I had just harvested from the “wilds” of the neighborhood park.

Once I got home, Princess Girl and I got to cleaning.

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After cleaning, I ended up with what amounts to about 15 to 20 bunches from the grocery store.

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I gave them one last cleaning in the sink, then got to chopping. Once chopped I put 1/2 cup servings into small baggies.

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When they were all bagged, I labeled them with the what they are, today’s date, and serving size. I ended up with 22 servings (11 cups).

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All the little baggies went into a large baggie and into the freezer for future use

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We’re headed to Nevada next week (yay!), and when we get back, if the onions are still harvestable, I’ll probably do it all again. Visions of quiches and soups and all sorts of recipes are dancing in my head!

Maridy

“I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth.” Ps 121:1-2

The city…grrr (And a garden update)

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City living can get me down sometimes. Sure, there’s beauty here. I run across it all around. Like this lovely little scene just down the street.

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Looks like a beautiful spot to explore and maybe have a picnic. Until you look to the side. And see this.

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I understand why they have to set boundaries and protect the natural places. But the limits can be stifling to this country girl. So, I come home to my little garden and try to shut out the sounds of the city and dream of the day we’ll be back at Castle Rock.

And speaking of my garden, here’s some recent pictures. It’s just about time to start thinning the radishes and lettuce. I actually picked and ate a couple of the lettuce seedlings which had somehow* gotten planted amongst some of the carrots. It was a delicious foretaste of the salads we’ll be eating in just a little while.

*somehow – like maybe because a two year old was helping me plant? 😉

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Seeing my little garden and how well it’s coming along helps me to better endure our time here. Gives me a purpose outside the house. And will eventually give us healthy food to eat. A win-win situation.

On my walk

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Look what I found on my walk today. “Wild” onions! At the same park I went to earlier in the week. The family and I went on a walk. In the pouring rain. And came home with a whole handful of onions. And there’s more, many, many more, to be had. I’m making quiche tonight with green onions in it. Yum!  And later this week, I’m going back to pick more and preserve them by cutting and freezing them. I’m excited. Can you tell?

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This is perfect because the onions are already there, growing great, and all I have to do is harvest them before they die off or get mowed down. And if you’re worried about me picking someone’s onions, don’t be. This part of the park is all but abandoned. The city comes in once or twice a year and mows it. And the onions are so thick, it looks like grass. I could pick as much as I wanted to, and you’d never be able to tell I had been there. In fact, I would never have guessed the “grass” was actually onions except that with the girls running around today, they were stepping on them and we could smell them and investigated. When I was there earlier in the week, I stayed on the trail. I guess there are times when getting off the trail is a good thing. 🙂

Maridy

“I lift up my eyes to the hills, where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, the maker of heaven and earth.” Ps 121:1-2

Garden Plot Update #2

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20150217_101044Our first garden visitor!

So, I mentioned before that we planted our seeds on Feb 17th. What I didn’t show are our garden markers. I have used popsicle/craft sticks before with so-so results. Oh one hand they are cheap and easy to use. You write the veggie on the end and stick it in the ground. But I found that the sun and rain fades the lettering after a couple months. Just fine if you only want to know which row you planted your carrots vs onions in until they grow and you can tell them apart by their leaves. Not so good if you want to permanently mark your 4 different varieties of tomatoes so you can remember which type is which when it comes time for harvest. So, I thought I’d try a little experiment.

20150217_114825First, I wrote the info on the stick as usual. I used both sides. The front has what it is. The back has the expected harvest date so I can remind myself when I’m out in the garden and don’t have to refer back to my packets or journal

20150217_114854Then, I coated the end of the stick in clear nail polish. The polish soaked into the stick and dried very quickly, so I am hoping it will keep the letters from fading. At least until I can remember which variety of lettuce I planted where! I guess we’ll just have to see how it does.

20150217_123501And there’s the newly planted (and marked!) garden.

A friend of mine expressed some skepticism about planting so early in the season, but here’s one of the reasons I wasn’t concerned. I have shower doors! And they fit almost perfectly on my new bed. I guess this means I have a cold frame. I’m still working on a system to cover the gap in the middle, but for now, they work admirably.

20150221_132523They help heat up the soil during the day to give my little plants a boost, and they hold in just enough heat at night that the slight frosts we’ve had don’t touch the seedlings (even though everything that I have planted right now can tolerate lights frosts.)

20150221_184551And, if it gets really cold, the doors make it a cinch to cover the bed.

20150305_140335They are easily propped open so that I can work in there or to let out excess heat in case we have some really warm sunny days (hahaha! warm sunny days in the springtime in the Pacific Northwest? I crack myself up!)

20150304_103200Wait, what was I just saying about warm, sunny days??

At any rate, the shower doors also serve two more VERY important roles. One, they keep the free-ranging hens out of my seedlings!

And two, they provide the perfect table for a two year old to play with her dinosaurs and a pail of water. 🙂20150305_141309-1

Stay warm everyone. And God bless!

Garden plot update #1

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March is here and today was absolutely beautiful out. I so enjoyed going out and watering my little seedlings. Today I noticed that the brussels sprouts and kale had sprouted. I figured it was high time to finally write a post about my little garden plot. My father-in-law has his usual plans for the “big garden” and said that I could have a little space next to the back deck for a garden of my own. About a month ago, here’s what my little space looked like.

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Yep, that area piled high with bags, buckets, and junk. I started cleaning it up with eagerness.

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See, looking better already.

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I found the buckets a new home and gave the honeysuckle a haircut because I planned on hanging some containers on the fence. Then I used some of the fence wood I found on freecycle.org (which we also previously used for our chicken run) to construct a raised box for the garden bed.

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How did I ever do construction without pneumatic tools?!

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It was sooo easy. Bam, bam, bam and it’s done!

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The box ended up being 5 foot square. Twenty-five square feet of garden goodness. Not much when I’ve been used to at least 5 times that amount, but I’ll take whatever I can get. I also have grand plans for a bunch of containers. We’ll see how those turn out. I have never done container gardening before.

So, the evening I got the garden box built I ran out to the store and bought bags of garden soil to put in my box. I hated to spend that kind of money on it since I know there are far cheaper ways to obtain soil, but I was too impatient to figure it out. I was even too impatient to wait for the next day to empty the bags into the box. So I rigged up a light and worked into the dark.

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A nicely filled garden bed waiting for seeds.

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It was such a mild night out, that I was able to kick back and put my feet up for a little while and enjoy my endeavors.

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And speaking of feet…I am loving gardening in my rain boots. I loved that I didn’t have to worry about dirt getting into my shoes as I spread it around. I know this may seem like a no-brainer to you all, but I’ve never had good rain/much boots before.

And here’s the prepared bed (along with containers on the fence and you can see a few on the table – more on those later.)

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Watch this space. A couple months from now I’m hoping it will look vastly different, namely greener! 🙂

The very next day (February 17th) the girls and I got busy planting.

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Such good helpers!

Well, that’s enough for now. I have several more pictures about my garden, but it’s late and I’m tired.

Until next time.