Looking like a creature from middle earth (the angst of going grey in unusual places)
A late Earth day challenge at ‘Green Cottage’..
Improving our recycling at home (thanks to Racoons tearing up our garbage bags)
Recipe with photos for ‘Welsh Cakes’..

Coming shortly

May 12th, 2008

Dear Blog Diary

Its funny how a busy, busy day can be the very day you catch up with things. At last a blog entry- I’ve missed doing this!

The Angst of Going Grey- It Would be Greener!

When my only son Josh (he who aspires to be a writer of fiction and is currently obsessed with the Mayan culture) starts staring at me for prolonged periods of time, with glassy eyes and a smirk on his face, I know its time to purchase a box of ‘Clairol Deep Auburn’…

I try not to dye my hair too often. One look on a box of hair dye you will see why- not really very green. Unfortunately not dyeing my hair frequently leads to periods of time where I greet the world, on a daily basis, with rather bizarre looking silver temples (I try not to go out too much when these arrive )

Thats when Josh amuses himself by staring at me before proceeding to talk incessantly about ‘Middle Earth’, ‘Lord of the Rings’ and ‘Anime’..I think ‘Labyrinth’ has been thrown in for good measure too. “Don’t dye your hair Mom”…”those SILVER bits look soo cool!”….

Although I love grey hair and secretly yearn for the day when I reach a more suitable age to suit such greyness, at 40 something I am just not ready for it yet!

A Late Earth Day Challenge

It really has been a challenge here post winter. My constant recycling and inability to get the filled recycling bags out for garbage collection in time (we live down a 1/4 mile lane which was sometimes impassable early mornings in winter to make the garbage truck) have led to lots of blue bags been blown around by strong winds and into the woodland. Emily and I have retrieved many of bags complete with their contents……we still have much to do and many trips to make to the recycling centre.

But we also stored some black bags too and this is when we realized that our recycling/composting was definately not up to scratch. A few noctural visits by racoons highlighted this fact by ripping open several bags to reveal compostable items as well as some recyclable ones too…

So we are now working towards better recycling and I think a big composting area is in order too!

Coming Shortly— Welsh Cakes and a Quick and Easy (and frugal) recipe to make on board your boat!

Dear Blog Diary

The other day a work colleague was talking about growing veggies which reminded me of the garden project that I had started 18 months ago and never finished….YET! (more in a moment)

We have always grown vegetables..well me mostly. It started, for me, around 12 years ago when we lived in England in a little cottage, on the outskirts of a fenland village with the most outrageous growing soil. I began reading about being more self-sufficient and thought this a good quality to have, not to always rely on everyone else, especially large corporations for all our supplies…

Our cottage adjoined huge fields where crops were grown commercially such as potatoes and wheat and I noticed that to make the growing of these vegetables and grains commercially viable that these crops were extensively sprayed with pesticides & acids to thwart the onslaught of a myriad of crop consuming insects/disease. Artificial fertilizers were introduced into the soil to promote growth and lots of it too…

I’d never really given any thought to the farming process before but having to keep the children inside on ‘spray day’ made me realise that there must be a better way of doing things…

Thats when I bought a packet of seeds (zucchini) and grew the most wonderful corner of veggies at my very first attempt….If ever you want to have a go at growing your own vegetables start with zucchini…they grow marvellously quickly, are generally left alone by disease and bugs and you can harvest the zucchini at any size- hell we let some grow into large marrows!

NO GREEN FINGERS THOUGH

Ever since I have always grown vegetables…Some years just a few pots full, other years several beds full. I’ve had lots of disasters along the way (I can assure anyone that is reading this that GREEN FINGERS are NOT something attached to my hands!) Most of my growing is still by trial and error but one thing growing ones own vegetables allow and that is CONTROL over WHAT goes into the soil and ultimately WHAT goes into our mouths..

I’d love to be able to buy ORGANIC all the time but this is not viable for us as a family so we buy whatever is on special offer mostly, so its nice to find time to produce some of our food organically ourselves…its very satisfying.

I also think these are good skills to have…

MY GARDEN PROJECT

Currently our garden is a disaster! I looked out this morning to see a garden awash with winter debri, litter that had blown around the garden and been covered by the snow. As it reappears the garden looks messy, sad and uncared for. It will be nice to tidy and clean up and get things ship shape again over the coming weeks…

MAKING A VEGETABLE GARDEN

18 months ago I decided to introduce a vegetable garden to ‘Green Cottage’ to grow a few veggies once again. Unfortunately the soil here contains huge boulders of rock and after many attempts I decided that ‘RAISED VEGETABLE BEDS’ would be the only solution in the area we wanted our garden.

The plans were to have around 10 raised beds to start with. Luckily we already had 6 small raised beds in place which would need digging out completely and the plan was to add 4 beds 8ft x 8ft. I ordered the wood from the local mill (much cheaper than buying from a store) and it wasn’t long before sturdy planks of rot proof hemlock arrived

These were relatively easy to contruct and if I can do it with just a hammer and nails then anyone can. Finishing touches were literally a swift chop with a chainsaw which my brave husband did for me (he also knew that if I attempted this he would have a wife without legs)

This year it would be great to finish the job and get some seeds sown or seedlings planted and get a small crop of homegrown veggies, hopefully without too many being sampled by the deer first!

What will you grow this year?

Dear Blog Diary

The other day a work colleague was talking about growing veggies which reminded me of the garden project that I had started 18 months ago and never finished….YET! (more in a moment)

We have always grown vegetables..well me mostly. It started, for me, around 12 years ago when we lived in England in a little cottage, on the outskirts of a fenland village with the most outrageous growing soil. I began reading about being more self-sufficient and thought this a good quality to have, not to always rely on everyone else, especially large corporations for all our supplies…

Our cottage adjoined huge fields where crops were grown commercially such as potatoes and wheat and I noticed that to make the growing of these vegetables and grains commercially viable that these crops were extensively sprayed with pesticides & acids to thwart the onslaught of a myriad of crop consuming insects/disease. Artificial fertilizers were introduced into the soil to promote growth and lots of it too…

I’d never really given any thought to the farming process before but having to keep the children inside on ‘spray day’ made me realise that there must be a better way of doing things…

Thats when I bought a packet of seeds (zucchini) and grew the most wonderful corner of veggies at my very first attempt….If ever you want to have a go at growing your own vegetables start with zucchini…they grow marvellously quickly, are generally left alone by disease and bugs and you can harvest the zucchini at any size- hell we let some grow into large marrows!

NO GREEN FINGERS THOUGH

Ever since I have always grown vegetables…Some years just a few pots full, other years several beds full. I’ve had lots of disasters along the way (I can assure anyone that is reading this that GREEN FINGERS are NOT something attached to my hands!) Most of my growing is still by trial and error but one thing growing ones own vegetables allow and that is CONTROL over WHAT goes into the soil and ultimately WHAT goes into our mouths..

I’d love to be able to buy ORGANIC all the time but this is not viable for us as a family so we buy whatever is on special offer mostly, so its nice to find time to produce some of our food organically ourselves…its very satisfying.

I also think these are good skills to have…

MY GARDEN PROJECT

Currently our garden is a disaster! I looked out this morning to see a garden awash with winter debri, litter that had blown around the garden and been covered by the snow. As it reappears the garden looks messy, sad and uncared for. It will be nice to tidy and clean up and get things ship shape again over the coming weeks…

MAKING A VEGETABLE GARDEN

18 months ago I decided to introduce a vegetable garden to ‘Green Cottage’ to grow a few veggies once again. Unfortunately the soil here contains huge boulders of rock and after many attempts I decided that ‘RAISED VEGETABLE BEDS’ would be the only solution in the area we wanted our garden.

The plans were to have around 10 raised beds to start with. Luckily we already had 6 small raised beds in place which would need digging out completely and the plan was to add 4 beds 8ft x 8ft. I ordered the wood from the local mill (much cheaper than buying from a store) and it wasn’t long before sturdy planks of rot proof hemlock arrived

These were relatively easy to contruct and if I can do it with just a hammer and nails then anyone can. Finishing touches were literally a swift chop with a chainsaw which my brave husband did for me (he also knew that if I attempted this he would have a wife without legs)

This year it would be great to finish the job and get some seeds sown or seedlings planted and get a small crop of homegrown veggies, hopefully without too many being sampled by the deer first!

What will you grow this year?