~ Garden Progress ~

My camera is broken so I couldn't take pictures of the peas or any of my other seedlings. My mom rocked the house and planted the entire big garden by herself, the boys did help with the potatoes by dropping them in the holes. We don't have all of our garden space planted yet but we (I) am working on it little by little. Our major priority is finishing the fence around the pasture.


 


We don't know what this is. Any ideas?




Dandelions




Heartease or Jonhy Jump-ups




Plum Blossoms




Apple Blossoms




Asparagus




Garlic





Phlox

 


Newly fenced pasture that is finally GREEN




Rhubarb





Bleeding Hearts
















This post is shared at the HSV Garden Challenge

~ Just Like Daddy ~





~ A Great New Way to Brush Your Teeth ~

After not being able to find a tooth paste that was chemical free at local stores I turned to a google search. I found toothsoaps, an awesome alternative to the chemical filled toothpaste that are widely available.

During the month of May is buy one get one so I stocked up. I want to do a longer post but it has to wait because we are in the middle of a big fencing projects and almost out of hay. So, click the link and head on over to check out a healthy way to achieve awesome oral health.

~ Our Recycled Polytunnel ~

This kind of happened by accident. We were going to use the black pipe to make a hoop to drape the deer fence over the asparagus but when I saw how nice the pipe arched I just couldn't do a little hoop cover.

I found some medium fence posts in the garden shed, I think they are around a $1.70 at Menard's. The black pipe was one great big coil that we had used to water the horses before we had a hydrant in the barn. It ran from the house spicket to the pasture. I don't remember how much it was but I will look on Thursday and report back.

The black pipe fit over the fence post, creating a lovely arch. I thought I had a picture of this but maybe not. Kids were playing with the camera so one never knows.

We made the base 8' wide by 12' long. Eight posts were used with four pieces of pipe cut 12' long. To figure your arch take the width x 1.5

The plastic was just what we had one hand, the left over stuff that was on the ground under our ice skating rink. It had some good holes but we tried to just work around them. We will buy some nicer stuff, 12mil, as soon as we get the chance. We are going to build another door frame so that both ends have doors making it easier to vent. We will also frame in the bottom with some lumber so that we have something to staple the plastic to.

The high temp for today was 67 and inside the tunnel with the door wide open it was 98. The peppers and tomatoes are loving it. I finally have all the pepper and tomato seedlings in bigger pots. It should have been done long ago but was so cold outside and I just didn't have the room inside for all those 2" pots.

Fence post 8' apart.

At the moment, its not pretty. As soon as we get a chance we will get some heavier plastic for it. This will be the small tunnel and we will still make a big one by the chicken yard.

This was so easy to do, I could have done it myself but it was nice to have some muscle to help with bending the pipe. I had no idea how much faster it is to plant seeds and seedlings when you don't have to be neat. It only took me about an hour to re-pot 48 pepper plants, 12 eggplants, and 12 more tomato plants.

So, Thursday I go to the "big" town and I will add up the cost of what it took to build this little gem of a garden tool and report back.

This post is shared at:

Homestead Barn Hop

~ Bees ~

If the weather warms up we should be getting our bees next week or the week after. Hubby is really excited! This book was recommend by a family friend, Don (who is also a state bee inspector) and the local bee keeping association. We are getting our bees from Don so we know that they are disease free and in good shape. They will be coming in their own boxes so there won't be a lot of setup for us to do. Looking forward to posting more pictures when we get them and thinking of doing a honey giveaway during honey harvest. We will have to see how well our little bees do.

~ Asparagus ~

Last year I order asparagus seeds but never planted them because we just ran out of time. Most people order asparagus crowns but it still takes at least three years till you can harvest. With the seeds it takes an extra year but the yield is suppose to be greater. We will see. This particular variety is a heirloom Martha Washington. The asparagus shoots are small and tender. Lightly steamed and topped with lots of grass-fed butter and fresh lemon juice, hmmm...

We planted the seedlings 6 inches deep 12 inches apart. Hubby tilled a new spot for them. The ground had some top soil but we have lots of sand so we tilled in lots of compost. We covered the whole patch with deer off netting to keep the critters out. So far they look good. Hopefully the time will fly by and we will be eating and freezing fresh asparagus in no time.


I ordered my seeds from Baker's Creek. There was supposed to be 75 seeds in the package but there were at least double that. We have 90 seedlings in the patch and another 90 to find a home for. 



This post is shared at:

Homestead Barn Hop

~ Cold Crop Veggie Boxes ~

After realizing that between the dog and my youngest, garden row just would not work, they would get trampled. Jairden tries hard to stay out, but the dog has no concept of rows when he is chasing chipmunks. 

So, I found some extra lumber, cut it down to two foot lengths and made some easy 2x2 boxes. I found another use for those plastic blind slats, they make great dividers. I planted eight kinds of lettuce, four kinds of radishes, and two kinds of carrots.

This is going to be the future home of our polytunnel. The book “How to Grow Food in your Polytunnel all Year Round” is awesome. We are really excited to be able to have fresh veggies in the near middle of winter. We figure that the cost of the tunnel will pay itself back if the only thing we grow is lettuce the first winter. Right now we spend about four dollars a week on lettuce and that is just for my husband's dinners at work.

Right now we are using the space as a place to till soil for the planter boxes and new garden beds.

All of the seedling enjoying some shady sunshine. Hopefully they can go in the ground soon under the cover of some hoop row covers at night.

This post is shared at:

Homestead Barn Hop

~ Wordless Wednesday ~

~ My Baby's First Shiner ~

Tired Exhausted toddler vs. playground equipment. Playground equipment won.

~ Strawberry Kefir Yogurt ~

My daughter loves dairy, specifically yogurt and kefir. I had a room temp yogurt culture, the Matsoni from Cultures for Health and loved it but then my supply of raw milk was inconsistent so I let the yogurt go and kept up with the kefir. I also purchased my kefir grains from Cultures for Health and love them. I even preheated them to 400 degrees and they lived. Kefir grains are not tolerant of high heat, but these little guys keep right on trucking. For more info on the products that Cultures for Health carries please see the link on the left sidebar.

Grace loves kefir and has it three to four times a day and she is rarely sick. In fact, this winter, when that horrible stomach bug was going around she was the only on that didn't get it. I believe that from eating all the kefir she does she has exceptional gut flora which in turn gives her an exceptional immune system.

Bowl, strainer, flour sack towel.

To make yogurt out of kefir I lay a clean flour sack towel in a strainer and pour my kefir in. I put the strainer on top of a bowl to collect they whey that drains out. As the whey drains the kefir thickens. I let it sit over night and it is perfect "greek" yogurt. Smooth and creamy. Past flavors have included Vanilla Maple and today we made Strawberry.

I blended a dozen half frozen strawberries in the food processor and then dumped in my strained kefir. I didn't add any sugar which I love and then members of the family who need a  little extra sweet can add some raw honey.

I was considering getting a yogurt culture again but I think I will order another batch of kefir grains and make a gallon of kefir at a time. We make a half gallon at a time at the moment but that doesn't last very long especially when it isn't just Grace that is eating the kefir yogurt.

Super simple and super good!

This post is shared at:

Monday Mania

Homestead Barn Hop
Traditional Tuesday Blog Hop

~ May 1st ~

I wish I had more hours in the day, but then don't we all. I had a really great time (what little it was) participating in the Natural Parenting Blog Party hosted by The Peaceful Housewife. I only got to write one little post on co-sleeping and so far have only made it to a few blogs but I am going to keep plodding along, visiting the blogs on the linky list with the few moments that I get here and there.

I had every intention to write a post on gentle christian discipline. I didn't get it done, life has just been too busy and with the return of warm weather equals even less inside time. For those who asked, this is my all time favorite article of gentle christian discipline, Is Spanking Biblical? (NO!) at Parenting Freedom. It is long but indepth. I also love reading Dulce de Leche and The Hippie Housewife. The both offer such great reminders and write about gentle discipline in such a graceful way. Another great blog that I found during the party is Hybrid Rasta Mama.

I wanted to write a post for National Spank Out Day but will instead link to Jennifer's {Hybrid Rasta Mama} because it is so good.


I am trying to outline a schedule that will allow me to write about the topics I love to talk about while maintaining balance in our family's life. I have several new recipes to share too!

~ Pepper Seedling Starts ~



This was in March, they are much bigger now.

Peppers are started. Some varieties got starter earlier than other because, gosh darn-it, there are just not enough hours in the day. You can read about the tomato seedling here. This year I started:

Jalapeno, Traveler Strain

Cayenne Pepper Blend

Orange Sun Pepper

California Wonder Gold

California Wonder Purple

Red Cherry Sweet Pepper

Beaver Dam Pepper

Sweet Pickle Pepper

Purple Mini Bells

Red Mini Bells

Yellow Mini Bells

Jimmy Nardello's Pepper (the packet was empty but another packet had twice as many seeds as it should have so I will have to identify by the type of peppers we get to see if I actually will get any of this variety)

Apple Green Eggplant

Rosa Bianca Eggplant