The Garden

I've mentioned our garden in a couple of previous posts and now I'd like the opportunity to share a little bit about it. When we moved in to this house last June, my husband stated quite clearly that he wanted at least half of our 10,000 square foot back yard to be garden space and a mini orchard. I smiled and nodded. My husband usually comes up with elaborate schemes, but rarely does he follow through. Besides,we live in the West Valley of the Phoenix Metro area. DESERT. Our backyard "soil" is caliche, a clay/concrete like mix where even weeds have a hard time taking hold. The temps here in the summer are upwards of 110 degrees every day and to water something enough to keep it alive would make our water bills atrocious, right?

Hubby assured me that we would could fix all of those problems and reminded me that gardening would make a positive impact on our environment, our health and our family. To tell you the truth, I really did want a garden but wasn't really in the mood to figure out how to go about it in this "garden challenged" area of the country. And so, the research began. Lots of books (I told you Amazon loves us!) 

To fix our soil issues, my husband constructed raised beds in which we mixed organic compost, steer manure and the native soil. This gave the plants good soil in which to grow and made it easer for us to do the hard work of gardening. He rigged up a drip line so we don't have to spend hours standing around with a hose. The system is more efficient than hand watering and can be set to automatically do the deed if we aren't around. The timer also allows us to water late at night or early in the morning while we're still asleep...perfect for our sweltering summers where watering during the daylight hours steals your water due to instant evaporation. We have yet to have a need for shade but the time is fast approaching. We drew out a contraption made of PVC pipe and shade cloth that we can erect to protect our more delicate plants during the summer. A trip to the hardware store is in short order...

Our garden has been one of the most wonderful experiences. We spend our weekends and evenings in the backyard, weeding, watering, tasting and playing. Our children helped plant almost everything and I love to see them pull a radish or carrot out of the ground and eat it. They don't even wipe off the dirt anymore. My daughter nearly annihilated my mint plant by sneaking leaves to chew while she dug in the dirt. Nothing is more rewarding than eating a huge green salad that you grew. Even better, watching your KIDS eat the salad because you grew it. My daughter is now in the habit of asking if we're having "store vegetables" or "garden vegetables." Love it!

This being our first year, we planted everything we wanted and hoped for the best. To our great suprise and delight, things are going pretty well. Some things are doing better than others and we'll take that into consideration for the next round of plantings. Here are some pics so you can see for yourself:

  Fuzzy Baby Apricots

                           

   Yellow Crookneck Squash Blossom

   Broccoli  

     Whole Lotta Lemons

      Pretty Purple Flower Whose Name I Don't Know

Hang Me Out to Dry

I know I talk about laundry a lot but it's something that everyone has to do. It takes up everyone's time and if there are better, greener, simpler ways to do it, I'm all for it! For the past month, I have hung out every load of laundry on my makeshift clothesline. If I ran out of space, I either draped the remaining items over kitchen chairs and barstools, or simply waited until there was space to hang them up. I have not used my dryer at all. Not only is hanging your laundry domestically satisfying (I coined that phrase myself!) it's good for the planet and good for your wallet.  Your wallet? Yes my friends. You may think that not running your dryer for a month wouldn't make a significant difference in your electric bill. But....BEHOLD!  This months electric bill!!
 

The underlined number is what I paid last month. The circled number is what I owe this month. I have not changed anything other than not using my dryer. That's $28.24 in monthly savings! Put that in your pipe and smoke it! And since I live in the desert, I can hang my clothes out year round bringing my yearly savings to $338.88. If that's not incentive enough to hang out your laundry, I don't know what is! But just in case you needed a little prodding, here are the top 10 reasons to line dry your clothes, courtesy of the book Simple Country Wisdom.

1. Conserving energy saves you money!! 

2. Your clothes will last longer. Dryer lint is actually teeny bits of your clothes.

3.Nothing will ever shrink again.

4. Clothes that hang dry don't develop static cling so dryer sheets are no longer necessary.

5. Line dried items are much easier to fold than that tangled mass that comes out of the dryer.

6. It's good for your body. The bending, stretching and lifting it takes to get laundry on the line is a good way to get some exercise without realizing it.

7. Sunlight has a gentle bleaching effect. Nothing gets whites whiter than the sun.

8.Line drying cools you down. On a hot day, hanging damp laundry is cooling and refreshing.

9.Some complain that clotheslines lower property value. There won't be any property if we destroy the earth!

10. Have you ever slept on sun dried sheets? PURE HEAVEN.

 

Sew Long!

I needed a clothespin bag. Despite my evil HOA's bylaw that disallows the use of clotheslines in my neighborhood, my hubby rigged up a nylon cord between our porch and the children's swing set. We're rebels, I know. It's not quite long enough to hold extra large loads but I haven't used my dryer in almost a month. The clothes dry fast, smell sweet and my jeans don't shrink up so I can avoid the "wiggle and stretch" dance to get them on. No one likes the wiggle and stretch dance. 

There is something quite satisfying about taking the time to hang out your clothes. I love looking out the window to see my towels flapping in the wind. Plus, I get 10 to 15 minutes of alone time whenever I go out to the clothesline. It's a win win, for me and the environment!

Anyhoo, since I now hang my clothes on a clothes line, I needed a clothespin bag to keep all my pins in one place and to provide easy access while I was out hanging. I did a little internet search which yielded several promising results. I found gaggles of cute, handmade bags. The problem was, most of them were upwards of $10 and then with shipping, I was looking at $20 for a little bag to put clothespins in. I think not. 

On to plan B.....make my own. Another internet search provided me with hundreds of patterns and ideas. The problem was, they ALL required sewing. I cannot sew. Not even a little. I can't replace a button, repair a hem. Sewing machines freak me out and I've always been terrified of the needle, convinced it's going to go right through my thumb. I know how practical it would be to learn basic sewing skills but haven't really needed or wanted to....until now. I found this idea:

Cool, right? And green too! My son has loads of outgrown button down shirts. What better way to give one of them a new life? All I had to do was turn it inside out and hand stitch the bottom closed. How hard could it be? An hour and a whole lot of profanities later and mine turned out looking like this:

Oy. Note the abysmal stitching. Good thing the seams are on the inside. From far away, it doesn't look half bad. I hope my stitches hold because I didn't have the slightest idea  how to tie off the thread. I've certainly got a lot to learn. Luckily, my friend Rachel has a sewing machine and a little free time so she's offered to tutor me in this most domestic of abilities. I can almost feel the needle crashing through my thumb...I'll let you know how it goes.

Yes I CAN!

When I make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, I use whole wheat bread (hopefully I'll soon be able to make my own,) organic crunchy peanut butter and my mother's homemade jam. Ah, jam. Mom's is better than anything I could buy and I know EXACTLY what's in it. I guarantee there won't be any high fructose corn syrup or icky preservatives. Fruit and sugar. Sweet and simple.

My Mom canned a lot when I was growing up. Jams and jellies were her forte, but she canned veggies too on occasion. I always associated canning with peeling, pitting, chopping and sweating and as soon as I was done with my job I hightailed out of the kitchen, thereby missing how to actually do the canning. Looking back, I realize I should have hung around. Our garden will soon be abundantly overflowing and since we've worked so hard to grow it, we want to preserve the fruit of our labors (no pun intended). We'll freeze some, we'll dry some, but eventually we're going to have to can some.


So....we bought books. That's what my husband and I do. If we want to learn about something, we buy lots and lots of books. Amazon looooves us.

We read them. We got confused. Low acidity, high acidity, pressure canning, open bath canning, headspace, hot pack, cold pack, raw pack....what? Overwhelmed, I knew it was important to learn how to can properly so I didn't inadvertently poison my family with tainted food. But, I figured I'd just put it off until the freezer was full and the dehydrator pooped out from working overtime.


No such luck. At our local natural food store we discovered that asparagus was on sale for a $1 a pound. My husband began loading the cart, insisting the only way we were going to learn to can was to do it, and that we needed a little practice before we actually had pounds of vegetables waiting to be preserved. I was of course terrified, but my hubby assured me if our Mom's could do it, so could we. 

We found a recipe for pickled asparagus on the internet and set to work. There was still a significant amount of confusion as to whether we needed to pressure can or use an open water canner. We decided to go with the latter. The recipe said to process the asparagus for 10 minutes but upon inspection, we realized the jars weren't sealed yet so we left them in for 12. The jars made weird squealing sounds when we took them out of the water (my husband said it was the asparagus crying) but everything looked good. And now, I have five jars of canned asparagus pickling in my pantry. I know exactly what's in it, I know how it was made and that, my friends, makes me very, very happy.

The Poultry Project

Growing up, my family had a small flock of chickens. We had several hens and one evil rooster. It was my job to gather eggs and feed the chickens each morning. It wouldn't have been too terrible a chore if not for that damn rooster. Lucifer incarnate. As I approached the coop he would flap his wings and scratch the ground like a little feathered bull waiting to charge. Clucking and crowing and watching me with those little black eyes. I would force open the door swinging my egg basket, yelling and kicking while that stupid bird pecked my toes and tried to poke out my eyes with his spurs. He was horrible.

I tried to explain to my mother how wicked a bird he was. My mother said to stop whining and just get the eggs. I begged her to gather eggs for me, telling tales of my valiant escapes from the rooster's feathery clutches and showing her my wounds where I had been pecked and spurred. Rolling her eyes, my mother grabbed the egg basket in one hand, my arm in the other and marched down the hill to the chicken coop. She unlatched the gate, stepped inside.....and two weeks later, that rooster was in the pressure cooker.

I hope never to have to deal with a rooster again. But I cannot deny the versatility and usefulness of having your own chickens. Farm fresh eggs every day, right in your backyard. How cool is that? Unfortunately, my HOA does not allow me to have my own chickens. However, my friend Anna, who lives about a half a mile away can have chickens. And lucky for me, she wants to have chickens! Anna and her family have graciously agreed to let me keep chickens at their house. I will pitch in for feed (we both agree organic is best) and clean the coop a couple of times a week. In exchange, I get fresh eggs, chicken manure for our compost bin, and a chance to share my "rural heritage" with my kids. I am so very excited!!

Since Anna has never had chickens and it's been ages since I've had my own, we decided to start small with two chickens apiece, four total. We have two Ameraucanas (which will lay green eggs!) and two Barred Rock hens. I took the family to meet our new chicks yesterday. The kiddos are pretty excited, even though they don't quite understand why our chickens have to stay at Anna's, or why it will take twenty weeks before they start laying. Either way, my daughter christened our two chicks Olivia and Minnie. Welcome to the family Olivia and Minnie. May you live long and lay often.

Tonopah Rob

In our continuing efforts to eat better and eat organic, I have searched high and low for a local farmer's market. The few I attended were heavy on the crafts, light on the veggies. What's a girl to do? Well, if you live in the West Valley of Arizona, you go to Tonopah Rob's!

Rob has about five acres out in the desert west of Phoenix. My family and I toured his farm today and brought home a bag full of yumminess. Fennel, turnips, pink and orange cauliflower, swiss chard, turnips....all grown locally, all grown naturally. Rob calls himself a "natural" farmer. He uses no soaps, sprays, pesticides or insecticides, even even if the USDA allows them for use on commercial organic crops.  He uses bugs, birds, lizards and snakes to protect his crops. Nothing has been dipped, bleached, power sprayed or waxed. They pull it out of the ground, rinse it and sell it off. It's a beautiful thing.

In addition to fruits and veggies, Rob also sells fresh organic eggs. He has quite the poultry flock from which my kids learned two very important lessons.

• Lesson One: Giant turkey (pictured below) may sound cool but if you gobble back in his face he WILL chase you. 

• Lesson Two: Chickens are cute but sticking your fingers through the chicken wire will result in pecked fingers. 

After bandaging the wounds my children acquired while learning said lessons, my husband and I picked Rob's brain as best we could for garden knowledge. He's a busy guy but between garden tours and shooting the breeze with his regulars, he was kind enough to indulge some of our questions. It turns out we're watering everything way too much, our tomatoes probably need more calcium, and if we plant crops from the nightshade family around our citrus trees we can kiss our aphid problem goodbye. I admire Rob and what's he's done. Not only is he providing us with nutritious natural food, but he is building a community and teaching those who listen about a simpler and more sustainable way to live. What a great way to spend a Saturday morning!

Put Some Garlic in Your Ear

My son is brute. No really, he is. He's one big manly boy, always covered in boogers and dirt, always destroying something. He's the sweetest thing, affectionate, curious and NEVER still. So when my little man was was pulling his hair, rubbing his eyes and crying inconsolably for for more than two hours I knew something was wrong. I made a quick call to the pediatrician and luckily, they had one more appointment and lo and behold, my son had his first ear infection. Some Amoxicillan and some Motrin and my little boy was right as rain the next day.


We're lucky to live in a society where access to basic health care isn't all that difficult to obtain. Something hurts, we make a call, take a pill and that's that. Pretty neat, huh? However, I feel that our dependency (mine included) on instant medical gratification has encouraged both patients and doctors to want just that. A quick fix. Got a cold? Here's a pill. Feeling sad? Here's a pill. Got a wart? Let's cut it off. Something has been lost in the whole doctor/patient relationship. Patients are treated but often don't know why they got sick in the first place.


Don't get me wrong. I believe modern medicine is an absolute necessity. I am so glad that there was a medicine that I could give my son to make him feel better. But what if I couldn't have gotten him in to the doctor? What if there comes a time when I can't afford to take him? Or, due to some economic or socioeconomic disaster, modern medicine is not easily accessed or worse, completely unavailable?

I have been doing a lot of research about naturopathic doctors, homeopathic treatments and herbal healing. Basic knowledge of herbs, nutrition and essential oils can help you treat common ailments at home. And if they don't completely remedy the situation, they will make you feel a whole lot better until you can get to the doctor. Garlic oil for instance, will help an earache. Unfortunately, I didn't have any and though a garlic clove would work too, I didn't think shoving a clove of garlic in a 19 month old's ear was very practical.

Here's a cool graphic I found to get you started thinking about your own medicine chest. Along with your regular over the counter meds, I would consider doing some research and finding out which herbs and oils may help your family.