It has been awhile since I really talked about what we have going on around the homestead. We have so many projects that weekends are anything but relaxing. As we dive deeper into this lifestyle, we are finding that during the spring and summer months, there is no such thing as rest. My old self would have balked, whined, and generally made disgruntled sounds about the thought of ‘all that work’ but that is a thing of the past. The level of satisfaction at being so productive is well worth a few sore muscles and some lost sleep. The quality of the food we eat is incredible as a result, too! We can rest in Winter, right? Anyway, here is a recap (with pics!) of all the stuff going on in our little world.
Catching Up
This is our second season trying to grow food and the garden is doing well! Other than the slugs (see below) everything is on track. This year we are growing;
Green onions, red onions, and Walla Walla onions- Beets (first time trying this year)
- Head lettuce, leaf lettuce, mustard greens
- Carrots, potatoes, strawberries
- Green beans, pinto beans, peas
- Garlic and tomatoes
- Dill, oregano, lavender, basil, and parsley
I am extremely excited for the harvest this year but I am finding some issues with the soil and will need to get a proper tester to figure out what amendments are needed. I think I made a mistake by planting the garlic inside the greenhouse. The leaves are yellowing and curling which is a sign of a type of root rot, from all I can tell. The garlic is on the right in the picture above.
The Battle of the Slugs continues. This year when we replaced all the plastic on the greenhouse, we made the sides longer so they would drape out from the base. Then we covered it with top soil so it would be better sealed and snug. Due to the greenhouse being exposed last winter, there were some slugs that managed to make it in there and I imagine some eggs were laid in the soil. I planted cucumber starts twice and they completely annihilated them! This weekend we are armed with flashlights and salt to exterminate the pests. We head out around 8 and then 10 in the evenings to check each cold frame, the greenhouse, and perimeter. I plan on getting something like Sluggo since it has been recommended to me many times this Spring. It will not hurt your plants or harm animals – just the slugs. Oh by the way: the copper tape we got to repel slugs didn’t work for anything. Likely the deciding factors were the tape was too thin and also not wide enough. I guess copper plates or strips of copper plating work better but honestly, who can afford that?
Last month, I tried my hand at making Apple Cider Vinegar. I wrote about it and though we still have about 2 weeks left to wait for it to finish up, I opened one of the jars last night and sniffed it. WOOO!!! It was a very strong odor somewhere between alcohol and vinegar. More toward the vinegar side, thankfully. I am very hopeful that we did it right the first time and can enjoy the uses of some homemade vinegar using apple scraps. See the link above for the article on how I did it!
New Projects
Today, I am going to try my hand at smoking cheese. I have a co worker who does it and she has brought in smoked mozzarella and cheddar which basically turned me into a teenage boy with the munchies. I made an absolute pig of myself! The upside is until then, I hadn’t really thought about it. I have a smoker and the chips already so why not? I will be writing an article about it as a guest post so stay tuned on the Facebook page, Pinterest, or Twitter to catch it. I am very excited to try it out and my mouth is literally watering as I write this. Pardon me while I clean up the drool off the keyboard. 😉
We recently went on a trip south and of course, always bring extra bags to be filled with goodies we either cannot get or is so expensive that it isn’t worth it. Well, I have been on a serious kick for broadening our grain supply and decided we needed corn. I want to grind my own corn meal and flour. Specifically, I want to make my own corn tortillas. I have already mastered making crackers from scratch using flour we also grind ourselves. Always seeking to add cooking skills from raw ingredients, it seemed like a good one to go for. The way I look at it, both the crackers or the tortillas could be made a little thicker and shaped to be a sort of edible plate or shallow bowl for a party, camping, or a SHTF situation. One of the fans replied to my cracker making infographic and said she used a hot stone (baking stone) that caused the dough to really shrink up. I would like to master making crackers and tortillas on heated stones as well. In fact, I have a secret desire to learn how to cook the most rudimentary ways such as on heated rocks and making a spit to turn the meat over the fire. If you can master that style, you are better off than the vast majority at being able to make yourself edible food without burning it and wasting it. Perhaps a little over the top but I like a challenge.
I started another Ebook primer about dehydrating. It will hopefully be about eh same size as the last one but there seems to be more to cover. My aim is to make smaller Ebooks (aka a ‘primer’) that a person can pick up, read in a couple hours and then do what they just read about. Learn a new skill in a single afternoon! I hope to have it out in early to mid July. In case you don’t know, my first Ebook, A Primer on Pickling; Learn to Pickle in a Single Afternoon is available on Kindle for less than a latte’ and you do NOT need a Kindle to read it. It can be read on any electronic device that can download the free kindle reader software.
And maybe…hopefully house shopping?
We are getting very excited at the real possibility of house shopping this Autumn. If things go through with a new position at work for me, we should be able to start the actual looking next month to get a real idea of what is out there. We can hone our skills to really see the house and signs of larger problems instead of the shine that has been put on it. My heartbeat speeds up whenever I think about it! I would rather live in a smaller house on a larger lot and that is kind of hard to come by in our price range…on an island. We did sit down and came up with some criteria that are non-negotiable and other things we can deal with if we have to. I am sure it will change multiple times as we progress through the process but even still, it is all very exciting and I am looking forward to moving…for the last time.
A Heartfelt Thank You
Thank you for following along on with me. I have a blog for many reasons but what really pushed me to go for it was from the responses I got on the Facebook page. I started the page so I could remember what I had done from year to year and it has exploded. We are nearing the 1 year mark of our page and have a strong fan base of over 5,600 likes as of this blog post. I learn so much from everyone who comments and yes, I read absolutely every single one! I never expected all of this would effectively grow out of deciding that I wanted a food source garden. It.Is.AMAZING! Thank you!
luckily garlic is one of those things you can pop the whole plant roots and all right out of the ground and into a prepared hole somewhere else–they should do fine outside-mine are out there right now!–good luck : )
I had thought about doing just that but we don’t have anywhere to move it 🙁