There are times in life where it becomes clear that you need to move on. I have been imagining lately how difficult and frightening it must be for baby birds to be pushed out of the nest by their mothers. But if it weren’t for the mother’s gentle nudge, would the baby bird ever have […]
At our party last weekend, we had intended to do grafting and mushroom inoculating, but didn’t get to the latter. Rob has been working on evenings this week to complete the task, which is not difficult, just time consuming. Amassing the items required for the job was the most tedious part. We have been collecting […]
This past weekend we invited friends over to learn how to graft fruit trees! Rob and a couple of other attendees have attended workshops with Ken Taylor to learn how to graft onto root stock. There were a few reasons for us to host a work party. Realistically, we have been meaning to do this […]
We lost a great deal of our orchard blossoms early in the season during a frost. It was a disappointing day. We tried hard to save them, throwing a sheet over each tree, which knocked off some of the blooms in the wind before we decided to remove them. After the frost hit, Rob got […]
Our garlic scapes are now coming fast and furious! They are a wonderful byproduct of growing garlic, since by harvesting, the garlic bulbs grow much larger. In the interest of making no waste, we use every single one! I get asked a lot what we do with them all, so I thought others may have […]
Young salsify buds and leaves The salsify has spread across our property. A main criticism of planting salsify is that it spreads so readily. I haven’t figured out why this is a problem yet. Usually we hold out until fall when we harvest salsify roots, but since we have such an abundance of shoots in […]
“A weed is a plant whose virtue is not yet known” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson This is a photo tour of five ‘weeds’ likely growing in your yard that you can eat! We use all six to make our ‘weed salads’ which we eat all summer long! The children love finding and eating many of these […]
Spring is here! Which also means that foraging dinner from our yard has begun. Our asparagus is up and delicious when it makes it inside the house. It is often consumed as a fresh snack, so it never sees the kitchen! Our hostas have also started poking their spears up through the ground. When tightly […]
As Spring brings rain and regeneration, I am growing my anticipation of the upcoming Forest Garden Convergence! The theme of this year’s convergence is “Deep Roots of Regeneration.” The general plan is to have panel discussions on topics of Forest Gardening with family programming happening at the same time. I am part of the family […]
Yesterday our family awoke to nearly a foot of snow after a week of playing outdoors in spring coats. At first I was so discouraged, feeling very much like I have had enough winter. Then I came to see the beauty of soft snow piled high atop everything. The snow was good for packing since […]
