Sage in bloom.

This is our sage bush. As you can see, it will be going to seed soon. I think we have saved some from previous years, but I am going to double check and make sure. This plant clearly comes from very good stock!

Sage.

Sage smoke is one of my very favorite things.  My boyfriend has made a number of large smudging wands. I have only had the chance to make one so far, and it did not come together right, so I need more practice.

See, we have so much that I'm giving away some fresh sprigs, but I am also now hoping to perfect my wand making skills, so that I can give away and sell those, too. (Blessed or not blessed, depending on what people want.)

All of that aside, I love this plant, and I use it in many aspects of my life. It has a hearty, positive spirit!

Garden Update-With Pictures!

The garden is going in pretty well, now that the weather has warmed up.  It looks a bit weedy, because it's in progress.  Some beds have not yet been cleaned up and planted.  Right now, we have parsley, peppers (in the pots on the fence), tomatoes, and carrots in.  (By "in", I mean they've been planted.)

The tall, scraggly things in the center of this photo are our 2nd year kohlrabi plants.  We don't have a plan for them, other than to eat the greens.  I don't think we are saving seeds.  Eventually, we will finish the greens up, and they will be cleared out, possibly for a new crop. 

The brick planter in the corner contains sage.  I believe it's three years old now.  We have been using it to make smudging wands.  (There's just so much, and you can only dry so much for cooking!) We may end up selling some of it, if we end up with too much.

 

This is a bag of mulch, not cat food.  We give as many plastic bags as we can as many lives as we can.  Some have lasted us years.

The bed in the foreground is the carrot bed.  They had to be replanted, because the first batch of seeds did not sprout.  It may have been too cold when they were planted.  We don't know.  Now that it's warmed up, hopefully we will end up with a bumper crop!

The bed in the background is the tomato bed.  There were eight planted in all.  The variety we planted is purple! (Sadly, I do not remember the name.)

Kohlrabi

I'm sure there will be more updates as the year goes on.  The story may not change all that much, because we are about where we need to be with our core crops--the plants we will plant most often--but Nature is full of surprises.

The only other development is  that the boards that we were using to block out the chemicals are rotting, so they need to be redone, but they will be.  As organic growers, we do not want any chemicals or residue on our plants!

That's all I've got for now.  I hope everyone is having a wonderful Spring!

Drying in the Kitchen

I'm posting from my phone, so I apologize for the unedited photo. If you see something weird, please ignore it. LOL!

This post is about sponges and plastic baggies, both of which we recycle. (Well, zipper bags, anyway.) They have their own laundry line, right above the sink. All it took was two screw eyes and heavy cotton thread. (In this case, the thread was recycled from a cat food bag.)

I just anchored the screws into the cabinets on either side of the sink a little above eye level, and voila! I believe the term my boyfriend used when he first saw it was "rustic." I'm OK with that, because to me, it says "treading lightly."

The thread is not that thick, but I've been using this setup for a few years now.

Garden and Home Update: Early Spring

This is an older photo.

 

 

It looks like Spring has finally decided to start unfolding here in Maryland. As you can see by the fact that I've used an older photo, I have not been out to take photos in our garden yet this year.  Truth be told, there's nothing to photograph just yet.  Just beds and buckets of compost.

 

 

My boyfriend has started out by planting some carrots, collards, and chard.  We are just finishing up the last of our carrots and beets from last year.  They are a little woody, but they taste wonderful. :)  The kohlrabi from last year hung on, too, and I've been using the greens.

 

This year, he is experimenting with using fruit-only compost.  I don't know that there's any goal to that, other than to see how it works out. He's been out collecting mulch already at least once. (I still owe you all the post I have on that!)

 

Since the weather has been so weird, he's been focusing his efforts inside the house.  We are doing some remodelling, and he is doing it all himself!  (I have not been helping out, only because the rooms he's been working on so far--our two bathrooms--are too small for two people!)  I help out with design and with purchasing the supplies and fixtures, but he's been doing the grunt work.  (I didn't have to ask him--he just decided to do it!)  I think the next room on our agenda is the bedroom. 

 

The studio will come later, and that's going to be a lot more complicated and will probably take a long time.  He wants to put in what he is calling a floating floor.  (If you search the Internet for the definition, you will not come up with what he means.)  What he means by the term is he wants to build a floor a few inches above the existing floor in our studio, so that the power cords from his equipment (he is an electronic musician) can be stored "off the floor".  The floor would have a couple of hatches, through which we'd access the space.  We don't have a timetable for when we will start that work. It should make things very "interesting" in our tiny house for a few weeks! LOL!

 

I've been focusing on keeping the house in order and on getting some items made for my upcoming craft show season.  Spring/early summer is going to be busy for me!

 

Once we have some new growth and more planted, I'll make a more detailed update--with pictures!

 

Happy Spring!

DIY: Fix My Slippers!

 



This is a really simple project I took on in order to save a pair of slippers I really like.  They are nothing high-end or expensive.  They were simply a gift from someone I really care about.  They are also comfy!

 

I have worn them so much over the past couple of years that they finally started to have holes worn in their soles.  Instead of recycling them, I decided to fix them!

 

I am using denim reclaimed from a tote bag and carpet thread (very heavy thread--nearly indestructible!)

 

I simply took my slippers, traced around them on the denim, and made "insoles." With the slippers still turned inside out, I'm sewing the new soles/insoles onto the slippers. (Pin them in place to be sure you get the placement right.)

 

This could probably be done in an afternoon, but it's taken me about a month, because I tend to work on things for a bit and then sent them aside for a while.  I'm about halfway finished with the 2nd slipper and will probably take them with me on a trip we are taking next weekend.  :)

 

I don't know how durable they will be or if the denim will stay in place once the original soles are gone, but this at least will extend their life a bit!

I Was Going to Write a Ranty Post on Thanksgiving...

I'm not a fan of the "traditional" Thanksgiving Holiday. In fact, I really dislike it. I was going to come on here that day while the rest of the US was stuffing itself and rant.  I decided to give myself a couple of days to cool off, though, so that my post would be more coherent and less ranty. ...Or so I thought.

The post did not happen.  Instead of writing that ranty post on Thanksgiving Thursday, I did this:

I spent a quiet day at home with my cats and my boyfriend, with nowhere to be and no belt-busting food plans (just pizza and a movie for dinner, like any other day off), and I made pet toys.

This was part of a team effort.  A group of us crafters got together and donated money and toys to a few animal shelters in NY and NJ that had been affected by Hurricane Sandy. The project was called Operation Chew Toys.  The 40 or so toys I made for dogs and cats went to Newark, NJ!

My point in making this post is to say that, for the first time in many years, I chose to take my angry energy and transform it into good.  I think of it as the Alchemy of Giving.

When I went back to work on Monday, everyone was so happy and seemed so refreshed and upbeat, I ended up being glad I did not rant.  If a Holiday makes people happy, who am I to take it away from them?  I like for the people around me to be happy.  I know what my own views are and why, and I abide by my own standards.  That's good enough, right?

I have made the decision that, in future years, instead of feeling angry about a Holiday I find offensive, I will try and put that energy into doing something charitable.  (Being who I am, the majority of the time it will involve animals, but not always.  I will look to see where the greatest need is.)  Maybe instead of "Thanksgiving Day," I will celebrate "Giving Day."


(Image credit: nbiebach / 123RF Stock Photo)