Springtime, Invasive Weeds & Lovely Dirt

I am working very hard right now to remember that winter isn't forever. I know that winter in Seattle is incredibly easy going and relatively quick to get through. I know that back home they're dealing with highs of 28 degrees and feet of snow still on the ground. I know. I do. It's just that I'd be happy with four weeks of winter a year, with the rest of the seasons happily taking up the other 11 months. That's all.

I bought my house back in December, and up until the past few weeks had done a remarkably great job of ignoring the state of my back yard. I knew that I had huge garden beds and four fruit trees. I also knew that I had ivy, blackberry, mud pits, and an overflow of trash from my neighbors property. I had automatically assumed the worst and was nearly ready to admit defeat on having a garden this year. Yes, before I had even put my hands in the dirt. It seemed like such an overwhelming amount of work, and I had assumed it would take me countless hours and yards of new soil just to get my beds into usable shape.

I was so wrong. Well, at least half wrong. I have spent close to 9 hours just pulling ivy, blackberry, and tiny fruit trees out of my garden beds. I am less than halfway done. I have pulled out roots longer than my body. I have fallen on my ass, gotten dirt clumps in my eyes, tweaked my back, strained my hands, been stabbed by blackberry thorns more times than I can count, and am now fairly certain that my entire neighborhood is built on a giant foundation of ivy roots. 

But! But! My soil! My soil is magnificent! My soil is rich and healthy. It smells beautiful and earthy and dark. It had gone years without being cared for, but because of that it had been filled with rotting fruit and leaves and is full of worms and bugs and magic.

I went from thinking that I'd be growing a few herbs in pots this year, to now plotting the largest garden  I've ever had. I haven't planted anything yet, but am dreaming of root veggies and peas and tomatoes. I may even attempt watermelons and rhubarb now that I have the space. 

What's going in your garden this year? Any favorites or suggestions for someone who has never grown more than a handful of tomatoes and peppers?

Events: June 11: 5th Annual SLEE Dinner

My beautiful friend Amy has been working for months to help organize this event! I'm donating a dozen vegan cupcakes, and will likely be attending as well. This is a wonderful event that supports a great cause, and $40 is truly a tiny amount if you consider how much you'd spend on a normal evening out! Find out more about Community Alliance for Global Justice and what they do here!

“Strengthening Local Economies, Everywhere”
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Happy Hour 5:00 – 6:30
Dinner 6:30 – 9:30
Same great location: St. Demetrios Church in Montlake: 2100 Boyer Avenue East
Buy your tickets now at Brown Paper Tickets!

Sliding scale $40-$75: Please be generous in your support! We want to make this event accessible to everyone while also recognizing the need for us to raise crucial funds. Paying at the $75 level will support a farmer/food worker! This gives you entry and also ensures that a local member of our food economy can be an honored guest at our event!  Kids are only $10! If you are unable to afford a full-price ticket, please contact us for solidarity tickets! Limited amount available! Email: volunteer@seattleglobaljustice.org

This year’s Keynote will be given by Aba Ifeoma, Organizer with Detroit Black Community Food Security Network. Aba will speak about the resurgence of urban agriculture and bee-keeping in Detroit! DBCFSN was the winner of the 2010 Food Sovereignty Honorable Mention Prize. You can learn more about their important work in this video showing Aba accepting the prize at the Community Food Security Coalition Conference.

Get involved! Help CAGJ organize our annual celebration of the food justice and food sovereignty movements! Contact us at volunteer@seattleglobaljustice.org

Everything You Need

The Sweet Life

With shelves full of books and tiny potted herbs growing on our kitchen table- I think I'm doing alright.

Weekend in Photos

 My first ever loaf of bread: Sourdough with rosemary and smoked sea salt.

Sourdough cinnamon rolls.

Rowdy! 

Weeding and planting starts at The Blue House.

Tiny mushrooms in woodpecker holes.

The view from the top! Hiking Rattlesnake Ridge.

More Rattlesnake Ridge.

Summer Love

U-pick flowers, mint, and lavender in Sequim, WA.

Farmers market green tomatoes, hand picked mint, blue cheese. 
It all went into a green tomato pie!

Container Gardening Fail

So, it's July.  At this time last year I had two jalapeno plants full of tiny little green jalapenos, a tomato plant full of lovely little green tomatoes, pots full of herbs, and even a few sweet little carrots that were trying to grow.

This year... not so much.  I thought I knew what I was doing.  I started a flat full of seeds back in March- and when those didn't make it I picked up another flat of healthy, local, organic starts.  I lost about a quarter of those right off the bat, and since then most of them have slowly gone down the same path.  Right now my two blueberry bushes and two pepper plants are doing okay.  Tomatoes, herbs, potatoes, strawberries, and fennel are all goners.  Our slow starting summer was a huge factor, especially paired with the fact that we only get morning sun on our balcony.  This past weekend got the rest of them- it was actually sunny and warm, but I wasn't here to water them, and our cat sitter was asked to water the cats, not the plants.

However, in the midst of all of this- I dug around in my potato grow bag this morning and pulled out these darlings.  This may just be our entire haul this year- but they're so sweet that I feel kind of alright about it.  Especially the lone purple potato.  I love him.

What have your gardening failures been like?  Any tips on planting in containers in July for a fall harvest?

Seed Bombs!

This past Sunday I attended a seed bomb making party, with the results of our labor going into vending machines at The 2010 Seattle Green Festival.  I got a bit distracted stopping in at Bottleworks and catching up with Ryan, so I missed the first part of the evening, which had more to do with the actual mixing process.  I showed up in time to still get nice and muddy, and to learn a bit more about the logistics of actually making the bombs- but missed out on all of the smarty pants stuff like what actually goes in them.  I've been doing a little internet internetting and dug up a couple of good resources and links that I think are worth sharing.  This project is a lot of fun, and has a really wonderful outcome.

- How to Make Seed Bombs from LA Times has some beautiful photos and easy to follow instructions.

- How to Make a Seed Bomb from Instructables user Treesneedtobehugged is similar, if not a little more nitty-gritty.

- A Flickr search for "seed bombs" turns up a lot of really cool results.

And of course- here are the pictures from our seed bomb making adventure!

And yes, the night did quickly deteriorate into jokes about balls, and attempting to rub mud all over each other.  Typical.

Oh!  And I know I promised I'd do another giveaway to make up for the one I had to pull down- and really, I'm going to, and it will be soon.  I have something really fantastic on its way, and another something I want to pull together before then.  So keep your eyes out next week, when I'll have it up for sure!  And yes, it does have everything to do with delicious, edible food!

Making a Giant Dirty Mess On My Patio AKA Potting Starts!

So, I guess I shouldn't call something an actual success until it's actually successful.  My oh so successful seed starts?  Yeah, not so much.

Luckily last Friday Seattle Tilth was having their "leftover" plant sale- which worked out perfectly for me.  $2 starts, with lots of really fun and interesting varieties.  I don't know why I did this- but I ended up buying a significant number of tomato and pepper starts- more or less spacing out the fact that our patio gets only morning sun.  We are actually trying to move to a different (larger) unit in our building right now, so I'm hoping if that comes through it will mean more sun.

I took half of the day off from work today.  For no real reason other than it sounded like a nice idea.  Sometimes you just need a little time to do nothing.  I came home, took a nap with Luna, and then in an effort to continue avoiding my math homework- made a crazy dirty mess all over my patio, which luckily resulted in a few plants in pots.  I ran out of potting soil, so the rest will have to happen this weekend.

   

My un-official plant list at the moment?  Potatoes (which have been growing for a while- they're in the black and white plastic grow bag and doing SO well), pineapple sage, peppermint, fennel, strawberries, two varieties of blueberries (another that I've had going for a while, also doing great!), cat mint, lavender from last year, and three varieties each of tomatoes and peppers.

What are you growing this year?  Any suggestions for full-sun plants that aren't getting full sun?

Tulip Festival

So, we did this really wonderful thing on Sunday afternoon.  The Skagit Valley Tulip Festival is one of those things that I've wanted to do every since I've lived here.  It's silly and cheesy and really wonderful.  Every three seconds you decide that THIS tulip is the most beautiful, or THIS tulip is the brightest.  I highly recommend.  There are also a lot more pictures up on my Flickr.

Figs & Ginger's 2nd Annual Earth Day Giveaway

I just found out about this this morning, and I think it's fantastic!

Go here for details!

Link Love!

Short and sweet!

- Jen of Indie Fixx has a post up on Craft Zine that details Growing Your Own Microgreens Indoors with lots of lovely pictures and really good instructions.  This is my plan once I have my little seedlings in pots.

- Have I mentioned that I have a big huge giant ridiculous blogger crush on Ashley English?  Seriously.  This woman is amazing.  I just found out about her YouTube channel and I can't stop watching.  On top of that- she just just just released the first two books in her Homemade Living series- Canning & Preserving and Keeping Chickens.  I haven't gotten my hands on either yet (my lack of chicken keeping space means I'll most likely be focusing on her canning book), but Food in Jars has a really wonderful write-up with photos.  

- I made this carrot cake on Sunday night for an office birthday- and it was one of my all-time favorites.  I covered the entire thing in unsweetened coconut flakes and walnuts, and used lots of lemon in the frosting.  It's even lovely to look at plopped on a paper plate.  I want to eat it again. 

- Fry Books is hosting the 5th Annual Seattle Edible Book Festival tomorrow (Saturday, April 10th) at the Good Shepherd Center in Wallingford, here in Seattle.  "Cook the Books! combines the creative and culinary talents of NW bibliophiles, foodies, book artists, chefs, bakers, librarians, kids and punsters."  
 

- Petite Vanilla Bean Scones from The Pioneer Woman are killing me.  A co-worker actually brought in a container of the "real" scones from Starbucks and they were good.  Really, really good.  I've never had them since, as I couldn't pronounce half of the ingredients in them.  But this... this I can do.  I'm hoping to have time this weekend.  White flour and refined sugar for breakfast!  Yes!