With the short growing season but mild winters of the Pacific Northwest we have decided that we can extend our growing season to almost year round by adding a greenhouse. We searched for a long time and finally found plans from Ana White (https://www.ana-white.com/woodworking-projects/diy-greenhouse) that I also saw completed by Justin Rhodes and helpers on his You Tube channel. Check out the video here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joRN06xY-UY if you want to see them build it. We are […]
Exiting time on the farm, we are about 8 weeks out from the last frost date and it’s time to get the first little seed starts going. This year we are trying to get them started in the grow tent with full spectrum lights, fingers crossed we can get it right this year and not be reliant on the starts from another source. So far the following seeds are warming away in the tent, I […]
With the shorter, colder days ahead, here’s some Ciabatta bread we made today! I was intrigued and challenged with the article by William Rubel in the most recent edition of Mother Earth News (December 2019/January 2020). I had always wanted to try making Ciabatta but was always a little intimidated by the end product. After all it looked like something that must be difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. I was pleasantly surprised, the recipe […]
It’s that time of year again! The spiders are out in full force. I managed to get a couple of shots of one right outside the window!
The busy summer continues here in the Pacific Northwest. As other parts of the US are winding down in the garden department we are just now going strong with harvesting. Things have been crazy here this summer with more varieties of plants to try but more pest pressure than we have had in years past. The leaf miner battle with the spinach, chard and beets has been a battle of wills for sure. Next year […]
The Berkeley Tie Dye variety of tomato is finally putting off large, ripe fruit! We can’t wait to sample a pile of these!
The last month in the garden has been eventful with everything really starting to grow and put on fruit. Really excited about all of the different varieties of tomatoes and peppers we are growing. There will be some surprises since we have no idea what the volunteer tomatoes actually are and some look really exotic at this point. There have also been some failures since the leaf miners destroyed my spinach and swiss chard and […]
It is the time of year that I see changes daily in the garden. The newest development is the Cucamelons, the tiny baby ones are on there although you almost need a magnifying glass to see them. I think they are going to be about the size of a grape when fully mature. It should be interesting to see how they turn out. I harvested 2.5 pounds of Sugar Snap Peas this morning and processed […]
The garden changes everyday and I really start to notice the subtle changes that will lead to amazing things in the coming weeks. The baby tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, pumpkins, peppers, etc will very soon be items for devouring and preserving for winter. I am excited every morning to see what has happened overnight and then to check again at the end of the day to see how much everything has grown in a few short […]
We have run drip irrigation to all of our garden beds and mulched them all to try to get water to the right places and keep it from evaporating too quickly. However the summers get drier every year and we have to wonder if we should be doing something else to provide water for the garden. I found 2 books that I am reading to try to see if harvesting rainwater during the wet season […]
