April Showers...

The biggest achievement this month was getting our little plants in the ground. Carolyn had been chomping at the bit since April Fools Day and I finally let her loose three weeks later. With everything blooming and greening around us it was understandable. At least now, I have the garden fence completed with the Groundhog wire and the electric fence charger. I feel like I've done everything I can to protect my garden short of keeping a mountain lion chained up inside the enclosure.

 

Kind of an afterthought, I quickly threw together a bed for a Three Sisters planting - corn, beans, and squash. It's a native American thing. The idea is that the beans will grow up the corn stalks and the squash will shade the roots during the heat of summer. We'll keep you posted on the success (or failure) we have. Also, another impromptu planting took place at the lowest edge of the garden (right of the bed below) where I sowed a row of field peas and okra.

Besides planting a bazillion tomatoes, peppers, onions, eggplants, and cucumbers, Carolyn has been busy with her flower beds. She has dug up a bunch of lilies and daffodils from the edge of the road where they would have been mowed by the county and transplanted them near the house. Also, she has added wild phlox and some birdsfoot violet to the butterfly garden.

As you all know, the Spring weather in the Southeast can be a bit turbulent as well as perfectly beautiful. Easter Sunday we were kept up half the night by tornado and flash flood alerts on our weather radio. A week later a particularly nasty thunderstorm was threatening hail so I ran out into the storm to lower my solar panels. It was unnecessary but proved to be a reasonable exercise.

Feeling the need to be creative, I made some garden tool racks for the covered space at the north end of the house. I guess we will be calling this the garden shed from now on. Certainly the organization of the tools makes it much easier to find and access what you need. Speaking of finding tools, look what I found buried in the middle of my drive: my long-lost Swiss army knife. The recent torrential rains uncovered enough of the red handle that it caught my eye. A little scrubbing with soap and water and a drop or two of oil and its ready to go.

This was the month that we decided to taste our homemade vegan cheeses. These are basically made from nuts (cashews) or oats and fermented with lactobacillus derived from rye (check out rejuvelac). We left these in the refrigerator covered with cheesecloth for about 6 weeks. Such restraint.  They are good. They do not melt the way dairy-based cheeses do but the taste is very similar.  They are a good addition to homemade vegan pizza. We decided to extend the test by coating half of each cheese in wax and waiting another few weeks or months if possible. Of all the stuff I have given up in the name of being more healthy, I'd say Cheddar cheese was the hardest. Now I know I can have the taste without the dairy.

For some unknown reason, I ordered 50 asparagus and 50 strawberry plants with no place prepared to plant them. The race was on. The nursery won. The plants arrived 3 or 4 days before I finished a fourth hugelkultur bed outside the fenced garden area. What was I thinking?  Anyway, this is a long-term investment. It will be at least a year before we get any strawberries and two years before asparagus can be harvested. A side benefit of this was the removal of a large pile of stumps that had been accumulating along with another half dozen stumps that lay buried beneath.

So, with all this garden preparation and planting, it should come with little surprise that I spent almost no time playing at the sawmill. But still, I did manage a couple of hours. I am gradually building up a pile of oak planks that I plan to use for paneling inside my shop.

Stay safe and check in on us once in a while.

Beware the Ides of March

Richmond Woods, by its nature, is quite secluded. At a time such as this, we are glad of that! We try to order what we need online and have it delivered when possible. When delivery is not an option, we order online and have the order ready to pick up in the store. Much handwashing takes place when unpacking boxes. Visits with friends and family are, needless to say, conducted via wireless technology. Carolyn was disappointed to have to cancel trips to Mexico and Italy!

Gardening

Carolyn has taken advantage of warm dry days to tend her flower beds as well as her herb garden. She also transplanted all of the tomato and pepper seedlings into larger pots so they can continue to develop strong roots. We take them out onto the back porch every morning that is warm and bring them inside in the evening if its going to be cold.

I am not sure whether this comes under the heading of Gardening or Home Improvement, but since it is specifically for the vegetable garden, I will include it here. I have researched how to keep deer out of your crops and the best answer I have found so far is the 3D Deer Fence. Basically, this is a fence within a fence. The two fences are separated by three feet. Apparently, this "deep" fence stymies deer who ordinarily would be able to easily jump over a single fence of the same height. As an added measure of deterrance, I am electrifying both layers. To keep groundhogs and rabbits out, there will be chicken wire around the bottom of the inner fence. But that will be an April project.

Home Improvement

This month I took advantage of comfortable temperatures in the attic to finish some lighting projects, mainly installing lights in the newer attic spaces above the kitchen and master suite. I also installed lights in the carport.

The drain line project I started in February was carried over into March when I extended the kitchen drain further out into the back yard. It, too, will eventually be used to supply greywater to a garden bed. After both ditches were filled, I raked the area smooth and planted some fescue in the bare soil. I covered the new grass seeds with an old tarp to keep them moist until they germinated and to prevent torrential spring rains from washing them away. That worked really well.

Another little project that has been on the back burner for a while is a new compost bin. It got moved to the top of the list when the old one (green trash can) filled up. This one is two chambered allowing one side to fill while the other matures. Carolyn calls it the "Bear Kitchen".

Finally, I had to do something about the ever deepening ruts in my driveway - especially in this one place. I put a couple of scoops of rocky red dirt in the lower rut (on the right) and topped it off with the last of the gravel pile that was out by the gate.

Food 

Food is Life and we are full of both. Carolyn continues to research and prepare exquisite vegan dishes. I continue to attempt to bake sourdough bread. I've got a good starter that Carolyn successfully used the other day but so far my attempts have failed miserably. Maybe I should stick to things I can address with a hammer. I did manage to make corncakes and cornbread without eggs or milk. Its definitely not as tasty as when I used to make it with buttermilk and bacon grease. But when paired with a delicious vegan soup like this, its perfectly suitable.

Wildlife

First to bloom in March are the Serviceberry bushes followed soon by the little dwarf iris and azaleas. I've been hearing the spring peepers down in the bottom for about a week now.  And this young terrapin showed up as I was filling ruts in the driveway. I took it down to the pond so it wouldn't get run over.

 

That's it for now. More next month. Stay healthy everyone!

February 2020

This post could have been titled "Not Much Happens in the Dead of Winter".  Especially when it rains or snows nearly every day. Well, it seemed like it anyway. This was on February 8th.

The main things I worked on were all related to the vegetable garden. First, we got another hugel bed prepared. Then I built a wooden frame to support a couple of grow lights. This frame was the first actual project constructed from wood that I milled myself. Following that, I planted two trays (10 dozen cells) with vegetables. A full tray of tomatoes and peppers and another tray that was mostly eggplant and onion with some more tomato and pepper as well as cucumber. Also planted some poppy for a little color around the house.

Finally, on the gardening front, I completed the bathroom drain line terminating it in a short drain field alongside the uppermost garden bed. This will serve to keep at least one of our beds well watered with shower, sink, and clothes washer waste water. As a reminder to folks who have not been following all along, this water is grey water not raw sewerage (I have a composting toilet for solid waste).

Carolyn and I continue to be faithful to our conversion to veganism.  Carolyn went to a Mushroom Club of Georgia meeting a while back and started a bag culture of oyster mushrooms. We harvested a nice crop and C made penne with mushroom, spinach, and lemon sauce with it. I have been baking bread and trying with little success to learn the art of sourdough. I can, however, make a pretty decent loaf using commercial yeast. A surprising discovery for me was that you can make pesto from Kale.  I'm not a big fan of Kale but I love pesto. This dish turned out amazing and if I had not made it myself, I would not have known the difference. A sprinkle of peanuts on top gives it a satisfying crunch.

After much hair-pulling frustration with my trash collection service, I finally figured out that my can was on the wrong side of the road. After more than a dozen phone calls to the company since July it finally came out that if the can was on the wrong side of the road, it would not be picked up. No one ever told me what the correct side was. I had assumed that my can would be placed on my side of the road. Wrong!  When I finally figured it out, I dug out a level spot on the other side of the road so the can would not tip over into the road by accident. Not a big project, but the end of a big headache.

And, just so you know, our Hawthorn out by the gate thinks its Spring! This photo was taken February 25th.