Rain Day

I got sent home from work today because of rain. Then it turned into a pretty nice day for a couple hours; now it's all doom and gloom again.
So I gardened.

This wont be a long winded post.  I'm looking after the baby tonight to let Tammy off the hook. We are staying home to watch a movie but every cry, feeding and diaper is mine till bedtime.

I've been obsessing over plant related activities lately. I think its really important and this is the season to start it all. After this its water and wait.

I've got a lot of tomato's this year.
This is a La Roma 3 I'm growing in a container. I made a bamboo trellis.
I have made 2 of these so far and am getting the knack for it. I'll post a how too some time.






I also made some small raised bed's for a grape plant as well as a lower area for contained invasive plants (in this case Peppermint and Spearmint).

I am going to need two of these to go at the east side of the hop beds.
This will allow me to grow the grapes on the same trellis as the hops.
This box cost about $5 in materials.

The hop beds are beginning to take shape...

I started out digging a 1 foot deep hole and filling it in with good quality soil.

 


Then I hammered in some cedar shingles to make a border.

Followed up with mulching it up with 'sunset red' cedar chips.

:)

 I'm really hoping it keeps the cats from using it as a toilet. Also the mulch will keep the dirt moist for the hops.

I don't know why I went with red. I guess because it compliments the green of the plants.

Chives have flowered next to the catnip.
Catnip attracts bees and butterflies so it's good to have near stuff you need pollinated. It also keeps certain insects away.
I haven't seen the neighbours cats near it; or around much t all since I got better with the sling shot.
Heh.

More to come as it gets done.

Summer Hate

Ok. So it hailed yesterday around 4am. Killed a lot of the plants. :(
By 9 am it was +26.

30 foot hop trellis

The seedlings survived. I had to take them out of the greenhouse and put that in the shed because we had such high winds and tornado warnings the other day. But the tomatoes and hanging plants got killed off by hail. :(
14 tomato pants in all. 7 green pepper. 7 hot pepper. 2 melon.

So its time to replant the replant. 3rd time!!

So I've added more grapes this time. Walmart had 'em on sale for $6. I think I might plant 'em near the hops so I can use the same trellis.

13 foot hop trellis

But for that trellis I'm going to need some wood. Hops are a vine that can grow 30 feet a year; up. I really can't have a 30 foot high trellis in my back yard.
So I'm going to build a 13 foot trellis instead. I really don't need 30 feet of hops from 6 plants. I couldn't use it all.
I might have enough to sell to locals in a couple years anyways. These need a season or two before they really produce.

I'll need to pick up a few more plants maybe today or Monday. Stores around these parts are closed Sundays.

Speaking of closed. There is a Postal Strike in Manitoba. I wanted to order some books from amazon but will they get here...?

• Gaia's Garden (good book for permaculture)
• Herbal Medicine Maker Handbook
• The Sustainable Vegetable Garden
• Seed to Seed

I've heard good things about all these books and they have good reviews too.

Tammy and Kayden are in Steinbach with their friend Mel; she's coming home with more decorative plants; Hostas for certain. We have a huge shade area at the front of the house we are still working on.

I also got another 50 feet or garden hose!!! I can finally reach my whole garden! That's right. I could only reach half my garden properly. The rest I had to fill a bucket. :(
Now I can even reach the orchard area!

Kiwi's! Yes. There is a variation on the Kiwi tree that can grow in my area! I found some bushes and meant to buy them but forgot. They produce hairless grape size fruit that can be eaten whole and it is sweater than a grocery store kiwi. They are also self pollinating but I'd like to have a couple in case one dies. 2 is 1 and 1 is none. Walmart $8.

In case you needed another reason why you need to grow your own food... there is a growing fear of another E.coli pandemic in Europe. It is deadly. 1800+ infected so far, in 12 countries; even USA.
It is resistant to antibiotics! You really don't want to get it - it won't be fun.
It is caused, in part, by poop. Usually wild pigs will poop wherever they good and if it ends up in fields of human food it doesn't bother them. Then you eat the human field food and if it wasn't cleaned properly and all the wild pig poop is still on your food you can get E.coli.
Yum. It's always the good foods too, eh. People that eat salads and try and live health... BAM - E.coli.
But what can ya do eh?

Alright. I've done enough writing. I need to go plant another tree.
-Joel

Summer Love

So life got a little hectic for a while there; and still is.

The baby arrived!!!
My son, Kayden David Bydeley, was born on May 17th at 11:40am.
Mom and baby are doing great - we are all getting used to each other and trying to sleep when we can. ;)
Tammy did an awesome job during the birth. She is such a strong woman for going through with it and not using pain killers. Wow.
My son is a little cutie. He weighed 7lb 11oz. He has blue eyes (for now?) brown hair and looks a lot like his daddy.

So ya!! Babies. Now that's a DIY project.

But it is also gardening time!
So I have been busy getting that going for the last 2 weeks. I got everything planted and then we had a surprise frost and a lot died. :(

So I restarted the process and I'm back on track!

These 3 beds are our originals. They got reworked and touched up with peat moss, new dirt, blood and bone meal and de-weeded. The nice thing about my wooden raised beds is that there aren't a lot of weeds or grass; the rock raised bed gets invaded along the edges. To try and counter this I've poured a mixture of dirt, Creeping Thyme and water into the between the rocks. This will grow into a nice ground cover that will keep the grass roots out a bit better - I hope. I'll also be adding some "moss milk shake" to add to the diversity and appearance.
The fruit bed (top left) is doing great. There are a lot of strawberry plants that are taking over; and the blueberry is holding its ground. I'd like to add another 2 blueberries.

This year I also added a pair of Raspberry Bushes!

I added some mulch to keep grass out and moisture in

They were planted on a slight slope so I built up the edge with rocks; that way the water won't run away from the plant with the nice soil.
Tammy likes Raspberries. I'm not a big fan.





To the left you can see the pea garden and it's new trellis. I'm going to be using the nylon garden netting instead of the wire fencing I used last year. I don't think the plants liked growing up the metal.

Below that is the potato planter.
As the potato plants grow I'll add more wood boards and more dirt to keep the potatoes growing up!
At the end of the season I'll take all the boards off and it should be pretty full of spuds!
I'm planning on having 3 of these with different taters in each.

The hanging garden addition is coming along good. I bought a bunch of these hangers at a liquidation store for $5 each. I'm going to compare the growth and produce rate of each hanging plant to it's garden counterpart. Green peppers, tomatoes, hot peppers and cucumbers; with salad greens and herbs out of the tops.
The dog keeps watch.

These are the hop beds.
I haven't added a border yet. I'm going to just use the black plastic border and pound it into the ground. These guys will do fine once they are established.
Because they are a trellising plant I planted some peas also. The Peas will only grow up a couple feet; while the hops can grow up to 30 feet in a season. So the peas can add nitrogen to the soil and give me something to snack on while I tend to the hops. ;)

Cherries! I added two Evan Cherry plants. In a couple years they will produce nice fruit for snacks, jams, pies and maybe a cherry wine, baby food?







Apple tree!!
This is a Battleford Apple. I planted 2 apple trees last year, the other one isn't doing so well. But this one is! So, groovy.

Here is the compost I made. Its working quite well hidden in the bush. Next years dirt will be excellent.
I might need another one as this one is already half full.

German Ivy.
Grows up and out. Thick foliage.
I'm hoping they will blot out my 'neighbours' yard. So we wont have to look at their abused dog or dirty yard.
Yes. They use old tires as "decoration".
I added some Irish Moss and transplanted a Lilly here also.

These beds aren't food producers but it's nice to have pretty plants to look at; they are behind the house by the patio. I also have a few rose bushes and planted a few trees.

There is more to come. But not enough time to do everything. This blog will get more attention as the garden gets all planted. It's a short growing season here so a small window to get it all planted. I still have a lot more to do.
I have a bunch of seedlings growing in the greenhouse as well as a bunch of plants I'm growing in containers.

I'm hoping on growing a lot of the produce we would normally be buying - that way when food prices go up, like they are telling us they will, we will be in a better position to buy the food items we can't produce on our own (yet).

Fromage Formanda

Today I'm going to write about cheese.
I'm also going to mention problems in Australia and the Middle East that will impact my life.

Cheese is gooda. HAH.
I've made 2 batches of hard cheddar with varying results. I've never made cheese before so I'm having to learn from books and youtube but I am going to get better at it. With hard cheddar you need rennet and live culture(or yogurt) I bought mine online from... http://www.cheesemaking.com/ or you might be able to get it at your local brew house.
I've heard good things about Glengary Cheese Company in Ontario Canada too.
It takes time to make cheese. When I make cheese I usually do something else in the kitchen like brew a bottle a batch of beer or vacuum seal meat.

I'm not going to spend time writing an instructional for making cheese because there are already a lot of good ones free online. I will say that I use about $4 of milk and it makes me a good $8 piece of cheese.


Making Cheddar Cheese - by Katie Thear
Cheddar - CheeseMaking.com - They make it look SOOO easy. ;)
     Or Youtube has some good videos.

Beside the ingrediance you need a cheese mould and cheese cloth. Glengary sells some really good reusable Cheese cloth. My dad uses it and says it is great. I'll probably order some in the near future.

Ok. Cheese is awesome on everything. But you still need milk - raw milk is the best. I figure that by making your own cheese for $4 you save $4 by not spending at the grocery store. But how can you get it even cheaper!? How can you get an $8 block of cheese for about $0.25 ?!
Go to the farmer.
Make a deal. If they give you 8L of milk (enough for 2 batches - and costs them nothing) you will give them 1 batch of cheese. All you need to pay for is the Rennet, Culture and maybe some Colouring. And time. The truth is it will probably cost you less than 25 cents a batch. Think of that next time you buy a big block of cheese at the store.
"This could be costing me less than 25 cents."


So now you expand and try and get more milk in exchange for more cheese. You can coat your cheese in cheese wax (which is reusable) and store it for months depending on the cheese type and storage location. Make some Swiss. Mozzarella. Brie. Parmesian. You can make more cheeses than you can buy for cheaper than you can buy and that is a fact.
If you are interested in this solution to your cheese costs I'd recommend getting some good books on the subject.

Another benefit to cheese making is the whey byproduct to cheese making is good for baking. Try substituting it for water next time you bake bread. Nom nom nom.
I use the same equipment for cheese making as I door for beer making so that has cut my costs down because it is used more often. And if you already have the equipment why not give home brewing a try? That 3 dollar bottle of beer can cost you less than a quarter.
In emergency situations beer is liquid gold in Canada. If an ice storm knocks out the power in the area and stores are all closed but you and your neighbour need a tree moved; offer the help beer and see who gets the tree removed first. ;)
I bought beer yesterday for the first time in months just so I can appreciate my own beer more. I'm not even going to drink the rest of these; they are crap I'll offer my guests - who should have been smart enough to try my own.


Now about the land down under. The north east area of Queensland has had a rough year. The flash flooding and now hurricane yasi. That area of Au grows a lot of bannanas, wheat and fishing. Those industries are all but wiped out now. So they will have to import more from the world surplus. This will raise the demand and the price. :(
I've also read reports that some of the underground shelters (the same ones they had to pump out and dry after the flooding) have started to flood and the people are trapped with no where to go. Why would they go there to begin with?
place
The Middle East is still in the dumps. Egypt is getting violent and turning it's eyes on Israel and US of A. That won't end well. They will see a 'new clear' way out of it I'm sure... new clear, nuclear.
Oil prices will go way up and that will drive food prices way up. Yea!

I wish I could explain how badly we all need to start planting and growing our own food. There isn't a draw back to having your own garden. Look at how much cheese costs you!?
If I grow twice as much food as I need and you produce twice as much milk as you need and we trade...
We are ruled by a society that says you need money; but they never tell you what money is; they stopped teaching it in school because they didn't want you to know. Money is slavery, it is dept. We use a fiat money system for christ sake. Does the average person even know what fiat is!?

Let me tell you the problem with slaves. You need to feed them, give them shelter and clothes, medical care and have guards keep them working.
But if you enslave them in dept... they have to work to feed themselves. Pay for their own housing and medical care. They wont leave because they have a home and family to take care of.

Do yourself a favour and get rid of your dept.
Grow your own food. Make your own cheese!

Fresh garden food tastes GREAT! If times get tough or even if they don't.

While my wife is off this year for maternity she will be doing a lot of gardening. And my son is going to be raised on fresh foods. :D
And we will take him out to eat at restaurants so he appreciates how much better our home grown food tastes.

This is the weekend so I want to post a positive message. Something to look forward to - Summer!

Beside building a fence between us and our nightmare neighbours, my wife and I are wanting to build a workshop for my wood working. I'm planning on a 20x20 foot building on the south west part of our property. In addition to wood working I am planning on building a brick wood oven in there for baking pizza.
I love pizza.
This will allow me to burn my scrap wood and collect and save the ash. Hard wood ash is useful for creating lye (a main ingredient for home made soap); the ash will also help add potassium to the gardens or be tossed in the compost.
So the pizza oven will allow me to cook pizza (in 90 seconds) and breads without depending on anyone but my own supply of wood. If the electrical grid goes down for a couple days I still can cook pizza and bread. But to be honest it is more about getting back to the roots of society. Ancient peoples used 'pizza' ovens to bake bread and having tasted it I must say it is far superior to oven baked.
But in case of emergency a lot of guests I will be able to put 4 personal size pizzas in every minute and a half. Not too bad. It is the first portion of my desired outdoor kitchen.

Another part of 'the kitchen' is the root cellar. I don't know if it's going to be possible to build this year but it would be good to have as our gardens expand and as a good place to age cheese. If we have a 10x5 bed of potatoes we will have a lot of surplus for the winter; where will we keep them!?
Because of our high water table it won't be possible to build the cellar under the ground. I will have to build it out of concrete and pile several feet of dirt around/above it. This will also make for a good slide hill for my boy during winter. ;)

I got the books I ordered from Amazon and early I might add.
2 books were for my son, who is due May 16th; the other is a book on gardening for BEER.
It's called the Homebrewer's Garden and I already read it cover to cover. I'm really looking forward to adding beer supplies to my garden this year. I've found another Manitoban who grows hops and is going to sell me some roots for $5 each. I'm buying 6 of them (Hallertau, Cascade, Nugget, Stirling, Fuggle and Mt. Hood varieties) which will give me a good variety of hops to use in my beers for many years to come. I will also be able to sell my own hop roots in a year or two.
Now, on average, if I were to buy hops from the store I would spend about $5 on each batch. So this puts me 6 batches of beer in the hole. BUT in 2-3 years when the plants have established their own root systems I hope to get around 24-30 batches of hops. If I am able to sell some roots (called Rhyzomes) then I will have paid off the costs associated with growing my own.
The unseen but tasted advantage is that my home grown hops will be much fresher than the store bought ones and will allow me to brew tastier beers. :D

Alas, that will not be till later on in the year. Or next.

NOT IT!!!!

Hop to a different beat

So I've ordered some hops today. I won't get them till closer to planting season in early May.
I'm going to start out with 6; unless I come across a few different varieties like Saaz, Ultra or Crystal

I've decided to go with Hallertau, Cascade, Nugget, Stirling, Fuggle and Mt. Hood. These seemed to be a good choice for their bittering and aroma; as well alpha acid levels. I can brew a variety of lager and ales with these.
I won't likely get a good crop from these till the 2nd or 3rd year. But they can grow well over 25 feet a year before being harvested and hacked back to the root for winter. So I will be building a special trellis system for them. I'm planning on going 7 feet vertical and 10 feet horizontal; creating a covered area to put a chair and enjoy a cold beverage under.

On either side of the hop trellis I will have my grape vines. I started 2 last summer, Beta and Noir, and plan to add another 4-6 this year. Not just for wine making but freshly picked grapes are a nice snack and can also be made into juice.

I also grow a lot of strawberries, blueberries, cranberries and have 2 apple trees. Along with my rhubarb (that the neighbours dog butchered last year) I have a nice selection of fruits!


The strawberries are a crazy grower. I planted 6 plants last summer and by the end they had multiplied (with a little help) and I had well over 20 in one 5x5" raised bed. Since my wife and I both really enjoy them we might put another bed together for them. I'd love to make a strawberry wine and some jams with them this year.

My apple trees should start to really grow and blossom this year. They were both planted last year and should start producing small quantities this year. I fed them good fertiliser last year to start them right and planted a few nitrate fixing legume plants around the base. Now that the legumes are dead the roots will compost and leave lots of good tree food in the soil. Nom nom nom.
I also gave the trees a few good compost teas I made up. Compost teas really give plants a boost without the need for chemical fertilisers.

All these fruit will be great mashed up as baby food! :D

So my fruits are going to be better this year! Yea! This is year 2 of the garden. It's going to be bigger, better and bolder than last year AND since food prices are going up it will save me more money this year.

Not it!

Ok. So I claimed it. I'm not it. Because I don't want to be it. "It" means I was last to react to being 'it' and now I am suffering the consequences of my fast reaction.
So I am not it.

That means more than just claiming the right. It means doing.
So what am I 'doing' to be "not it".
Well right now as I type I am waiting for my milk to convert to a curds. And soon enough to become cheese. Chedder to be exact. That is my way of being not 'it'.
I also just finished bottling my own home brewed beer (Honey Brown Lager) - in 2 weeks I can drink it - I've been waiting 3 months already.

What or who is it? 'It' is the person paying 4 times the price for groceries in a couple months. 'It' is the person who is still eating contaminated foods grown by people who don't care what you are eating or if it makes you sick or not (because they grown food for their own families separate from what they grow for you)
'It' is the person waiting for someone else to save them when times get tough or even if they don't.

So this is me. Saving myself. Being 'not it'. How lucky.
Now I have to deal with the responsibilities and workload it entails.
Lucky me; I am on my 3rd beer. They cost me $0.18 a can compared to $3.00 for store bought. Mine tastes better. How lucky.

It is part of my chore. Being not it is a lot of work. But it can also be a lot of fun. Cheers to that.
I decided several years ago that I needed to keep learning new things. That developed and evolved into a need to support myself.
To become more.

So now I choose 3 new skills to learn every year and I keep working on them till I... well I just keep working on them.  Last year I wanted to learn how to brew my own beer and I did. Now I am learning how to grow my own grains and hops to brew my own beer from scratch. Growing everything I need in my yard to brew beer. I will get my cost down to $0.10 a can, I think. Maybe less. And it tastes so good! I enjoy learning and brewing it!!!

But being 'not it' is a lot of work. It means you understand you are better than you thought and can produce for yourself more than you thought. It is a lot of work. But it is worth it.
If you stop, give up, take a break than... you are it. And when life sends trouble your way then you have to beg and look for someone else (who isn't it) to help you. To give you scrapes.

Bummer.

Well I am not it. And the cheese i mentioned when I started this; it's looking really good. 25 hours from now it will be shredded on a pizza.

Well. I'm not it. My pregnant wise isn't 'it'. We are here to help ourselves and others not be it.
And I am starting -this year- with Pizza.
Pizza to save the world.

1 of my 3 goals this year is to make pizza from scratch; from my own property (minus the pepperoni). I'm already making my own cheese. I have started a garden last year for a lot of the veggies. I am also starting my own mushroom's. and growing my own grains. Milled wheat for pizza and 2/6 row barley for beer. If I can make my own pizza I can make a lot more.

But that is just the start of the journey and this is my introduction.

Thanks for reading.

TAG!!!!
Are you it?