Education is the key!

This weekend, I made progress towards my garden goals by making some plans for the dreary winter month of February. First, I signed up for a class at Seattle Tilth. For Christmas, Jake said he would pay for me to take a class at Tilth, so I finally found one that I can really get some use out of, Indoor Seed Starting (2 day intensive). I'm super excited because I really have no idea what I'll need to grow seedlings inside and I recently discovered, through reading and planning, that in order to grow some of the vegetables I want to grow like broccoli and cabbage, I'll need to start the seeds indoors. I also know that it's best to grow tomato plants from seed by starting them inside, but was too intimidated to do it last year so I just bought a seedling from a store. This season, however, I'm ready to take on the challenge. This class will be great too because I learn best when I'm with others in a class setting. I think it will be amazing.

The next thing I did was put the Northwest Flower and Garden Show on my calendar.I've heard about the show before, but have never been really motivated or prepared to go (meaning, I usually hear about it while it's happening or shortly thereafter).I looked through all of the seminars and events that will be happening during the show and made an unofficial plan of all the seminars I plan to attend. For $29, I can go to the show on both Saturday and Sunday and attend seminars like: Gardening in the Pacific Northwest, Year Round Vegetable Gardening, Grow Fruits & Berries Anywhere, Glorious Container Gardens, and Portable Balcony Composters. The list goes on!

I started mosaicing a garden gnome for my garden this weekend too. When we cleared out my new backyard garden space, we unearthed 3 concrete stepping stones that were just begging to be mosaiced. Jake had the fabulous idea to mosaic a garden gnome on to one so that I would have one of those kitschy things in my garden too, only cooler. It's not finished yet, but I love him already. Jake named him Carl.

Finally, I'm getting a worm bin together to have at school. This year, I volunteered to head student council and we (my student council 4th and 5th graders and I) worked together to organize "Green Week" at my school this week - a spirited week of all things green and eco-responsible. I thought it would be a fitting week to get the worm bin going in my classroom. It won't have worms in it this week, but it's a start. Turns out, I have to order them (the red worm variety). When I mentioned this to my students, they looked at me incredulously and asked, "Why would you buy worms, Srta.Stacy? We can go out and get them for you." But I guess, your typical night crawler earth worm does not like the small space of a worm bin. To make a long story short, I'm going to try to get my worm bin together this week so that my students can put their food waste scraps in there and start helping me make compost for my garden. They're helping me with my garden and they don't even know it yet. It actually will connect to our curriculum eventually (we study plants/seeds in science in April), for those of you who are wondering how I am getting away with putting my kids to work. If you get creative, you can make almost anything work out. :)

Now that's more like it!

Today was amazing!!! First, I handled the fence situation. The fence lady came out and leveled the fence and it looks 100% better. Then, Gabe, my brother-in-law, and Jake spent the day helping me completely clear out and level the ground that is now part of my back yard since I pushed back the fence (the part of the yard that will house my new raised veggie beds).So basically, all of the grass that you see in the first picture (where Beans is standing) is now removed. It was incredible. They worked so hard. It would have taken me weeks to do what they did today. It turns out asking for help works out pretty well. Normally, I just try and do everything all by myself. I'm super lucky to have such an awesome boyfriend and brother. The yard looks fantastic and I can't wait to spend my summer in it harvesting tons of organic vegetables. It is going to be awesome! Check out this series of photos to see how my backyard got transformed. Yay!!

The happenings of an urban gardener

A lot has happened since my last post.

1. I had an amazing white Christmas. Jake and I went to Portland and had another fabulous trip there. This is trip number two to Portland for us. As you can see by the picture, we went to our favorite place - Powell's Books. This time, we split up - Jake spent his time at Powell's Technical Books browsing computer books and I spent my time in the garden and cooking section, looking for some new books to further inspire my New Year's endeavor. I managed to find a ton of fun books, but had the self control to only buy two. I bought a garden book called Square Foot Gardening, which outlines how to grow the maximum amount of vegetables in the minimum amount of space (literally how to use every square foot of space you have). I love it!

2. I used the new cookbook I bought at Powell's, Local Flavors by Deborah Madison, to cook some new (for me) and interesting vegetables. I made Celery Root and Wild Rice Chowder, which was super delicious. Celery root (see the before and after pictures) looks pretty gnarly, but once you cut away all the growths on the root ball and dice it, it has the texture of a potato and a lot of flavor. I also made Purple Potato and Cabbage Gratin with the most beautiful cabbages I have ever seen. My new cookbook inspired me to make Sage Oil too. I absolutely love sage and thyme. It reminds me of fall, probably because they are the predominant spices in Thanksgiving stuffing. To make the oil, I put 24 fresh sage leaves in 1/2 cup of olive oil and cooked it over low heat for about 10 minutes. Then, I put some of the sage-infused oil on roasted spaghetti squash with some freshly grated Parmesan cheese and it was amazing! The sage oil is super easy to make and gives the food a really deep and delicious flavor. Tonight I made Sunchoke (otherwise known as Jerusalem Artichoke) Bisque. Sunchokes look like overgrown pieces of ginger and taste pretty mild and nutty. Turns out, sunchokes are pretty good. I'm glad I decided to give them a whirl.

3. I took the first step towards creating my new backyard garden. I hired someone to take my old backyard fence out and build a new one, 11 feet back (to the end of my detached garage). My yard looks huge! It's amazing how much wasted space I have been missing out on. Unfortunately, the fence did not quite turn out according to plan. The fence is not level on the bottom and there is a big gap (big enough for Beans to sneak out of) because of the uneven ground back there. So now, there are retaining wall stones temporarily filling that space until I can get the woman I hired back out here to finish the project the way I want it. I assumed that we had the same idea in mind and I guess I should have known better because you know what they say about making assumptions... (you remember that silly middle school quote, don't you?). I'm a little disappointed because I want it to look right...now. But luckily, I have enough vision and imagination to see what is about to become of my backyard in my mind. I'm getting closer and I can already see (crook-eyed fence and all) that it's going to be great! I'll post photos of my new fence when it looks a little more like the picture in my head.

Finally, I know this blog is supposed to be all about my garden and my goal to be a localtarian, but I'm feeling compelled to write about all the crazy crafting I've done lately too. And, as it turns out, most of the projects I've done, beautify my kitchen and garden...so I guess this "bird walk" does fit into my post somehow. During my two weeks off from school for winter break, I made mosaic garden stakes to keep track of the veggies I plant (see previous blog post); I painted my dining room table and chairs and made chair cushions for them; I made my sister and me "Recycled Jeans" aprons; I gussied up my "green" grocery bags; and I made the cutest clutch purse ever with an Amy Butler pattern and delightful Amy Butler fabric (my new favorite creator of cute and savvy patterns and fabric). While Jake and I were in Portland, we came across this amazing fabric store called Bolt, which had tons of cute and hip fabric. Jake dipped out for a cup of tea across the street while I stayed in that store for over an hour. The hardest part about it was choosing which fabric to buy. I couldn't be happier with the fabric I finally picked out for my purse though. It's like carrying my garden around with me.

Patience is a virtue

I tend to be an instant gratification kind of girl, but this garden lifestyle change inspires patience and planning. I went to the farmer's market this weekend. Bless their hearts for coming all the way out to the U District with their goods and for standing outside all day in those cold, outdoor market stalls. I had hoped to buy more local honey and some other ingredients, like onions. But since only a handful of farmers were able to make it to the market in this wintery weather, the pickings were slim and I wasn't able to instantly satisfy my desire to have those products. I discovered that I was OK with that. I picked out some shallots instead and decided to wait until next week to pick up a new jar of honey. I think I'll appreciate them more when I finally get them next week (hopefully). I know this epiphany seems like minutiae, but for a girl that's normally impatient, I think it's a good thing.

Along the same lines, I've been thinking a lot about my future garden and how beautiful it's going to be. Since I can't be out there right now, I've decided to plan ahead and complete a garden project that I'll love when it's finally time to plant. Normally, I would squeeze this mosaic project in (along with a few flower pots) while I was knee-deep in the bigger project of creating the garden itself (which will be quite a labor-intensive, time consuming job on it's own). But now, in the spirit of patience and planning, I've completed the project ahead of time so that when the time comes to actually build the new garden, I can focus all my energy and attention on the task at hand (the most important one of all).

So, here is what I made: mosaic seed markers. I stripped the wooden slats off some old garden fencing and made each one into a plant marker. I don't think I'll actually forget where I planted each type of vegetable and certainly won't need a marker to know what a tomato plant looks like when it sprouts, but I think the more garden bling there is, the better.

Let it snow!

My garden is officially asleep now, covered in a freezing white blanket of snow. I'm keeping warm and have got a new garden craft in the works...stay tuned.

What about a sprinkle doughnut?

One of my favorite things about the weekend is Saturday mornings at Top Pot. Jake lives just around the corner from a Top Pot coffee shop, so ever since we started dating, we've been spending almost every Saturday morning eating doughnuts and drinking chai (a local treat!). The pink sprinkle doughnut is my absolute favorite - not just for the taste, but for how beautiful it looks. Each one's like a little festive pastel water color. I even took a picture of it to use as the wall paper on my phone. I know you must be thinking, damn, she must really love doughnuts. But, it's more than the doughnut itself. It's always been about the experience. Every time I open my phone, it reminds me of lazy, cozy Saturday mornings with Jake. The whole thing makes me feel comfortable and warm.

So why do I look so guilty in this picture if I love the sprinkle doughnut experience so much? Because being thoughtful about the food you eat means you have to make choices. Now that I've started this project, I'm engaged in an on-going mental debate, asking myself questions like these: What food counts and what doesn't? How local is local? Does this mean no more mangoes, coconuts, and avocados? Can eating local mean supporting a local business? If a chocolate truffle is hand-crafted in Seattle, but the cocoa beans come from some far away country, is that considered a local food? What is the whole point of this thing anyway?

Lately, my response has been that if I can make it, I'm going to make it (especially things like home-made bread). If I can grow it, I'm going to grow it and if I can't, I'm going to buy it from someone around here who can. Going to the farmers market means I may even get a chance to talk to the person who did. If it's a product that is made in Washington or Oregon, that's the one I'm going to get. And if it's an experience I enjoy, like sippin' on a chai and eating a delicious doughnut from a hip, local joint, I'm doing it. So here's to that! Cheers!

What's for lunch tomorrow?

Everyone knows that I'm an early bird by nature and since my job requires that I be a ball of energy all day, I go to bed pretty early on the week nights. We're talking 9ish - pretty early, right? But here I am, standing in my kitchen, waiting for my Butternut Squash Autumn Millet Bake to be done. It's almost past my bed time! :) So, why am I still up cooking some crazy squash recipe? Because I ate all of my left overs from the weekend and I have two more weekday lunches to go.

Before my resolution, I would have just resolved to buy school lunch and call it good. You remember - the Styrofoam tray, prepackaged bags of apple slices, corn dogs, etc. That just won't cut it now. During a typical week, if I cook a big meal (leftover size) on Sundays and Wednesdays, it gets me through the week like a charm. But this week, I had plans on Wednesday that didn't end until late. So now, I find myself in the kitchen, up a little later, to have something healthy, seasonal, and delicious to eat for lunch tomorrow. Is it worth it? Hell yeah! There's nothing better than getting hungry during the day, looking at the clock and seeing that it's almost lunch time, and remembering that you have the most awesome food packed away in your lunch bag to eat. It sure beats eating mysterious breaded meat on a stick.

Now before I sign off for the night, I have one more story to tell. I come from a family of meat eaters. So when I became a vegetarian eight years ago (I'm not anymore), I was sort of an anomaly. I'll never forget visiting my grandma for the first time after I became a vegetarian. She's an amazing cook (good southern cooking) and likes to keep us well fed, but she just didn't know what to do with me. She sent my grandpa to the store for tofu and I'm sure that was the first and last time that ever happened. It was adorable. I tried to reassure her that I was fine and that I'd eat whatever she made, but she still wanted to make sure that my dietary needs were met, bless her heart. This brings me to my special request (for my grandma and all of my friends and family): Please don't be afraid of me now that I'm a seasonaltarian! I still love food and love your company, so if you want to go out for a bite to eat or have me over for a meal, I'm game - no special menu or ingredients required. My new food lifestyle is a shift I've made to improve my daily life, not something I want people to worry about or try to accommodate. It's a commitment I'm making to myself that I want to share with the people I love. :)