To Garden or Not To Garden? Thoughts

While I do love to have a veggie garden each year(since it makes me exercise and gets me outside on a regular basis besides gives us fresh vegetables)I have come to the conclusion that gardening here is just not working any longer.

By not working, I mean that we have critters(critters=rabbits, raccoon, chipmunks, squirrels, deer and an occasional bear)living in the yard and nearby now that we can't keep from getting at the veggies before they are ready to be picked and consumed by the humans growing them.  We have had to replace seedlings multiple times in a season and then if the weather doesn't spoil our harvest the nibbling critters make swift work of the goodies before things are ready to be picked.
It wouldn't be so bad if I had the room to plant larger amounts to allow for a percentage to be eaten by the local wildlife, but I don't have that kind of space.
I guess our dogs use to keep the wildlife on their toes more and they were more reticent to move in so close to the house to nibble at the garden goodies.
sigh.
It's frustrating and I just hate throwing all this money into gardening and getting nothing for the effort and expense.

Now if we were to make a proper garden area with real fences to keep out the critters it would be worth going through this exercise.
But that would mean a LOT of money spend on real fencing at the least and seeing as we are only planning on living here another 1.5 years I don't see the point dropping that kind of cash into this.

It would have to be a high fence(to keep the deer at bay)and I think only a wooden variety would be allowed here.  Since Hubs can't do it himself we'd have to pay through the nose to have someone else build it.

We do have seasonal access to fresh veggies via farm stands and a farm in the area but at a cost....although it is usually cheaper than buying at the local grocery store.  They still aren't veggies we hand raise at home.

So the only way I see putting in yet another garden is if I can come up with something that will keep the critters at bay without shelling out for a proper fence.

I'll be thinking on this issue in the coming weeks.


Sluggy

Final Garden Update for 2010

I got the remaining collards picked so now the garden is done for the year.
Here's a pic of the greens before I blanched them and froze them....

That's 2lbs. 9.3oz.

And here is my 'frugal hothouse' eggplant.....get out your magnifying glass first...lol.....

This behemoth tips the scale at 3.2oz.

Combined total....2lbs. 12.5oz


Garden Harvest Weight Grand Total for 2010....93 lbs.  15.52 oz.

I am sure that if I had kept up on the garden better(not let so much of it rot because I was too lazy to get out there and glean or pick in the heat some days), we would have topped 100 lbs. of food.
But I am more than happy with the 93+lbs. we ate or will eat this winter.
I believe I spent right around $50 on seeds/seedlings/dirt/manure on the garden this year.
Not a bad ROI(=return on investment) for my $50 bucks, huh?

Maybe next year I'll hold a little contest where you can guess what my final Garden Harvest Weight will be....maybe with a cool prize of home canned jelly, relish, pickles and tomatoes?

So what is stopping you from having a garden?  I am a half-assed gardener so if I can do this, you can too! 8-))   That should be encouragement enough, right?lol
Just find a little piece of dirt and do it.  Heck, that little piece of dirt can be in a pot even! 8-)  At least try growing some tomatoes if nothing else because a 'real' tomato tastes nothing like that red thing they sell in the grocery store....

Now to put the garden to bed.  The planning for next year will have to wait until January at least.
I've got more decluttering, eBay selling and the Holidays to contend with now.
Oh, and the family too.... ;-)

Sluggy

Randomly Yours Monday

**My sleep schedule has been off for a week now.
I am wide awake at the crack of dawn.....so unlike me.
Then I crash and nap by noon and wake up again around 2 or 3pm.
Then I am wore out by 9pm and crawl back into bed.....and it starts all over again the next day.

I know this schedule is like most people's out there but my usual schedule is to to go to bed between 2 and 7 am, sleep until 2pm, nap again around 7pm for 2 or 3 hours and then up by 10pm until 2am or later and start it all over again the next 24 hours.
I have always been a night person and find I am much more productive at night.

Anybody else have unusual sleeping/waking patterns?

**And no, I haven't been to Rite-Aid this week yet.....but the week is young yet!lol
Anybody else been yet?  What did ya get??

**I have a Meal Plan figured out for this week to as far as Tuesday.lol  Last week I hardly cooked at all.  Only one night getting take-out too.  Seems the teens have hardly eaten here all last week so when I cooked something it lasted for 3 meals or so for just Hubs and I.....meaning I didn't need to cook but 2 times.

**I just found 2 high value coupons over on AllYou dotcom.  1--It's a Scott products Q for $2.50/1 on the purchase of 8 or more roll package of Scott Extra Soft Bath Tissue or a 4 or more roll package of Scott Towels.   Print it now for any upcoming TP deals.  2--It's a $2.50/1 Kendall/AMD Wound Care Product(they make bandages, etc.) Q.  Rite-Aid has a sale/+Ups deal coming up on Kendall/AMD products in a week.

**After slacking off on the decluttering/donating the last couple of months, I sent 2 loads to Sallie's last week.  No pretty pictures though....

**And from the annals of "The Grocery Store Powers That Be Heard Me"......I saw a Catalina Deal in the Price Chopper(northeast) Sales Flyer from my Sunday paper yesterday involving.....BACON!
Woohoo!!!
It's a Hormel Catalina.....Spend $10-$14.99/Get $3 OYNO Cat Q, Spend $15-$19.99/Get $5 OYNO Cat Q, and Spend $20 or More/Get $7 OYNO Cat Q.
Price Chopper has historically gone off of the reg. retail shelf price to figure spending threshold levels(not the sale prices on the participating items),but I haven't been in awhile so I'll be taking a trip to the store tomorrow to test the waters.  When my coupons arrive in the next couple of days I'll be all ready to stock-up then on some Pork Love. ;-)

**I got something rigged up for my Eggplant plants, in hopes that I could keep them alive long enough for the tiny eggplants to grow enough to be edible.
First I took a clear plastic gallon milk jug and cut the bottom off of it so I could put it over the plant.
That would have been quick and easy but the plant was too tall.  I then considered taking more milk jugs, cutting the bottom and tops off and leaving the sides(making a big plastic square)that I could duct tape together to make the 1st milk jug taller.  But that idea fizzled out once I started the cutting.lol

Then Hubs and I came up with this.....

We put a tomato cage on each plant.
Then we took a drum liner.....it's a HUGE clear plastic bag(used to line metal drums, like oil drums).....and put it over 2 cages at a time. 
Then we used pieces of bricks to hold down the edges of the liner to keep out the cold and keep the liner from sailing off with the first stiff wind gust.
It turned out to be a quick and easy fix with no cutting or taping involved.  Plus we can reuse the bag. ;-)

Two days out and so far so good.
I don't know how much time I can by these eggplants though since we will probably get our first freezing night later this week. 8-(

**October is almost 2/3 over!  I was adding last week's grocery spending to my budget book and realized that.  Speaking of grocery spending, I spent $37.89 last week.....fresh fruit, produce, 1lb. of butter on sale and about 16lbs. of meat/chicken.  Ok...I also had an impulse buy and picked up a bag of cheese curls for $2 on the spur of the moment.  Yes, my one wild and crazy purchase for that week!lol  Sometimes junk food calls my name.....well, it seems to SCREAM my name loudly and often.....and I just give in.  Ah well......
Anyway, I haven't even broken $100 for food spending in October yet.  Yay for the freezer and the stockpile!! ;-)

So what has everyone else been up to lately??

Sluggy

Sunday at the Farm & In the Garden

It was a beautiful day on Sunday so DH & I took a ride to a couple of farm stands I like.

I got....
6 ears of corn
6 pickling cukes
5 yellow squash
3 large tomatoes
2 bell peppers
2 zucchini
2 onions
1 patty pan squash
1 qt. of wax beans

I paid $12.55 for this local goodness.

Other than the corn which I grilled already for Sunday's dinner & the tomato I used for the BLTs at lunch, here are my plans for it all....
*make a batch of bread & butter pickles to eat off of all week
*make fried zucchini
*make squash casserole
*make stuffed peppers-I have half a leftover red bell pepper I'll stuff for my portion that night since I don't care for the green kind
*mix green beans with the wax beans for a simple side dish one night/blanch & freeze the rest of the wax beans
*not sure about the patty pan yet
*sliced tomato for Caprese Salad-it's not a roma tomato but it will have to do

That's a whole week's worth of side dishes and then some.

I talked to the woman who runs the small family farm nearby on Sunday.  She said the last week's heat spell and lack of rain is nothing but bad news for them.  Everything is drying out.  Her son dug down 4 feet and there is no moisture in the soil to that point.  Wells are drying up too.  I hope we get some good soaking rains soon!  I've got an order in for a bushel of beans, roma tomatoes, red peppers and dozens of ears of corn to put up for fall but this won't happen if the rains don't come soon. 8-(

I am getting very impatient with my own garden here.  I need to go harvest more collards and the lettuce is big enough to pick too but nothing else is ready to pick. 

The peppers & green beans are finally budding though....yah!

And we have golf ball sized maters now!!  No sign of the late blight so far.....crossing fingers this year!

I took some photos of the garden on the 2nd but I guess everyone is pretty bored with this kind of stuff so I won't share them.  But I do have to share these.....

This is the barrel by the back deck where I put kitchen compost-ables in the winter, when it's took bitter outside to walk all the way back to the compost pile.  About a month ago these 2 volunteer tomato plants shot up!lol  So I stopped dumping kitchen waste in there for now.  I just continued to put grass clippings in to act as a mulch, as things in containers tend to dry out so fast, and I don't want to have to water these constantly.
And over by the back deck fencing these volunteers starting growing.....

I had Morning Glories here last year.  When the vines died I just left them on the fencing until winter and pulled them down and threw them into the garden bed to compost.  I guess there were some seed pods left on that vine, huh?lol

I'd better get outside now and cut those collards before I have to go to pick up one of the doggies from the vet's office.

Sluggy

Garden June 6th Update.....10 Days

Because of our location, we are not able to have a longer growing season or even garden year round like other parts of the country.  Man, if I lived someplace that was warm year round I'd be a growing fool...instead of just a plain fool!lol

The best way to live frugally foodwise, if you have the climate and a little land is to keep a garden.  I don't care if you think you have a black thumb, anyone can grow something!  I truly believe that.
You may not be P. Allen Smith or the world's most knowledgeable horticulturist but everyone can find something they can grow and eat.

Some seeds are pretty forgiving and fool-proof....just throw em down and even if you ignore them(and the skies provide rain when you forget to water them) and the bugs don't chew their way through everything, you'll end up with something to eat.  Imagine if you make any kind of effort to fend off the bugs, water and nurture these little seeds, what you could accomplish! ;-)

I am a lackluster gardener.  I like to garden but my old decrepit body does not, so I like my gardening simple and I don't put a big effort into it.
We don't have acreage here, we have about 1/3 of an acre lot.  We've got a deck over part of the land, drainage ditches & underground buried power lines in other parts of the land and an above ground pool taking up more valuable real estate.  Take away the areas with large shade trees and there isn't much ground for gardening but we use what we have.

Seriously, if you don't garden but you have a little plot of land or even a pot of soil, get a packet of seeds and try growing something this summer. ;-)


Here are some piccies I snapped last weekend(June 6th) of the garden.  10 days out so it's still early here and not much to see....lol
The butternut, peppers and marigolds in the front....still no sign from the sunflower seeds.

Here's the side bed on June 6th....

Peppers doing ok.  The tomato plants have blooms already!   Here's what the tomoatoes looked like on May 26th....

You can tell by comparison the pepper plants have done squat.....lol

More tomatoes and marigolds.  This end of the bed has worse soil and less sun.  I've manured and I'll give them 'fish tea' so we'll see how they do...
DH sewed zuke, squash and bush bean seeds in the middle 3rd of this bed Sunday so nothing to see there yet.

Now to the back bed.....

Tomatoes grew some....

And the Cauliflower on the right has started growing.  DH planted the eggplant on the right in the photo and they are holding their own.  Here's what the cauliflower looked like on May 26th...

Marked improvement with the cauliflower.

And I'm glad to see that the salad greens #1 son and I sewed are starting to pop up!  It was only a matter of 4 days or so for them to germinate and break the surface.....we'll have salad in a few weeks...yay!!

Here's what our salad greens part of the bed looked like last summer at it's peak in mid-July....the greens sort of took over due to the wet and cool summer we had last year and just wouldn't die!lol

Last but not least, here is a planter with some leftovers that didn't fit into the beds(peppers, a butternut and a yellow squash?).  Not much growth yet but they aren't dead so I am happy with that.lol

Looks like it's time to get the fencing up though.  Our resident rabbit(who lives under the shed)has been eye-ing the plants..... 8-(

Sluggy

How does Your Garden Grow?

HELP!
We are overrun with Veggies!!!


Ok, so this really isn't a BAD problem, is it?lol
This is what hubby & I picked on Sunday. If this heat keeps up, we'll have to pick again in two days.

We planted 2 types of Summer Squash this year-the Straightneck and the Crooked Neck. I figured, since some years we can't grow ONE SINGLE summer squash, I'd cover all the bases and plant both types and hope one of them thrives.
Well, boy!....they both survived and flourished....and then some!!lolol

We only put in 2 zuke plants this year because, usually we plant 6 plants and are overrun with zucchinis, picking 10-15 zukes every week for 6 weeks or so. I figured 2 plants would cut down the zuke harvest by 2/3rds.
So of course, we plant 2 plants and we just last week harvested our first zuke. Sunday we picked 2 more and I think there is one single zuke left on a plant and no more flowers forming. 4 zukes total this season=2 zukes per plant. Did I buy the underachiever zucchini plants this year or what?LOL

The salad greens are still going strong, though I suspect the heat predicted for this week will do them in finally before the week is out. Then I can plow them under and reseed there with greens and spinach for a fall crop.

I need to get out to the garden soon and cut some more greens and take some of this bounty up to the people I have promised the overflow to.

What have you picked from your garden this past weekend or today?

Sluggy

GREEN & THRIFTY THURSDAY...the Most Green & Thrifty

There is something most anyone can do that will make you extremely Green & Thrifty.

It doesn't involve giving up bathing.

It doesn't involve going off the grid(=giving up electricity).

It doesn't involve selling your car and walking or biking instead.

It doesn't even involve giving up meat.

Very simply, it's this....

Go plant something that will provide you with food to eat.

One of the best things you can do for this old Mother Earth and for your own financial bottom line is to grow some of your own food.

Just take a trip down the produce aisle of your local grocery store.

See those squash, bags of lettuce, green beans?

See what those things cost??

With a little bit of a financial investment in some seed, and some time, you can grow your own and stop giving some of your money to the grocery store!

It's almost as good as having a Money Tree growing in your backyard!!

It doesn't matter where you live in most cases, you can grow food.

If you have some land, cultivate as much of it as you can take care of.

If you are planted in a suburb, convert a piece of your lawn or commandeer a flower bed to put in some crops.

If you live in a townhouse with no or little yard, get some pots and make a container garden.

If you are a city apartment dweller, chances are there is a community garden in your town that you can participate in. If there isn't, there SHOULD BE, so get out there with some friends and make one happen!

When I moved to this little subdivision in rural Teeny Tiny Town almost 9 yrs. ago, NOT ONE House here had a garden! Some homes had flowers outside in the flower beds(not many) but nobody grew food.

My motto is.....if you have a choice between growing something that's nice to look at or growing something that's nice to look at AND it can feed you, grow the one that feeds you!

Get some seeds.

Put then in the ground.

Water when & if it's needed.

Watch the plants grow, flower & produce food.

Pick the food.

Eat it.

Anyone can do it.

EVERYONE should at least try!

But what if you've never grown anything before?

Just do it!

Ask for help from someone who has done it before or find help from any of the many online resources.

And don't be afraid to fail.

That's how we learn. Failure often is the best teacher!

I've had seasons where things got washed out, or the birds or other little critters ate my seeds or starts, or bugs munched on the food before it got picked or it was too cold or not enough sun or the plants got some disease.

Yep, everyone has those things happen.

But don't let what might happen keep you from trying!

But I live in a community that restricts what I plant, or won't let me plant a garden?
Then go Commando! Sneak a pepper plant here, a tomato plant there amidst the 'proper' shrubs and flowers. No one will be the wiser....
Do like me and rip out the nasty overgrown landscaped shrubbery and put in a garden bed.....or rip out a chunk of lawn and convert the space to a melon or bean patch.
Be the subject of neighborhood conversation!

You might just start something GOOD happening in your town.

Sluggy

GREEN & THRIFTY THURSDAY-Being Frugal AND Environmental TIP #2

Today is....
GREEN AND THRIFTY THURSDAY!

And that means it's time for another small tip on things you can do to save money AND help the environment. After all, being frugal is great but saving money & time is not so good, at the expense of our Planet!

This week's Tip is about newspaper.

We Couponer-istas love us some Sunday newspaper!

Heck, many of us love us 10 or 20 copies of the Sunday newspaper.

If you coupon, you KNOW what I mean.lolol

After we lovingly extract all those wonderful Coupon Inserts, & we read the actual comics/news/articles in the 1st copy of the paper, we are left with a big old pile of newspaper.
Hmmmm..
NOT very green to just dispose of it, even if we take it to the recycling bin.
Let's put the power of the newspaper to work for us.
But where & how, you say?

WHERE....In the garden!
Spring is here and many frugal folks turn to thoughts of gardening. What better way, if you have the outside space, to save money on food than to grow your own!

Sure you can buy plants in a few weeks and just transplant them into the ground, so why not start your own plants from seed Now?
Because it costs less for seeds than for seedlings ready to transplant, that's why.

Before you go off to the local Home Gardening Store and buy little plastic seedling pots(plastic=not green) to start your seeds in, use what you have at home to Make Seedling Pots for FREE!
That is where the leftover Newspaper comes in.

HOW.....Here's how I make them.

1. Get a muffin pan. If you don't have one, try using a styrofoam-y egg carton from the grocery store.
Get a large bowl. Put some water in it.

2. Get some newspaper & cut it into strips or small squares. I use squares about 5"x5".

3. Take your pieces of newspaper and wet them in the bowl of water.

4. Take wet newspape and line your muffin pan/egg carton with the paper, pressing it against the indentation. I use 3 thicknesses of newspaper per hole.
Do this for each muffin/egg hole.

5. After each indentation is filled, take the edges of the paper that extends over the top of the muffin hole and fold it down so that the newspaper edge is even with the muffin hole. If the newspaper edges have dried out and won't stick, wet your fingers to make the newspaper moist again and press these folded parts into the newspaper cup you have made. Doing this makes the pots look nicer but also make the edges sturdier when you start filling them with soil and wetting that soil.

6. Put muffin pan/egg carton in a sunny spot. If you don't have a sunny spot, put it in a warm spot in your house until thoroughly dry.

You now have 12 seedling pots!

Rinse & repeat until you have as many pots as you need.

These are so great because when your seedlings are ready for transplanting outside into your garden, you can plant them plant and pot. The newspaper pot will eventually decompose in the ground. No digging your seedlings out of their pots like those plastic ones they come in at the store. Less trauma to the plant when transplanting and less plastic in a landfill.
A win/win!

You can also use that pile of newspaper in your flower beds too. Instead of buying landscaping fabric for $8 a roll, use newspaper! Just lay it down to cover where you don't want weeds to grow, overlapping each sheet of paper. (I generally use 2 thickness of newspaper.) When done, soak the paper with a hose set of a gentle mist or spray. Cover the area with mulch. With any luck, you'll have no weeds to pull wherever you do this for the entire growing season!
If you still have leftover newspaper, try shredding it and using it in your compost pile. Newspaper qualifies as a 'brown' material for this purpose. To keep your compost in balance, make sure you have 'green' material to add to it too.

Any other ideas? Please leave them in the comments section below.

Sluggy