Bags and Brussel Sprouts.......

unlikely combination right?  well i finished another grocery bag and yesterday was 'out and about', going to our semi-local farmer's market... well not exactly since a goodly portion of their produce is brought in from california, mexico and other points far south... i took my beautiful bag with me and filled it up.. i'm happy, they hold a lot of groceries and look pretty, had no distress with the weight of the produce... all good i'd say...

as for the brussel sprouts i've found a very very good reason to grow more and protect them better from the deer.... at $8.13 a kilogram i'll not be buying many more from the produce section of anywhere..... the brussel sprouts do very well overwintering here and in the spring  the stalks produce lovely tasty new spring greens and if you  haven't eaten all of the sprouts you also have those ... not bad i'd say... and did i buy some? Yes.... sigh.. why? you might ask ...because turkey just is NOT the same without brussel sprouts and cranberry sauce... we are going to have a family dinner next weekend and the turkey has been in daughter's freezer.. time to cook it up and make a batch of turkey broth with the carcass...i've now used up all my canned turkey broth and am needing more...

this winter i truly fell off the veggie wagon and have been eating a fair bit of meat/poultry and fish... not sure why, but i figure if i'm craving it i most likely missing something in my diet... i'm gradually cutting back more and more on the meat department and trying to get back on the veggie/beans/rice wagon... wish me luck!!

am going to have to grow more green/purple beans this year too since i've managed to use almost all my canned beans that i did up... i canned them because i had them and a lot of carrot leftovers and i'm a touch quirky about letting the bounty rot on the compost heap... i'm not much of a canned string bean and or carrot lover but i've used them in a lot of soups and stews and i have to admit they were a good addition..

and here comes the 'rant'... i shall be good, honest!! this link is from Mother Earth News so i'm going to 'assume' that it's pretty correct... it's an article on certain company that isn't on the up and up on their 'organic' status...... as for me IF i could find a supplier of local goats milk i'd be there like a dirty shirt.. but once again.. not allowed to buy it raw and no place local that i know of..... the milk police at work you know... the milk police, the egg police, the slaughter house police .... oh wait... here's a link to an article about how our meat has to be processed.... it is an older article but still rings true.. many small farmers literally gave up and once again many of us are forced into buying meat that is processed in large facilities.....

here on Vancouver Island there is a movement from local small farmers to break into the market, as it is now it's a very small portion of what is offered in larger grocery stores... 
rant over..... back to reality....
since gas went up another 10 cents a litre... $1.23 a litre ..... i shall be home much more..so a sewing i shall go.. until i can 'sow' in the garden!!!

Snow and Sewing......

yes.... sighhhh... i'm snowed in... not a lot of snow, but enough that i can't get out of my driveway... oh what to do...... i have the pre-spring garden bug and it's driving me crazy... well crazier than my normal state ....
my poor little peas.... huddled in my raised bed, tucked under the reemay and 4 inches of snow.... my greenhouse seedlings tucked in their stryofoam boxes with heat pads underneath and triple layers of reemay on them.... brrrr  .... i guess we'll see how my plant early experiment goes, since this is an unusually chilly/snowy arctic blast, and those poor little seedlings thought it was spring too....

i must admit it does 'look' lovely out there, as i'm sitting on my chaise, with a cup of coffee, my laptop, Dora behind my back and Sampson curled up at the end of chaise lounge (we're a might scrunched but happy) but i was outside earlier, topping up the bird seed and trust me.. chilly it was!
yesterday i spent sewing and today i will finish my current project... i made 2 grocery bags and am working on a third one... it's not like i don't have enough grocery bags but the ones i have are beginning to look a wee bit tattered and my new ones have a hint of elegance (one must LOOK good while shopping)

this is one of the bags that i made... the new one i'm making is made of a oilskin type of fabric and i'll post a pic when i'm done...it has bottles of wine and grapes all over it... i don't drink wine, but should prove to be a conversation piece....

i 'liked' a Facebook page Take back Urban Home-steading(s)  due to the kerfuffle over the trademark issue and the site has taken off... within a week over 5000 people have 'liked' and i'm really impressed with the activity it's generated... some of the folks who's blogs i read such as Deanna Duke's Crunchy Chicken have been commenting and contributing and it really is fun to share ideas with everyone.. i believe that a goodly majority of us farmers/gardeners/earth folk are generally solitary but not adverse to 'visiting' and what a great way, coffee, puter at your fingertips and ideas flowing ... last night the 5000th 'like' arrived and April the owner of Take back Urban Home-steading posted Rachel's blog Turtles Eat Lettuce  .. congrats on being punted out into the limelight ....

another blog that i've followed for awhile now is Mobugs ... i really LOVE her site since i'm a bugaholic... but this week she made a post on a Crawdad (Crayfish for us Canadians) that she found attempting to walk on ice... its a heart warming story and if you have children or grandchildren i recommend having a look at it, the pics are awesome and  the story will make you feel warm and fuzzy (well it did me) ... the posting after this one is a semi follow-up...

i've noticed that i have a few new 'followers'... thanks for reading and i hope not to disappoint you... cheers.. am off to sew..... laters.... 

The word is.....

my washing machine works great!!! Daughter phoned me this morning and let me know that she'd done a load of laundry .... unfortunately her washing machine is broken so i loaned her my 'new to me' one.... she was delighted to use it... one small problem tho... it leaks... but we think it probably won't take much to fix that issue... YAY......
for those of you that posted yesterday regarding Urban Homesteading etc., great posts, i've not read all of them (there were a ton) but have enjoyed reading what i have....
the Electronic Frontier Foundation has sent a letter to the Dervaes, on behalf of the several targets of their takedown requests... the letter is great to read and hopefully will make a difference... we shall see won't we!
another issue i have is with Facebook .... as much as i love the connection it has given me, i find their 'holier than thou' attitude more than distressing...not just because the Dervaes were able to shut down several group pages but also their actions regarding shutting down breastfeeding and art sites which they deem 'obscene.... here is a link to the pictures.. if you don't mind looking at mommies feeding their babies, have a boo.. or perhaps that should be 'have a boob'... and if you object.. just don't look!! now back to facebook.. grumble grumble... one of the owners of a site that was shut down due to the Dervaes objections is unable to find anywhere to send them a letter..... soooooo she wrote a great one and is sharing it with others in the hopes it will be addressed... here is the facebook link, ..... enough grumbling for one day.. don't want to overload my brain and blow a gasket or anything ...

a cold snap is on it's way... complete with cold bitter winds and possibly snow.... in all reality snow first then winds would be better, sometimes snow is a good thing helping to insulate some of the more tender plants...

i have to thank my friend who bought new furniture... they were all covered with some fabric /reemay like product which i cheerfully scored and saved...... new use..... in my greenhouse, covering my new seedlings from the impending drop in temperature..... i must admit i get great pleasure out of recycling things..... i even have my kids saving me things  (and yes they DO think i'm a bit ummm... quirky ) such as string and binder twine (from  hay bales) , all good and useful items in the garden....

Urban Homesteading (minus the trademark)....

normally i wouldn't blog about an issue two days in a row, but you know what.. i'm annoyed about the whole issue... and i'm also glad in a rather odd way... i've come across some great new blogs and connected with some like minded folk...
so back to the 'why' i'm blogging again on the same issue as yesterday... it's to show some solidarity with other Urban Homesteaders (minus the trademark) who have been practicing their own brand of Urban Homesteading (minus the trademark), not just the past 2 years, but for years... today (monday) is what i'm going to call an international day of  Urban Homesteaders Day of Action , the trademark that is in question affects not just Americans.. it affects all of us... i'm still at a loss as to 'why' it was accepted.. was someone sleeping at the switch?? something 'stinks' and it's not my sweet smelling pile of horse manure, lying rotting and waiting to be spread on my Urban Homestead (minus the trademark) garden.... ahhh feels good to be a rebel.....
i'm looking forward to reading a number of blogs tomorrow... Deanna Duke over at The Crunchy Chicken is requesting people to post their blog Urls if they are going to be rebels and join in on the Urban Homesteaders Day of Action... should be a fun read....

in last blog i mentioned that i'd planted peas... tonight it's supposed to snow..... i'm hoping this is incorrect!!! but i've covered them with a reemay house (made of pvc pipe and reemay).... it's rather cute... reminds me of a covered wagon.. i'll have to get out and take a pic... the actual raised bed is a half life raft capsule that someone gave me last year... it worked very well last year when i planted it up with 3 different kinds of pole beans and 2 spagetti squash plants... this winter i dug in some veggie scraps and freshened it up with some new soil.....there were only a few holes in the bottom but when i dug around yesterday i found some worms... YAY ..... worms make me very happy ... (easily amused aren't i )

speaking of worms.. i've been following some worm gurus and am hoping to try out a bit of worm farming this year... right now it's too cold start them... so sometime later in the season...

anyone want to play with mr. sadsack Sampson?  he was very sweet and sat there for quite sometime, watching me, waiting for me to open the door and come and play.... life of a farm dog is good .....

OKAYYYYYYYY i suck......

and my deepest apologies ..... i've been away for so long... i'm not exactly sure where i've been... i did all the gardening things, canned and preserved things for winter.... and then the doldrums.... long doldrums... but not unhappy... just bleh... between driving grandkids back and forth to school and doing family things, and even a quilt i've been quite busy over the winter....

you (if i have any followers left) might have wondered what happened to me, i received several notes from people wondering if i was okay, i replied and hopefully you got them...

you might wonder what woke me up...... facebook did.. royally... a mental stirring if you will... the issue of trademarks and a certain family that have created quite a stir....... i suppose i'm not suppose to mention the issue at hand without referring back to them.. but tough... since URBAN HOMESTEADING (minus the damn trademark) has been around for a very very long time... the issue that they 'invented' it.. is obsurd... my grandparents were 'urban homesteaders'... they lived in a small town and had a huge garden, chickens, fruit trees, berries and the like.. my aunt and uncle lived next door and had a huge garden, chickens, ducks, turkeys, geese, sheep, goats AND 4 pigs.... all URBAN, all homesteaders... thats what people did to survive, have clothing often and other assorted things.. self sufficiency wasn't something that was hip/cool or anything else.. it just WAS..... as for today's world... the more URBAN HOMESTEADERS the merrier!!! we all need to be more self sufficient, to share and care and just be supportive of each other....

i've 'liked' several 'organizations on Facebook because they all 'give a damn' about the issue... for myself, i worry about the precedent that it's setting... i could go on about it, but i suspect that most of you are more than aware of whats going on... here's a link.. many articles and blogs are out there with their opinions etc....

ahhh i feel much better.... my rant for now is done... but definately not forgotten..

just a note.. was out in the greenhouse... i have tiny arugula, lettuces and cress which have popped their cute little green heads out into the big cold world........ bees are arriving during the warmer part of the day, my snowdrops, crocuses are blooming and the daffodils are a couple of inches up... i planted some peas yesterday, covered them with reemay and we shall see.... it's earlier than i normally plant peas but then again...

 YAYYYYYY spring is on the way........

see my new washing machine... i'm sooooo jazzed... been looking for a very long time!!! it's an 'apartment' sized one and will be perfect in the summer when my water is at a premium!!!  it was a very worthwhile $75.00 and is in mint condition...

Sucking it up....

i'm really not sure what is going on, but my blue water barrel has been a watering hole in the past few days... hoards of bees, several different species, and wasps have been drinking madly...i've observed the bee 'dance' they do to let the rest of the gang in on their findings... odd stuff i say... if anyone can tell me why the odd behaviour please do tell!!!

sooooo more buggy events... did i ever mention how much i love insects ;)
   
this wee jumping spider, species unknown, found lunch on the windowsill... i didn't have my camera handy on viewing the initial pounce but did get it out for the remainder of the 'event'... i must say i did feel badly for the fly... hard way to die...

one has to admire the tenacity of the spider to hang on to his dinner...i removed spider and fly from windowsill to outdoors to take 'better' pics... moved them around several times (for better lighting) and not once did the spider let go... i guess lunch was tasty!  

outside in the garden i didn't have my camera but there was a difficult drama going on, a poor honey bee and one very determined red/black ant...in the hopes of saving the bee i had to detach the ant from the bee several times, mr/ms ant just came coming back for more.. finally with a dry stalk of grass and a good flick the ant went for a flight of his own.... as for the bee.... i put him/her in my garden in what i hoped was a safe spot... at least for a short while!

Island hopping.....

last week a couple of friends and i went island hopping... Salt Spring Island to be exact!  if you've never been and are on the west coast, it's a very 'cute' little island which is what i like to think of as 'artsy fartsy'... i've only been a few times but i think a fall visit will be required for photography... it was extremely hot, humid and smokey from the mainland's forest fires so my shots weren't very good and i didn't take very many... Salt Spring's micro climate is warmer than where i am so they get to have a bit longer seasons, not so cold and have great little farms which they are famous for their lamb...they are famous for the Salt Spring Island Coffee Company and  most famous for some of their art and music inhabitants..

arriving at Vesuvius Bay...

i found this article from the Seattle Post  while i was hunting to see just WHO lived on Salt Spring Island besides Randy Backman and Robert Bateman.. it's a great little article to peruse and gives you an idea of what Salt Spring Island is all about...

the stone building says 1901 on it, so am assuming it was built then.. as perhaps the barn in the next picture... they were on the same property.... 

this was the Morningside Bakery/Cafe that had the most scrumptious goodies... but their fireplace intrigued me more... and their beams for the roof!!

 

on the way home, after we got back on Vancouver Island we went to Cowichan Bay to a little pub with a great view!!!

can you see the Dragon boat?

was a nice afternoon spent snooping around.. next time i go, it will be me and the puppies and i'll be checking out many more places... hopefully passing on some pics your way!