It's A Dirty Job

I've been playing in the dirt this past weekend. I was able to dig up some (free) dirt between my house and the house next door. I'm trying lessen the amount of dirt I will have to buy. I had to sit on the deck most of the afternoon and pick a lot of rocks, twigs and roots out of the dirt and then break up the big clumps.

Now I should only have to buy soil to fill the three big, round containers and fill in a little in the others. I'm going to start "composting" my coffee grounds, eggshells and veggie peelings directly into the containers and hopefully the dirt will be get richer as we go along.

As a matter of fact, the same night that I filled the containers I decided to make mashed potatoes for supper just so I could use the peelings in the dirt.

And because I might, might, have just a little touch of OCD, I couldn't just throw the peelings in the dirt willy nilly. I cut them up into little pieces (kind of close to the same size) and put them in the containers in an orderly fashion, then turned them into the dirt. I know, I know, but I can't help myself. I'm not always that bad....hardly ever.

The weather has been really cooperating and hopefully in a couple of weeks I can start planting. I can hardly wait. I still haven't quite decided what I want to plant. Tomatoes of course, that's a given. Definitely some herbs, maybe some peppers. I would like to plant some kind of greens like swiss chard or some lettuces.
Decisions...decisions.

On another note, I think I may want to learn to make homemade jam. My grandma use to make it and it was really good. I have her old recipe box and I'm going to see if that recipe is in there. By making my own jam I can control what goes in it, no high fructose corn syrup, no preservatives, etc. I usually buy a lot of strawberries from the farmers' market in the late spring and might just buy even more so I can do this.

I also got an easy recipe for homemade bread from a friend at work. I was going to make it this past weekend and let you know how it was, but I didn't have any yeast so I will be definitely making it this weekend. She tells me it's so easy that her husband makes it every couple of days. Nothing like homemade bread.

I've been reading a lot about GMO's and the value of heirloom vegetables and saving seeds. Also, I been reading a lot about how a certain large corporation is trying to "own" most seed varieties and how dangerous that can become. It just makes it seem even more important that we save the heritage and non-GMO seeds and continue to grow those fruits and veggies. Of course, I like a good conspiracy theory just like anyone else, but unfortunately, this is really happening and we all need to be aware of it.


Kathy