Updates on Indoor Plants.

The sprouts seem to be paused as they grow roots.

Lavender's doing well. The bulb is working on roots.

I wrapped the jar because it was starting to go green.

The aloe had to be moved out of the window.

It seems to be getting sunburned on a few tips.

Yoghurt and Lessons Learned

So a few days ago I made yoghurt using THIS recipe I found on the Plastic-Free Life blog.

Fresh out of the Thermos. Still warm and smelled oddly like white glue.

After a few hours in the fridge. No longer smelled like glue but was weirdly watery.

Strained out some whey. Thicker and tasty! (bigger bowl)

Next day. Tasty and very creamy... with some weird bits.

I had a small bowl today and it's a lot creamier than the store yoghurt it was cultured from and reminds me of the fancy super creamy greek yoghurts. I think the weird bits may be scalded proteins and I think next time I do this I'm not going to boil the milk. Store milk is highly germ free after going through pasteurization so I'm not worried bad germs will take hold.

Success!

After two hours in the fridge straning out some of the whey, the yoghurt finaly started to resemble yoghurt! Because it finally looked right and smelled okay I was willing to taste test. It's definitely different than the store stuff that cultured it but it's also definitely YOGHURT! 

(I even got John to taste and make sure it wasn't just wishful thinking.)

Maybe Not So Cultured

Yesterday I made yoghurt using THIS recipe I found on the Plastic-Free Life blog.

I put everything together and set it aside to sit at 5pm and this is how it looks when I poured it out at 7am this morning.

It's lumpy and watery and kinda smells like white glue. Sooo... I'm straining some of the whey out to see if I can get a thicker, more... yoghurt-y yoghurt.
Updates to follow.

What sorts of things have you made from scratch? 

What sort of things would you like to?

Jack Frost is a Busy Guy

Winter's definitely here. There's icicles, snow, and freezing winds.

Down spout icicle

I removed the paper and sticks. The garlic bed looks a little drier than the others because it had that layer of "protection" from the early morning frosts and such but it's not overly dry. It'll be interesting to see how much we can get from this one bed.

Garlic hibernation.

Evil White Stuff

Seems the snow is starting even though winter is still officially about a month away. Going to get the newspapers and sticks up before they get buried under a few inches.

Let There Be (more) Light!

Put a mirror behind the planter to help the lil sprouts grow strong.

Oregano

Chamomile

Callendula (Pot Marigold)

Chives

Sage

As you can see, most of the sprouts are starting on their first set of true leaves. The chives don't grow like most and the sage is a slow starter. I'm hoping to have everything well established before I have to start the seeds for the garden.

Sheilds Have Been Breached!

Looks like the squirrels got curious. Damn. I don't think any of the garlic was disturbed though so that's good. Fingers crossed that because they didn't find anything they'll leave it alone now.

Squirrel? Cat? or Raccoon?

Sheilds are Holding Cap'n

Made of nothing but a layer of newspaper and a few sticks to keep it from blowing away, the squirrel shield seems to be holding! It's been at least 18 hours now and no signs of trouble. Knock on wood but I think this just might work!

What do you use for critter protection?

GARLIC!

Got the garlic planted today. Good thing too because the ground is bound to start freezing soon. I planted twelve blocks of nine so 108 all together.

Sorting/Counting on the table.

Each set had some old(sprouted) and some new.

Newspaper and sticks laid over the bed to discourage scavengers.

Hopefully my plan to cover the bed for a week or so with newspapers(and sticks so they don't blow away) will keep the squirrels from digging it up. I know they're not digging by smell or they'd know they don't want to eat the garlic before they dig it up. If this doesn't work... I don't know what we'll do next year... chicken wire?

Make Your Own

I don't usually send people to other blogs but I just read a post about how to make your own seasoning packets and I had to share. Self reliance by Jamie - Tis the seasonings

I knew you could make your own onion soup mix but I had assumed ranch dressing and taco seasoning would have ingredients I couldn't get a hold of.  **happy dance**

Fertile Beds

Urea now shovelled into the beds. It came in water-soluble pellet form and looks like little hailstones. Hopefully the spring 2013 testing will show awesome nitrogen levels and we won't have to do any more store bought additions. I have a friend who's willing to give us straw for mulch, and Fall 2013 will be the first time we can add some of our own compost to the beds so that will be cool. :)

West side

East side

closer view

Front Window Update

Not much to say. So here's a bunch of pics to say it for me.

Little white Calendula sprout by the stick.

Three itty bitty green Chamomile sprouts.

Red-neck flower pots.

New addition is a Paperwhite bulb.

Should look like this when grown.

A Pillar and Boxes of Pee

I decided we needed some greenery indoors other than the aloe this winter, so I took the two containers the hot pepper plants were in and stacked them so the smaller top one drains into the bigger one. I figured that some fresh herbs would be welcome in the kitchen and the flowers will make awesome tea and salves.

Top: Basil surrounded by Chamomile;  Lower ring: Calendula, Sage, and Chives

I also got to the garden center today to pick up the nitrogen for the garden. Because we had plenty of everything else I wanted to find a high-nitrogen, low to zero phosphorus, low to zero potassium solution that was naturally sourced and slow release. I was considering poultry manure but the size and weight of the required amount(not to mention cost) was a bit uncomfortable... especially since I don't drive and I'd have to take it all home on the bus. What I found instead was this:

Urea is the chief solid component of mammalian urine; synthesized from ammonia and carbon dioxide. It is filtered out of the body through the kidneys, and is one of the components of urine.

Five boxes should do the whole garden plus some left for if the front yard needs a boost. Amazingly potent. :) We'll get it mixed in ASAP and it will age over the winter into very nutritious soil.

Plants and Plans

No I don't have 2013 all planned out all ready. I'm good but I'm not that good. 

This little off-shoot from the lavender we pulled up yesterday begged me to come inside the house instead of the compost. An empty peanut butter jar made a decent flowerpot.

Seems to be doing well.

 Because we don't have a working mower and no one wants to cut the "lawn" anyway, we're going to turn the front yard into an herb and flower garden. 8'X17' is a ton of space so there will be lots to use in bath products, herbal teas, and such.

Testing, Testing...

Results of The (suposed to be biannual) Soil Test

Last tested in March
Results were:
PH - 7 (neutral)
P   - 1 (Deficient)
K  - 4 (Surplus)
N  - 0 (Depleted)

Just tested results:
PH - 7 (neutral)
P   - 4 (Surplus)
K  - 3 (Sufficient)
N  - 1 (Deficient)

The kit I use to test.

Seems the compost did help but not enough. We've mixed in the fall leaves and will be getting some boxes of Urea to up the nitrogen. Hopefully ageing those two over the winter will balance out the numbers.
(Considering the nitrogen content I'm surprised we got the amount of produce we did this year.)

Wrapping Up for Winter

Did a bunch of work in the yard today including flipping the rain barrel so it wouldn't fill & freeze.

Obligatory before shot:

We harvested what we could of the parsley and kale before pulling everything up and turning in the leaves.

I know that kale and parsley could have survived til next year but we're going to most likely be turning in a lot of things to the beds and it's not like they were hard to grow.
The cauliflowers found in the centers of the plants weren't even big enough for a snack.

Tiny

Less Tiny

We already have two big mason jars of dried parsley, a large container in the freezer of frozen parsley... so hopefully we can find this fresh bunch a home with friends.

What was left of the parsley.

And of course, the obligatory after shots:

Shed & compost piles

Trellis tied for wind stability

Lonely potted calendula.

Closer shot so you can see, the new compost pile is off to a good start.

Learning from 2012

We learned quite a few things this year:

• I don't actually have the time or desire to keep track of seeding/transplanting/harvesting every week on top of watering and weeding.
• I don't mind drying/freezing/canning our produce and would much rather have a big harvest to store than a continuous trickle that will most likely get wilty and gross before we eat it
• We don't need half as many varieties and would probably be much better off planting more of what we'll definitely eat
• The seedlings were leggy because they didn't get enough light
• The transplants did poorly because they were not properly hardened off
• The garden in general did poorly because the soil's still terrible and we didn't water nearly enough
• The front lawn is a waste of space(even tiny as it is) an no one wants to mow it even if the mower were working

What did you learn this year?