Unstuffed: First Harvest!

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

First Harvest!

At the garden a few days ago, the spinach caught my eye. "Getting big", I thought. But my mind was focused on a 'to do' list, and I moved on to another task, forgetting about the spinach.

Last night I checked again, this time a little more closely. I'm glad I did because there was enough spinach ready for me to harvest a basket!

Our first official harvest from the garden amounts to just a little over 5 ounces! That's worth like at least $5 dollars at the farmer's market. I'm so darn proud.

Now I know that some of you old pros are used to this sort of thing, but garden neophyte that I am, this is super exciting for me! The ADGMD and I did a little dance and shared a ceremonial leaf together.

And just 'cause, here's a picture of the cherry tree and back corner of our garden. (You can just make out the basket of nettles I harvested for the seed.) I'm hoping to naturalize this space and add some native, wild plants to this shady area. (Ottawa Native Plant sale)

Yes those are scarves hanging in the tree. And yes, that kinda does make me a bit of a hippie. You wanna make somethin' of it? ;)

4 comments:

wendyytb said...: Yay! for you! I can relate to your excitement! I planted yesterday and have been out hourly to see if there is any action...there isn't of course...other than the neighbours who are bent over in laughter watching me. AHAHA! he who laughs first...

Found a great recipe for those dandelion heads that are in my freezer...
Wendy; June 3, 2009 at 1:57 PM
Anonymous said...: Hippie!; June 3, 2009 at 4:59 PM
Rachel said...: Congratulations on your first harvest!

I love the scarves. :); June 4, 2009 at 11:59 AM
Amber said...: Tee hee. Wendy I know! If my garden wasn't a 15min bike ride away, I'd probably get a few laughs too! "Why does she spend more time harvesting weeds than she does working in the garden?"

Hey Anon,
I know you are, but what am I?

Thanks Green Grrl. I do think they add a nice touch. My next project is to make some wind chimes for the tree!; June 4, 2009 at 1:48 PM

Raison d'etre

In 2008 I didn't buy anything new for the whole year. Food and basic toiletries (but not toilet paper) were the obvious exceptions (twice I broke my own rule). Used items were allowed, but I tried really hard to reduce consumption as much as possible.

I finished my year successfully, and along the way learned a lot about how much the world consumes, the waste we produce, sustainability, voluntary simplicity, climate change, peak oil, resource depletion, the water crisis, the food crisis, voting with your dollar, voting with your fork....

Now, I've transformed into a slightly nutty, very passionate, gardening, preserving, DIYing, simple living, nature loving, weed eating, backyard medicine making, urban homesteader, and I still don't use toilet paper!

With the help of the Awesomedudeguy (ADG), I'm continuing my exploration of living lightly and frugally, while increasing my self-sufficiency and resiliency, staying debt free, and preparing for a climate changed, resource depleted world, in uncertain economic times.

My nothing new restriction is lifted, but I continue to be a gentle, local consumer as much as possible.

My hope is that some of the information and resources I post about here will be helpful to others. Thanks so much for stopping by !

Yours in unstuffing,
Amber

"Forgive me if I never visit. I am from the fields, you know, and while quite at home with dandelion, make a sorry figure for the drawing room" ~Emily Dickinson

"I never had any other desire so strong, and so like covetousness, as that.... I might be master at last of a small house and a large garden, with very moderate conveniences joined to them, and there dedicate the remainder of my life to the culture of them and the study of nature." ~Abraham Cowley

"The laws of nature are under no obligation to cater to our culture’s emotionally charged fantasies of perpetual progress and limitless growth." ~John Michael Greer

"Sometimes we think we are too small to make a difference in this big world. Our actions seem insignificant in comparison to global issues such as climate change and population growth. However, the reality is that action on an individual level is exactly how big changes are made. Without individual and family sustainability, there’s no community sustainability. And without community sustainability, there’s no global sustainability. In fact, earth-wide change is absolutely impossible without individual change.
It really does come down to you and me."
~From Living Sustainably: It's Your Choice

"The universal conspiracy of the silent-assertion lie is hard at work always and everywhere, and always in the interest of a stupidity or a sham, never in the interest of a thing fine or respectable. Is it the most timid and shabby of all lies? It seems to have the look of it. For ages and ages it has mutely laboured in the interest of despotisms and aristocracies and chattel slaveries, and military slaveries, and religious slaveries, and has kept them alive; keeps them alive yet, here and there and yonder, all about the globe; and will go on keeping them alive until the silent-assertion lie retires from business--the silent assertion that nothing is going on which fair and intelligent men and women are aware of and are engaged by their duty to try to stop." ~Mark Twain

"It is not enough simply to abstain from theft...We must remember that nothing in this world really belongs to us. At best, we are merely borrowers. It is our duty, therefore, to borrow no more from the world than we absolutely need, and to make full and proper use of it. Taking more than we need, and wasting it, is a form of stealing from the rest of humankind."
~Commentary on Sutra 30 The Yoga Aphorisms of Patanjali