One week update

I finally got some of the plants in the ground (beans, corn, etc.) Later today I'll be planting squash in the front and back. Some of the strawberries are coming up - they are tiny! I hope I can keep them alive long enough to plant them outside. It looks like I'll have to start some pepper seeds inside because the ones outside aren't coming up. It's a real possibility that they got dried out at sometime during sprouting and didn't recover.

The search for doves so far has be futile - it seems that there just aren't a lot of folks breeding them. Guess I'll just have to keep looking...or start bugging Hubby about rabbits instead :)

Well, it's nearly the end of the semester. I've got to finish my final presentation which is due tomorrow. Then we have our final test on Wednesday. I cannot wait for this class to be over!

A wonderful Mother's Day

Wow, I had a great day thanks to the three most important people in my life. We were out all day today but the kids were wonderful, even though they are thoroughly exhausted (Little Man is currently passed out on the couch). We started the day at the Sportsman's Warehouse - hubby has been wanting to show me this place for weeks! We left with a case for hubby's bow - an early anniversary gift. I've been looking at them online but when we went today I decided, what the heck? This way he can pick it out himself - he's rather particular, and currently happier than a pig in the sunshine.

From there, we went around to a few pet stores. I was looking for a book on doves but wasn't successful in acquiring one. Flight cages were also on the list of look-ats (and eventual must-haves). As the day went on, I could tell hubby was coming around to the dove idea. After all, they're quiet, beautiful, don't take much space, don't stink, and aren't considered agricultural animals. Our final stop was supposed to be to pick up a pair of black clown fish for my salt water reef tank. The only fish at the store had a lot of orange on their face, so we decided to wait on another shipment. Hubby was pretty disappointed by this - thought that it somehow ruined my day - so he said I could get my doves! Yay! I'm going to be doing a lot of research over the next couple of weeks, but I think I want ringneck doves. They seem to come in a lot of color variations, which will definitely keep things interesting! What I've read suggests that pigeons would be a better choice for meat (because of their larger size) but people seem to have completely different feelings when it comes to pigeons. So, doves it is. Not that I mind one bit.

After the final pet store, hubby wanted to stop by Home Depot to pick out a shed. Afterall, he's going to need to do some rearranging outside so the doves can have protected spot on our back porch. While we were there I decided to give the blueberries one last shot - and they had some! Woohoo! We picked up one bush each of the Misty and Oneal varieties. The Oneal bush already has a little cluster of berries on it. I am ridiculously excited about this - I've been looking for blueberries for a year now. No one ever has them and online stores can't ship theirs to CA. It's been extremely frustrating. We are going to plant these guys in the front yard under our pine tree in the coming week. I may also root a few cuttings so we can take them along when we move.

Our final stop was dinner at a fabulous little Mexican joint on the way home. Wow they have the best food! Delish. As we were headed home I mentioned that someone at work told me about an alternate route we could take to get back to the base. 'Really? Wanna check it out?' asked Hubby? Sure! It's been a long time since we did anything even a little unexpected. The other route took us on a nice drive through the country, around an enormous lake and finally down a gravel road back to one of the base entrances. It was beautiful back there. It really is too bad CA has such high property taxes. I would not mind living in this area one bit.

So, that was my day. It was the best Mother's Day yet.

New books and random other things

I had to run some errands today and while I was out I picked up three new books! Storey's Guide to Raising Dairy Goats and Chickens and Basic Butchering of Livestock and Game by Mettler. I won't have time to read them anytime soon but I have something to look forward to when I get some free time.

I got my herbs planted this evening. Lavender, Thyme, Basil, and Parsley. I can't find my packet of chives seeds. Chamomile is next on the list if I can it. Also planted some California Poppies. They grow wild around here and are just amazingly beautiful. I didn't want to mess with the wild ones so blew 99 cents on a package of seeds. I can't wait to have some blooming outside my door.

The cauliflower seedlings are already growing like gangbusters. They just peeked above soil this morning and they're suddenly over an inch tall! The top is off the little greenhouse right now as it was pretty steamy in there. Every seed I've started inside has died due to damping-off disease so I'm trying to prevent that. I also read somewhere that watering with chamomile tea will prevent this problem. When they need watering, I'll give it a shot. The corn is already coming up too - planted two days ago. This why I love gardening - the promise of things to come!

New seedlings!

Yay, some of my cauliflower seedlings came up over night. So far, seven of the 12 have sprouted - in 4 days! I'm very impressed with the quality of this seed. Nothing from the strawberries yet, but here's hoping. We're off and running!

On another note, I had a dangerous thought last night...I can't have chickens because they are considered farm animals. I can't have rabbits because of the limits on the number of pets we can have and because the hubby would not be keen on the smell. But, maybe, just maybe, I can have some doves. I had dove once as a child and I have never forgotten how wonderful it was - they were delicious! Today after house-cleaning, gardening, and homework I plan to do some research on dove/pigeon husbandry. This may be do-able!

Slow progress

I haven't been able to get out in the garden as much as I wanted to this week, but did get a few things done. I've got some corn starting indoors and will start some beans tonight - just so I can have them going before the garden is done. I also got a planter ready to go for the cauliflower seedlings when they're ready.

We picked up some herb seeds earlier this week and hope to get the little herb bed dug this weekend, along with getting some of those blackberry canes mentioned in a previous post. I also ordered the plastic drum for my composter. The person selling barrels locally was over 4 hours away so I ended up buying on ebay.

Here's hoping that there's enough time in the day tomorrow to get some things done outside!

Some pictures

My pride and joy, a grape vine! We moved here over the winter of 2006 and saw this random vine growing from under the house. Naturally, we cut it as far back as we could - we would have removed it completely if we'd have been able to. Imagine my surprise when it started leafing out in spring and I realized we had a grape vine! It was cut back too severely to produce anything last year, but it's now covered with flower buds. Can't wait for fresh grapes. (Forgive the riding lawnmower - we have no where else to store it).

Not much to look at but these two pictures show the future garlic beds. The soil in this spot seems really nutrient deficient, though the roses do very well. I plan on adding some compost to get it ready.

Future strawberry patch! Last year this bed was full to the brim with begonias but many of them did not make it through the winter. This seems like the perfect spot for them - right by the front door, lots of sunlight, easy to observe. I decided to grow Alpine strawberries because they come true from seed but what I've read recently makes them seem rather difficult to grow. If nothing else, I can buy some strawberry plants from Wal-Mart, though I hope I won't have to.

As you can see, this bed houses five miniature roses. This is most likely where I will plant the chives that my hubby bought. This spot was full of small river rocks when we moved in. I removed most of them but the soil still doesn't seem very nutrient rich. This spot will also benefit from some compost. The bricks are going to go towards another project.

The hubby has agreed to help me make a composter. I know it seems ridiculous but I'm pretty excited. Buying dirt just seems so ridiculous somehow. Until mine gets going though, that's just what I'm going to have to do. These are the plans we're going to use: http://http//www.wikihow.com/Build-a-Tumbling-Composter

I hope it's going to be as easy as it looks! There is a fella on Craigslist selling drums, so that will be our first move.

I haven't talked about animals. The eventual goal will be to have some laying hens, dairy goats, meat rabbits, a few pigs, and perhaps a Jersey cow. Every spring we'll order some chicks for meat and perhaps buy a calf or two to put on the cow, as well as breeding her back. We'll probably drink the goat milk and use the leftover cow's milk (if there is any) for cheese, butter, cream. This is all a long ways off - when we finally get to buy our land. I tried to talk the base into letting me have a few laying hens but they were having none of it. As for the rabbits, I could probably get away with it if I had somewhere outside to put them. Luckily, I have a friend who raises rabbits for show. The ones that don't make the cut get sold to a processor so I'm talking to her about buying them myself. I figure it will save her a trip, I just hope she doesn't think I'm too weird.

The hubby is getting into the self-reliance groove a bit too - we bought a bow and he's going to learn to hunt. He's so excited. We're also going to buy him a shot gun for bird hunting - if you've ever had dove, you know that they are worth the time and effort. We're also looking forward to trying some quail - they seem to be everywhere here. He's going to take a safety course over the summer in order to get his license. He's acting like a kid at Christmas.

That's all for now, kids gotta get to school!

Here goes nothin'

For as long as I can remember, I have loved animals and plants of all types. I also loved stories and books that included self-reliance in the storyline...Some of my favorites as a child were The Boxcar Kids and the Island of the Blue Dolphins for that very reason. Finally, last year (hey, I never claimed to be intelligent!), I realized that I could put all of these things together. It even has a name - homesteading!

I joined some forums and started reading all that I could and am starting to form some ideas on how I want my eventual homestead to function. There is a problem however - I'm in the Air Force so I can't exactly put down roots. Not only that, but I live on-base meaning that there are many rules that I have to follow regarding how my yard is supposed to look, what animals I'm allowed to keep, etc. For now, I plan to stay in until retirement which is 12 years away. This leaves lots of time for planning but is also immensely frustrating somehow. I've never been a very patient person and dreaming and planning for something so far off almost hurts. Another thing is it's going to be so hard to start from scratch every time we move. You've gotta do what you've gotta do though.

So, here goes. I'm getting a late start this year, but better late than never. Two weeks ago I finally got some seeds in the ground - jalapenos, sweet peppers, tomatoes, cuke. This weekend, I'm hoping to get the beans planted (Blue Lake and Romano). Tonight I started some Alpine strawberries and cauliflower seeds indoors.

Future plans include digging a bed on the east side of the house for the cauliflower, as well as broccoli, spinach, and lettuce. It gets so hot here in the summer that I believe these vegetables will do best if shaded from the afternoon sun. I'll also be starting them indoors for the most part. I plan to plant garlic on either side of the roses in the front, as well as chives. I'm also going to plant a small herb garden - most likely in the back. This weekend we're going out to dig up a few wild blackberries. These will go on the west side of the house. We would also like some blueberries but finding them locally is proving to be tough.

I would love to plant some fruit trees but we'd have to leave before they got large enough to produce anything. We've been looking at dwarf trees, but I'm not sure that any truly stay small enough that we'd be able to take them when we leave.

That's it for now, as it's getting pretty late. I would leave with a few pictures but can't figure out how to move them where I want them (they automatically show up at the beginning of the post?) and I'm too tired to play with it tonight. Ciao.