ray thinks it's his radio, but......

i'm gonna steal it for the new kitchen.

it's going right on the yellow formica table i rescued from the alley. 

especially since it was really nice to have the radio going while i was cooking our "out of the garden" dinner last night. just look at those fresh mustard greens. they're doing really well out there under the double layer of frost cover, with little to no attention being paid to them. the turnips are doing ok. their growth seems a bit stunted with the colder weather, (it's gonna get down to 11 degrees tomorrow night ya'll!!!!!) but the ones that are full size are keeping nicely in the ground.

i can't wait to get into the new house, get settled, and start the new garden. i have big big plans for my little space. it's gonna be a lot of trial and error as i try to grow things up instead of out, and to be productive and harvest through all four seasons. i have a message into the sellers to see if i can grab some soil samples to send off for lead testing. once i get the results i will know which kind of garden plan/raised beds i am going to do.

i'm leaning towards a little something like this....

 (photo snagged from "the year round veggie gardener")

so nice and neat and pretty. 

i think the hubby would approve. 

also the cool thing about these raised beds is, you can use outside of the bed and the space in between to grow veggies up, like this.......

 (photo snagged from veggiegardener.com)

this will be great for my lemon cucumbers. they did really well this year and didn't suffer at the hands of the squash vine borders or the squirrels. however, for my winter squash i will need to find a way to grow upward and still keep them under a row cover of sorts for protection. dang you squash vine border!!!!!!!

getting some produce love from the garden in january!!!

it's been a little dry here lately, so i though i'd go out, check under the row cover, and water the fall garden. i really didn't expect to find much new going on. i knew the swiss chard had taken a hit the other night after the row cover had gotten blown off and a light snow fell on the exposed leaves. and i knew the the mustard greens were doing pretty good after i quickly reached under the covers two nights ago and picked some for our soup. but i really had no idea as to what was happening with the beets and turnips. well surprise, surprise!!!!!

look at that little garden grow!!!!!

it looks good from up here, let's take a closer look. 

what the heck!!!!

there are some turnips growing in there!!!

who knew?? not me. i wasn't expecting that at all. 

i was just gonna do a little watering. 

see the little bit of purple top peeking out.... that's me turnips!!

there was quite a few of them out there in various stages, 

so i just pulled out a few to see what they looked like. 

aren't they pretty!!??!!

the rest of the turnips i'll leave in the ground for awhile and harvest as needed. if we get more frost or a big freeze, in the end, that will just make them sweeter as the plant sends all it's sugars down to the roots for survival. and the row cover is proving to be useful at keeping the frost from damaging the green leaves. as for the beets, well, they were a failure. but if i remember correctly, i did not give them as much love as i did the turnips in the beginning, so i may only have myself to blame. i pulled up all the beets, which were growing in the middle, and that made it easier to water both the mustard greens and turnips, so c'est la vie. the swiss chard was looking a little sad under it's tent, so either the snow did it's deadly deed, or the soil was simply a little dry. i gave them some water, and with the temperatures rising a bit this week, we'll have to wait and see if they perk up over the next few days. stay turned!!

now just image what i can do once i get around to building cold frames and proper row cover!!!!

the dirty dozen for 2012

call them goals, call them resolutions, call them what you want, here are a few things i wish to work on for 2012....

1. eat better, exercise more, drop 20, 25, 30 pounds, blah, blah, blah....

2. be a nicer person and don't gossip. do what i wanna do, and don't tell others how to behave.

3. learn to knit.

4. sew a complete outfit.

5. work more on my bloggy blog.

6. spend more time in the kitchen learning new things, especially cheese making. 

7. brush my dogs' teeth at least every other day.

8. read 1 book a month.

9. keep up and organize the bill pile, along with organizing and downsizing the house.

10. create a 4 season garden that will hopefully, one day, provide all our produce.

11. enter at least 5 juried contests and take pictures, take pictures, take pictures........

12. spend more time, getting to where i'm going, by foot, bike, bus, or train.


and for our baker's dozen bonus....

13. GET CHICKENS!!!!!!!!!!!! 

happy new year. 

my best to you and yours.  

 

fall garden covered

a little garden update... not much of a fall garden happening here. i did manage to plant some turnips, beets, and mustard greens along with the swiss chard from earlier this season that is still going pretty strong. with the temps getting pretty low in the evening, i decided to put some row cover over the plants. since i didn't really build anything or plan for this, my little jacked up system consisted of a few poles with either wine or beer bottles placed over them so the poles wouldn't poke through the fabric, four sheets of row cover, and some landscaping staple thingys to secure down the cover. next year i hope to have a nicer looking system, but till then this seems to be working pretty well.

before cover.

after cover.

after this picture was taken i also made a little tent like home 

out of row cover for the swiss chard as well.

hey man, it's cozy in here.

goal for 2012: tomato crafts

dang, i wanna learn to knit/crochet my own little veggie patch.

along with scarves, gloves, booties, and more....

tomato by: locoMOmomma

one of many goals for 2012

not only to do more photographing, but to look this stylish while doing so.

photo of and by: Vivian Maier

lifted from: http://www.vivianmaier.com/

garden break = photo work and better plans for next year

portland chickens

now that the little fall garden is pretty much set, it becomes a beet and turnip waiting game. time to move the activities inside and spend the winter organizing the house for an upcoming move, working on bigger and better plans for next years garden (well, as much as i can plan not knowing where said garden will be), and taking more time to work on my photos. once again, it's time to dust off the little green camera and get to it man!!