Many of you know that we have been attending classes at Lady Slipper Nursery on Saturday mornings. This Saturday we had the opportunity to attend Preserving the Harvest by Liz Porter of Buckeye Creek Farms. Liz led a fun, informative class and gave tips for both newbies and veterans alike. She had excellent suggestions for tools, methods, and resources. Specific topics discussed were pressure canning versus water bath canning, blanching before freezing, canning additives, and the canning of Continue reading Preserving the Harvest by Liz Porter
Category Archives: The Suburbs
Merrilily Gardens
Our Saturday morning classes at Lady Slipper Rare Plant Nursery have been quite a joy, and this last Saturday was no exception! In the latest class we were privileged to learn from the owner of Merrilily Gardens. Merrilily Gardens is a local business that specializes in over 350 varieties of day lilies. The owner of Merrilily Gardens, Merrily McLaughlin (yes, you read that right), was especially helpful in explaining how to propagate daylilies. This is an inexpensive way to get your landscaping dollars to go further. Furthermore, splitting your day lilies is actually good for the plant. It is advantageous even if you do not want more day lilies (You can always give the cuttings to friends and family to share the pleasure of these beautiful plants). Continue reading Merrilily Gardens
Ladyslipper Saturday Morning Class – Farmers Organic
For those of you that live in the Woodstock, GA area and that enjoy gardening you may want to check out Ladyslipper’s Saturday morning class schedule. Bethany and I attended our first class last weekend. It was all about composting and creating/maintaining living soil. It was educational but also surprisingly interesting! The presenter was Greg Parrish, the general manager of Farmers Organic. He explained different aspects of soil, composts, and fertilizers and answered everyone’s questions related to those topics (and gardening in general). Continue reading Ladyslipper Saturday Morning Class – Farmers Organic
Ladyslipper Rare Plant Nursery
Today was an awesome day of sunshine and gardening! I have been looking forward to the last frost so I can get busy with our garden. I checked the weather this morning and the 10 day forecast looks promising so we decided to get started today. As many of you know, Mannah has taken an interest in gardening and asked if her birthday present could be to have one of the square foot garden raised beds for flowers this year. I love vegetable gardening but I’ve never really gotten into flowers. I’m hoping our growing knowledge of plants will rub off on each other and I will pick up some flower skills. Continue reading Ladyslipper Rare Plant Nursery
The Value of a Real Estate Agent
Is hiring a real estate agent worth it? Doubtless, many people ask this question when venturing to buy or sell a home or piece of property. One may wonder if he or she wants to pay a real estate commission on top of the loss of equity experienced in the last several years. One may wonder if he or she would come out ahead on their own.
I would argue vehemently that YES . . . a good real estate agent is worth every penny.
An outstanding real estate agent is worth every penny and more. Continue reading The Value of a Real Estate Agent
Our Homestead in Suburbia
Many of you have left comments and suggestions regarding the planning of our homestead in the country. However, one of the points of Wholesteading is that you can be somewhat self -sufficient even in the suburbs. Currently we do not have the big white farmhouse or the acres and acres of land to work with. But what we do have works for us now and allows us some degree of Wholesteading, even in the suburbs. For those of you who are curious about what our homestead looks like in suburbia, here are a few shots that capture both the outside and inside of our little “farm” and “farmhouse”. Continue reading Our Homestead in Suburbia
Blueberry Harvest!
I was hanging out in the back yard with our youngest daughter (Harvest) yesterday and decided I would go check on the blueberries since I knew it wouldn’t be long until they were ripe and ready to eat. I was so excited to see the branches weighed down to the ground with dark, plump blueberries! I ran inside and grabbed some bowls and worked for a long time with Bethany to harvest as many of the ripe blueberries as we could before sunset. I would say Harvest helped us except she would eat all of her berries every time she reached about 20 in her bowl. Continue reading Blueberry Harvest!
Square Foot Gardening in Georgia
I have been gardening for many years now but I distinctly remember my first experience gardening. I always suspected I would enjoy gardening but at that time I had no hands on experience and felt extremely intimidated. I happened across a book called Square Foot Gardening