Chicken Garden?

Someone posted this in a chicken forum that I read and I'm a little (a lot) intrigued. We definitely have the space, maybe enough energy (calling all friends!) and probably not enough time...but I think this would work for us.
The concept is that you let the chickens loose on one side for a season, then after you harvest the garden, you let them scratch that side while you turn the soil and add your compost to the other side.

My only concern, is that the chickens wouldn't have constant access to grass. I know that this isn't a necessity but it does give them some omega 3's which in turn, give us omegas through their eggs. I could just give them greens from table scraps. The fact that they are enclosed would make my hubby quite happy as he constantly complained of chicken poop in the yard (I didn't notice that much of it...).

If you see any potential 'problems' with this plan, PLEASE let me know. I'm still a newbie when it comes to chickens and gardening. Plus, I tend to dream big while reality takes a backseat.

Something to think about for sure.

http://www.backwoodshome.com/articles/silveira44a.html

Who needs a white Christmas? This is what I'm dreaming about.

Need I say more?

The Making of Yogurt

You might recall, a few months ago, I bought the book The Homemade Pantry. It is not only inspiring, but also chalk full of great recipes. My plan was to make everything in it at least once before the baby arrived, however, that did not happen.
So far I've made the granola (which I never did post about - I'll get around to it. I make it twice a month because it's so darn good), the 'OREO' cookies and now the yogurt. You may also recall that I received a yogurt maker for mother's day and I finally put it to work.
My apologies for not sharing the recipe for the yogurt here as I'm unsure about copyright laws and such. Plus, I really think you'd love this book - so just go and treat yourself to one. And no, I'm not getting paid or receiving anything from the publisher or author of this book. I just like it.
The recipe for yogurt is simple. Milk (I used whole milk), a yogurt starter (I used plain yogurt that I had on hand, you can also buy starter that I think comes in powder form but plain yogurt works just as well), a candy thermometer and any flavouring that you'd like to add. I really, really, really love anything vanilla so I scraped the seeds from two vanilla beans and added those plus the beans themselves to the milk while it was heating up. When the milk was cooled to the right temperature, I removed the bean pods. That was the only variation that I made with this recipe. For the rest, I just followed the directions, set the timer and waited. This morning, I tried some and it was really yummy. It had the tang of plain yogurt but with a hint of vanilla. If you like it sweeter, you can add honey to it - I just may have to try that too.

Crafty Sunday - Onesie edition

I've taken the plunge and I feel like if all works well, I may have a little problem after and no fabric will be safe.

I bought these three onesies ages ago thinking that I'd add an appliqué or something. BUT - then I saw this tutorial over on MADE. I have never dyed fabric before as I find the whole concept TERRIFYING, but really - what is the worst thing that could happen?
   
I got some RIT dye from Michaels. The package said to dissolve the dye in 500ml of water, however, the tutorial says to completely cover the fabric in the water so I just kept adding water until they were covered. The package also said to add 250g of salt to the dye bath which, thanks to Google I found out was 1 cup. HOWEVER, the tutorial at MADE said 1tbsp (which I read after adding the cup of salt - I have no idea which advice was right). I left the onesies in the dye bath for 6 hours. Not really by choice, it's just that I had a nap (not a 6 hour nap!!). When I finally did take them out and rinse them, I really thought that the colour was just going to rinse away, but alas, it didn't! The next step was to put them in the washing machine. Again, I was pretty sure that I'd have stark white onesies after the cycle was done, and yet again, I was surprised to see that the beautiful teal colour was still there.
After they dried, I noticed that the colour wasn't completely even but if you ask me, perfection is overrated.

I created the stencils using freezer paper. Have you heard of freezer paper stencils before? Tons of tutorials online and they work great. Cut it out, iron it on, paint, remove stencil and let dry. I used a hairdryer because I'm impatient like that.

p.s sorry about the colour in some of the shots. I just don't know what I'm doing when holding a camera.
p.p.s - this Crafty Sunday edition was completed MONTHS ago. I'm just now getting around to blogging about it. Two of the onesies were sent to a friend with twin girls and one of the transformer ones adorned our little lady for about a week before she grew out of it. Must. Make. More.

Hallowe'en 2012

Hallowe'en is beginning to be my favourite 'holiday' of the year. Seriously, I can't get enough. The costume making (and the midnight/morning mad dash to finish said costumes...), the decorations and the anticipation are just so much fun!

Gage got to choose our theme this year. And surprise, surprise.....Angry Birds for all!
Luckily, I found this tutorial online. My sewing machine got a work out and I found some amazing fabric glue to pull this all off.

Lets hope these birds don't mind getting rained on. And I also hope that someone doesn't take all our candy from the 'help yourself' bucket.

For all the mom's out there...

source

Garden Fail

Oh man...the 2012 garden of mine is a disaster! I really had a romantic ideal in my head that with a new baby, I could just strap her on and spend hours in the garden, taking a few breaks to feed her and then returning to get more dirt under my nails. HA! How naive can I be?
The reality was:
1) By June I was too huge and sore to really get down and dirty in the garden - which was the beginning of the end
2) A newborn and a 4 year old and hosting to all the family that came to see our beautiful girl left little time for gardening
3) With the baby-free time that I did have, I had to choose between sleeping, eating, showering, spending time with family or gardening and sleeping usually won.

On the plus side, my husband built me four new garden boxes that we used this year. I had four, 4'x4' raised garden boxes that I separated again into the 1' sections like last year. I say 'raised' but when I went out to check on Eric who was setting them up, he had dug down into the earth so that they were kind of half above the ground and half in the ground...and he had put them in a different spot than I had wanted, but really, I was super pregnant and I couldn't help so I shouldn't complain, right? (but on a side note...my plan had been explained to him several times and he still did it wrong. It was a little frustrating). Oh, and I should mention that all the dirt/sod that he dug up to make room for the boxes was thrown to the side and is still sitting next to the garden beds, with a forest of weeds on top.
Anyway....
What I planted this year:
Green bush beans
Scarlet red bush beans
Red onions
Lettuce mix (I don't think I'll do a mix next year, just individual heads of lettuce)
Tomatoes - cherry, plum and your typical round tomato
Snap peas
Carrots
Green Peppers
Watermelon - which gave me tons of flowers but only one fruit which only showed up about a week ago so I highly doubt that I will get a ripe watermelon this season, plus, this little watermelon decided to fruit on the one flower that made if through out fence into our neighbours yard and is now too big to pull if back through. That must be karma's way of telling me not to be upset about the garden boxes being in the wrong spot.
Beets - which did a whole lot of nothing
Turnips - which I harvested too late and were rotten when I pulled them from the ground
Radishes - they were yummy.

I got a great amount of cherry tomatoes, which I roasted and froze to add to sauces later in the year and the green beans are so delicious that I can't completely write off this garden just yet. But it definitely wasn't the garden that I had fantasized about.

Next year will be better.