Weekend Full of Activities

This past weekend was a whirl wind of activities.  I don't think we got to truly sit down once.  Saturday began early with a trip to the Waynesburg Sheep and Fiber Festival just south of Pittsburgh.  This was my third year attending, but the first with out my husband.  He's been so busy taking a class and working full time.  He needed to stay behind and get caught up.  This was okay, as I headed down with a friend who we've met up with the past two years at the festival anyway.  Last year I rode back home with her to 'chaperone' the two pygora goats in the back of her car.  Oh the adventures we have!  I'm really not much for garage sales (I've got enough junk I'm trying to scale down), but we stopped at a few along the way.  I did managed to find this wicked broom!  

I think I'm going to hang it on the wall in my craft room.  Perhaps it will get some use one day, but for now, I just want to admire it.  I attended a broom making seminar last September at the Mother Earth News Fair in Seven Springs, PA.  I couldn't believe what all went into making brooms, especially if you grow your own broom corn.  I guess that's why I couldn't pass this one up - for a whole $2.  What a deal!

The Fiber Festival was actually rather small this year.  Perhaps people were still getting over there fiber shock from the recent Maryland Sheep and Wool festival.  Still I picked up some roving to spin.  Here's the before and after.  At least for the purplish one.  I've a ton of fiber I need to process and dye.  I'm hoping these beautiful colors will give me the motivation to get some art batts made to spin.  I've yet to really try some of the core spinning.  There were some amazing handspun yarns at the festival.  We refrained from bringing home any goats this time, but my friend did find a great little loom.  So it wasn't a complete bust, but we didn't stay as long as we have in the past.  


The remainder of the day was spent working in the garden.  We've really been working hard the past few years to try to build up the soil.  We even brought our own compost pile when we moved down here.  Sound silly!?  Well it took at least a year to establish those beneficial microbes and attract the worms!  How could I just leave them behind.  It was only a large Rubbermaid container-full, but we made it, and I wanted to bring it.  Now our pile is 20 times that size (or more).  We're working on building semi-raised beds within the area our landlord has offered for us to garden.  It's just a corner off of his corn/soy field, but I appreciate it all the same.  The only downfall has been that the soil has been stripped over the years from growing just those two crops.  So we've been building the compost to help rebuild at least our little section of the field.  We'll see how it goes this year.

Here's a small section.  We used grass clippings to lay out the plots
for this summer.  We move them every year.

Notice that there is some growth already?  The garden was full of weeds two days ago.  When we went to weed-wack, we discovered that our Parsley and Cilantro came back from last year!  I was really excited to see that. We'll let some of it go to seed.  The Cilantro is already flowering.

Cilantro!

Parsley!

Garden

Yellow Squash Seedling

We did our garden a bit differently this year.  Other that two tomato plants, one basil, and one cilantro, everything was planted from seed ~ the first weekend of June.  It was a late start but except for the stevia, everything appears to be coming up and doing well; especially the potatoes, onions, squash, and beans.  My focus this year were root cellar crops.  I wanted to plant as many foods that could be stored and used throughout the winter as possible.  Last year we had sweet potatoes in the basement as well as some canned pickles.  I'm hoping to expand that this year.  Baby steps, folks!  That's how it's done.  I have grand ideas for my gardens, I really do.  But can find myself quickly overwhelmed if I try to do it all at once.

I'm pretty proud of what we've planted this year.  We've a 4X8 plot of butternut squash as well as another of a variety of bush beans.  A third plot is split between red potatoes and yellow onions.  A fourth with jalapenos, broccoli, okra, eggplant (which I don't think is going to grow), and carrots.  A fifth with roma tomatoes, beets, and green onions.  And lastly a small strip planted with the basil, cilantro (one plant, the rest seeds), parsley, and stevia.  That's just the garden.  I also planted in a couple of large pots yellow squash and zucchini, and a half barrel of potatoes, and a small pumpkin patch next to my bleeding heart.  Just making the most of the space I have.  I still would like to put in some lettuce but I'm having a hard time keeping the  chickens out of the planter I want to grow them in.  I suppose I could fashion some kind of lid to start them off with.

In the mean time, the weeds have come in along with the sprouting seeds.  Mostly Lamb's Quarters (which I just recently found is edible) and some suspicious red-bottomed leafy plant.  I'm not sure what that one is just yet.  Perhaps it is edible as well.  All I can say is that they came from our compost as none of the 'compost-free' areas have it growing.  I don't mind the weeding that much though.