Catch Up

Though we truly loved running this event every summer, it meant we didn't have weekends to work on our projects....and everything had stalled. So this summer we've been reveling in finishing things. Including installing the upper tier of safety glass in the greenhouse.
Thanks to everyone who helped! Including our lawyer neighbor who gave us the safety glass for FREE (one of his clients paid him for his services in safety glass...lucky us).

Greenhouse as seen from my mum-in-law's back garden.
Since these photos were taken we've almost finished the wood trim and have harvested a ton of spaghetti squash and zuchs from the roof top garden. And even now we're still harvesting; the roof has been surprisingly immune to frost. Even tomatoes are ripening up there. Yay for microclimates!

How 'bout them apples.

We had a bumper crop this year. Here's a few...
This is the rosy red runt. (It was delish!)
So... I've been absent from the internet. And feel deliciously secretive...but here's a peek through the garden gate.
love and growth and respect,
quel

Wicking it Up

I've been making herbed butter and fresh cheese. Oh! And chutney with homegrown dill and coriander seeds and homemade vinegar (a batch of kombucha turned into some very tasty vinegar).
This is the view from the art studio window. I love watching the alley art develop plus we're really close to the Gallivan Center and can hear a lot of the Thursday night concerts. It makes me more productive to feel like I'm in the party but not of the party.
And here is proof that Mamma Mia-of-the-off-the-charts-high-energy can sit still for a couple of minutes!
We're writing a book together. It's all about our beloved ancestors and their unbelievable stories. In comparison Mamma Mia and I feel...much quiet(er). By the way, Mamma Mia is an excellent, no messing around writer. I'm contributing by giving her topical assignments plus she's under the impression that I have good grammar. Teehee.

Besos!

Victory Garden Art

I've been enjoying the propaganda of the grow-your-own-food movement. Some of these are from WWII and some were designed recently. ALL of them make me want to roll up my sleeves and get to work!

Harvest Basket

*photo credit: Sam Callis

Today's pick included our dog Farmer's favorite food:

EGGPLANT!*

and lots of it! Some of which we coated with fresh egg and grilled for lunch.

Also, calendula flowers, green beans, lavender sweet peppers and green peppers, lemon cucumbers, squash blossoms (stuffed with ricotta and grilled those too), nasturtium flowers, tomatoes, oregano, basil, and kale.

Our garlic has been curing on screens under the patio awning for the last two weeks. Now they're braided and hanging - ready to use up.
* This is Farmer going APE over his other favorite food, Ben & Jerry's (supplied by his grandmum.)

Jarring Prettiness

Canning season will soon be upon us. Hip! Hip!
This lady is the 2008 canning champion. You are so cool lady.
Yes, canning is a competitive sport. But as the intimidating USDA rules currently stand my made- up method of using agave nectar in my syrups disqualify me. This competition is about much more than food safety. And I am not that precise. I am crying into my yerba maté. I am not actually crying.

Ah well. I will watch and cheer from the bleachers.

Bonus: Canning anecdotes by funny man Robert Kirby. (Made me laugh into my first cup of yerba maté. I am now on my third cup and ready to go!)

*photos from the Salt Lake Tribune.

This Just In: Provo City Hall's Urban Garden

Dear Reader,

Did you just feel your rib cage compress? Yes? That was me hugging the whole world. I am so happy to know about Provo City's Urban Garden and will visit it soon. Many thanks to Helen of the Mayor's Office, for e-mailing me the youtube link. And Helen? Have I thanked you for having an original Brian Kershisnik painting hanging in your office? No? Well, thank you very very much.

xo!

Taking Cues in the Garden

For generations my family has been growing a stand of bamboo so that we always have something to cut and use for trellising peas, beans, pumpkins, squashes, cucumbers, and more. Below is Tia Magdelena with her hens and the little girl is Abuelita. You can see her bamboo trellis behind her. Tia Magdelena was the medicine woman of her neighborhood. She also grew flowers to sell at the market and baked bread in enormous clay ovens.

Many years later...Here is my Abuelito with his bamboo. It looks like he is gardening in the countryside but he owned two long city lots...that's urban farming. A few minutes away is the heart of downtown Paraná, population 265,000.
And more years later...here's two of my bamboo trellises. The sugar snap peas have died back and the lemon cucumbers and some pumpkins are taking over. In the left of the picture you can see some of my growing clump of bamboo. Peering through the pea vines you can spy pretty yellow lemon cuke flowers and a lemon cuke that will soon be ripe.
I'm about to go outside and cut the pea vines at the base and harvest whatever peas I can for eating and seeds. You don't want to pull the vines out because the roots fix nitrogen in the soil. Now is the time to replant peas for a fall crop. Well, it's a tad late but I've been busy...

Do you need some bamboo starts? Let me know so we'll have you in mind. We'll have some starts available in the spring. It's the clumping bamboo instead of the runner bamboo. I promise that the clumping kind is much easier to tend, plus your bamboo would be the grandchild of Mamma Mia's bamboo, and that is good luck.

xo!

Adding it Up in Chicago

urban + art + farm = the perfect formula for a public space.

Presenting a glimpse of one of Chicago's many urban farms...
I bet O'lover will want to forge a funky trellis when he sees this cool sculpture.
The fantastic foliage textures and colors almost-sort-of light a fire in my belly to do something like this at a park in Provo. Meanwhile I'm just enjoying that this coolness exists HERE. Meet David, one of two farmers at this site. While he's interning here in Chicago he has also leased a greenway (with a pond!) in Chapel Hill North Carolina and is orchestrating the beginnings of an urban farm there.
He was planting new seeds in several bare beds when I stopped by.
Here are some of the students who help out.
And here is David again on Saturday at the Green City Market in Lincoln Park.
"Art on the Farm" features more than 150 varieties of heirloom vegetables, herbs, and edible flowers. For more about the farm visit Growing Power.

Besos from Chicago!

Hedge...

...of Evening Primrose in the moonlight.That last post was half-baked.

And gooey in the middle.

This post is raw but with a crunch?

Being in your backyard haven while the entire downtown is exploding in firecrackers,
sirens,
the deafening house band on Center Street,
the port-a-potties on every street corner,
people setting up blankets and chairs to save their spot for the parade,
and bike riders weaving their way through traffic,

It's quiet and noisy
private and public.

And I wish you were here to witness it.

Maybe you are?
(I seldom know who's in the treehouse.)

Besos!

Buying Virtue, Getting "Sexy" Back, and Cottage Industry

We went to the nursery and bought santolina. Santolina signifies virtue and we need lots of that along our path to the front door. We also planted more lavender for good luck.
Yoga for Energy is my early morning best friend. One second you're going from on-top-of-the-world exalted warrior to humble and submissive child's pose (and back again) which makes you feel like everything is going to be okay. And rolling with the highs and lows of life... that's super sexy, eso es el plano.
The result of a two day sew-a-thon: seven baby dresses for TamTam's soon-to-be-born baby girl! The dresses look much cuter in real life than in these pics and will look WAAAAY more adorable with the baby wearing them. Can't wait!
besos!

Blocking it out

Yesterday Oliver took the day off from work and we:
cleaned up after Sunday night's wonderful dinner party,
constructed and hung two lovely gates,
weeded much of the garden,
carefully watered new plants,
ate strawberries for every meal (straight from the back patch),
harvested our first raspberries,
visited with friends,
brought in our summer clothes from storage,
and bricked up a hole in the side of the house where a broken air conditioning unit used to be.

And every chore was interlaced with conversations about a new vision of our family's future. What do we want?
What do we not want?
Where do we need to build walls and where do we knock them down?
Today we continue in "vision mode". I'm not sure what the future will bring, we are usually too busy to give it much thought. But right now the future seems like a clean slate ready for drafting new plans and reshaping old dreams.

signed,
in love with the colors of the bricks but yes, we will paint over them...

P.S. I'm so proud and inspired by Susan Krueger Barber for having a painting acquired by a very important art collector!! (Ask her about it when you see her!)

Garden Q & A

Dear Reader,

Got any gardening expertise you can lend? (i can't wait til I'm a wizened old farmer!! with ALL the answers!)

***

Question from Rachel of Los Angeles:

Help! My tomato plant! Doesn't look so good! It has all these yellow leaves (see pic). What do I need to do? Water it more or less? yikes
Gritty Pretty's from-the-hip answer*:

Container tomato plants have unique problems. They don't do well in a window or covered balconey, they like the hot sun overhead. Is the tomato inside? They need insects to help fertilize the flowers (or you'll need to hand pollinate with a paint brush). Is there anyway to move the plant somewhere with direct sunlight? Also, watering might be washing the iron and other mineral contents out of the soil. Do you have access to rusty old nails? You can spike the soil with ungalvanized nails (careful not to hurt the roots). And my favorite remedy for general health of the soil...You can pee in a cup and then add water 1 part pee to ten parts water. =) Also, after you water the plant do not touch it. it only likes being handled when the soil and leaves are dry.

Reader, do you have ANY ADVICE FOR RACHEL?

Comments are on.

The garden is in full bloom

So we deliver home grown flowers to the sick and the weary (i'm talking 'bout you Sophie and Hobo, get better soon!!)Lately we've been running skating our flower deliveries and other sundry errands as a family.

signed,
thank goodness we both ride goofy.

Roll Call

Confession: Not that long ago I couldn't tell cucumbers from zucchinis (so embarrassing!) I just ate whatever, no questions asked. Now i can name four cuke varieties off the top of my head (armenian, pickling, marketmore, lemon) and i definitely know what i'm eating. and when to expect it to be ripe in our region. (yay for getting savvier with age!)

These are the flowers that grace our table now. They're from our garden and represent the season. You can tell time by flowers.
I am slowly learning their secrets... Every year it's the same roll call. It begins with forsythia, crocuses, violets growing in spring grass, tulips, then the fruit trees blossom, lilacs, the bridal veil bushes, arugula goes to seed, love-in-a-mist nigella is dying down...Currently the daises and irises are at their height and the lamb's ears are flowering with the peonies about to burst. Being in tune with the seasons takes patience in a world where we grew up wanting what we want and wanting it now.

Some peeps who don't know the time line think our farmers market is lacking because we don't currently have fill-in-the-blank-let's-say peaches ('cause they're now the size of marbles in the tree!!). and sometimes these people are quoted in certain local university papers.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

But then i remember i used to not be able to tell if i was eating a cuke or a zuke.

and i sorta forgive.

This is Eve. She was gestating during last year's market and will be raised at the market from here on out. She's going to grow up advantaged, knowing the timeline.
***

signed,
Henry Rollins is in my head. Anyone remember him? "it's time, it's time to align your body with your mind"--only hardcore punk.

Two Yays!

Firstly, as of last night Provo City does indeed allow urban hens! YAY! There was a revote and all but one council member voted for a revised ordinance. To celebrate Oliver is planning a Tour De Coops. There are some very lovely hens living in clever and charming hen homes out there in P-town...more about the tour later.

Secondly, one of my top favorite private blogs went public! I went to art school with Pamo and am so inspired to see how art not only remains a part of her life but how it forms the adventures they have as a family. (WOW.) She throws birthday parties for dead artists plus other art themed elaborate projects. Her three children are so lucky! And her blog readers are lucky!
Cake for Picasso.
Even the littlest Greta has her art displayed at a family art show.

So go check out Pamo's In My Shoes and add the feed to your google reader!

You're very welcome,
GP

Since the news that the hen ordinance had been VETOED...

I've been referring to the ladies as political refugees. I know, so dramatic, but they are an integral part of our homestead and the thought of turning them over to willing friends' who live in a different city was...NO CAN DO. Fortunately, after speaking to Helen of the Mayor's Office, I've learned the hens are safe, for now, and hopefully forever. There's some ordinance tweaking going on and Provo may yet end up with a great urban hen ordinance.

Meanwhile the ladies continue to eat our kitchen scraps, our neighbors' kitchen scraps and even the Campus Plaza Apartments' kitchen scraps that Janise (pictured below) collects and regularly delivers on her bike. The never ending task of weeding continues ever so much more satisfactorily when you know the hens will be thrilled to feast on the greens. Spreading the chicken manure in our garden beds is a joy when you know you're using the best soil amendment for Utah's high ph.

and even though we have plenty of eggs we still buy eggs from Provo's Farmers Market as a novelty because check out Honey's good sized brown egg compared to a giant goose egg from Ralph Steele's booth.


Brings new meaning to a one-egg omelet.

Signed with a prayer,
May concerns about ordinance details be ironed out promptly