More Garden Neighborhood Swapping

It turns out my daughter's girls scout leader's mom has also taken an interest in gardening. When I found this out I let her know I was interested in swapping plants and or seeds. She took interest. So today she gave me a call and asked me what seeds I had. So far she has most of what I have and no seed swapping transaction was made today, but I let her know as soon as my chives seed I would give her some of the seeds. I forgot to tell her about the herbs. My parsley  and cilantro are doing so well they have each grown another thick stem. Soon I will have to give some of this stuff away. If enough neighbors and I swap maybe one day most of the neighborhood will have a swap garden. Wouldn't that be interesting?

Another Beautiful Day After an Unexpected Few Cold Days

I made up my mind that today I would make more seedling pots so I can grow the green beans. So I did. Then I made more for tomatoes, and some for basil. It took maybe 15 minutes to do it all. I then transplanted the cantelope seedling into the back yard garden and I transplanted the potatoes into the bushel baskets I found at the resale shop a few months ago. So far so good.

Organic Valley - In Whom Do We Trust?

I read Organic Valley - In Whom Do We Trust?  and it made me think about trust about the aspect of "organic food". What is organic and how do we know it is really organic? Why should we trust something that is labeled organic? Should we trust blindly or become more informed and possibly even detective consumers?

Personally, the more I know about a company or a farmer, the more likely I am to trust that the food they produce is organic. I want to know what they grow, how they grow it, the hardships, their successes. I want to know a little bit more about them too.

My CSA's farmer tells us a lot about the food she grows for her CSA members. It almost feels like I'm growing and harvesting it myself and the closer I get to my food, where it came from and how it was grown the more comfortable I feel about eating it. I think this is the way it should be.

Tofu and Broccoli

The night before last I cooked Tofu stir fry for dinner. I used my home grown organic broccoli in the veggies stir and I used the tofu recipe from thedailygreen to make the dish. My kids loved it! They really loved it. They asked me to make it again. So....I'm happy to say I finally I made really good tofu. The sauce made all the difference. Thanks thedailygreen.


For the The Ultimate Tofu Stir Fry recipe click here.

Earlier afternoon my neighbor, the one that often brings me mustard greens from her garden, traded soybean seedlings for greenbean seeds, basil seeds and seeds to some flowering plant. I gave her the seedlings after showing her what they looked like in my newspaper potters. She loved the newspaper, toilet roll, and oatmeal container potters. She was suprised at how easy it was to make them and how much money they saved. She also mentioned her interest in growing soybeans herself. So, I gave her one of my two soybean trays. She took the trays home and then came back with seeds. I love this trading system between us. I hope it continues.

Now, I have to make more newspaper potters and plant some green beans and basil. It's another beautiful day today. Yeah!

A Beautiful Sunny Day

It is a beautiful sunny day out this wonderful 5th of March. It is so beautiful I just stopped in to show you pictures of the flowers on the broccoli I mentioned last week. They have flowered more since I've taken the picture, but I haven't had a chance to take the time to take some more picture. The good news it is such a beautiful day I plant to spend some time in the garden tending to it, maybe even transplanting some of the sunflower and soybean seedlings into the ground. I have just the spot for sunflowers on the side of the house and maybe a few in the front of the front window. The soybeans will be put in the back yard.

Now that I know how to harvest the broccoli I will be harvesting before the other heads bloom. Here is a tip for Harvesting Broccoli.