composting poster and giveaway

I finished a small composting poster late this evening to put up in our house so our lovely roommate, who is learning our very small space and very urban composting system, can have a reference sheet.  As I was working on it, however, and from feedback about my other recent artwork posts, I thought of hosting a giveaway to encourage us all to share a love of gardening, sustainable practices, and homemade lifestyles.  So, to that end, I am offering a giveaway to the first 5 people to post a comment to my blog.  In this delightful giveaway, you will receive a handsewn seed pack with seeds to spread garden love and a piece of artwork (perhaps a poster like one of the two posted here….).  Spread the word if you have a blog of your own!

*Send us an email with your address if you’d like to participate in the giveaway in addition to commenting on our blog.

feeling cozy

Sometimes it’s nice just to curl up at home—I really like the way we’re transforming our now, joint, space.

new artwork

balcony garden continued

Today we began a bigger transition from our indoor to outdoor garden—we planted our first wine barrel! We started with our early spring crops, so planted strawberries, peas, and beans.  The petunias, which will go around the outside, are still growing in the mini greenhouse for our seedlings.  The wine barrel is on a caster so that air can flow from underneath and keep moisture from accumulating on the wooden deck surface.  I can’t wait to add more wine barrels as the planting season progresses! In the meantime, we’ve been enjoying mornings on the porch, with the company of our compost barrels, cold frame, hanging planters, and wine barrel…

children’s alphabet poster

I started making posters this week and finished the first one last night.  They will all be for sale in my etsy shop, and we are hoping to use money from the sales of these posters to get funding for our guerrilla gardening project…More details (and posters!) to come…

it’s the little things

I spent much of the weekend working on our house.  It felt good to get a lot of things organized and some photos, etc. hung.  Kevin was holed up studying for a test all weekend, so I had some good “me time.”  Yesterday after cleaning the window in our bedroom, I set out four newly transplanted succulents, along with a few prints I’ve collected over the last year.  It looks so nice on the windowsill, especially with the early spring light coming in.

Also, a ton of our seedlings have sprouted, and we are now hardening them outside during the day.  We have squash, zucchini, strawberries, potatoes, onions, garlic, beans, peas, and loads of herbs growing, in addition to our gigantic tomato plants we wintered over.  I’m thinking of staging a guerrilla gardening site later this spring…so our little neighborhood can have a raised bed garden to grow some larger vegetables in—what do y’all think?

garden in transition

Here’s a few photos of our garden as it currently stands—it’s spread now between outdoor pots in the cold frame and indoor pots in our “office” space.

from cement block to whiskey barrel planters…

After much research and planning this weekend, I’ve decided to go with whiskey barrels for our balcony garden rather than the cement blocks and pond liner I had thought to use.  Since we will be planting on a wooden balcony, moisture accumulation is a real issue, and by propping the whiskey barrels up on casters, we can ensure proper airflow underneath our planters to avoid moisture build-up on the balcony surface.  I’ve been trying to be better about taking notes in my notebook on the planning process for our garden, so I took a few photos of my sketches and notes to share here.

cold frame

Today we completed step one of our larger garden project.  We are hoping by March to have built a balcony-sized raised bed so we can transfer the seedlings we started indoors last month to a more permanent outside space.  I’ve been doing a ton of research on the best, and most ecologically sound, materials to use, but it’s been difficult given the constraints of a small growing space and HOA restrictions.  I think we will end up using a combination of ceramic tile and cement block, but we are going to piece together the walls and bottom of the raised bed slowly.  In the mean time, this weekend I bought a heavy-duty (non-PVC!) pond liner, laid scavenged ceramic tiles over it, and put our newly constructed cold frame over the top of it.  Our seedlings and herbs now have a sunny, warm home.  As tonight will be the first “overnight” for our plants, I’m monitoring the temperature closely….(we have a tiny little thermometer in the cold frame).

tomato plants

Tomato plants are an odd mixture of hardy and frail.  I moved a set of tomato plants with me from Indiana over the summer, and finally, finally, the first of the stalks are flowering.  Tomorrow there will be big garden changes around here–I’ve devised a plan to construct a raised bed for our balcony, and our seedlings will move into the cold frame…