Cucumbers and flowers

 

The weather this week is in the low 80s. It's actually nice and not too hot. Although the cilantro started bolting, the other hot weather veggies are loving it! 

Cukes, curcubit, or cucumbers are the vegetable for this weeks harvest. Mr. Wonderful was surprised by them, in a good way. I was surprised too! If you notice those bumps on the skin, they have really small, but sharp thorns on them, something I didn't expect. This is the first time I really harvested cukes. I will be pickling them this evening and posting about it later.

Roses from the front yard were already put in when we purchased the house. I will definitely be keeping these. I place them in the restrooms and they make them smell so lovely, instead of you know what!

 

The zinnias I planted earlier this summer are starting to bloom. They don't really have a smell to them, but the have amazing color and are great for cut flowers! I'm hoping there will be more blooms when we have our housewarming party in a couple of weeks.

 Hope all is growing well in your garden!

Weekly update

Updates are difficult for me, so I'm making it my goal to at least update once a week, even if it's a short update. So, first on the list of things is the temperature for the week and the growing cucumbers. The weather looks like it's going to be a bit cooler this week compared to last week and the cucumbers are growing pretty well. There are so much flowers and tiny little cucumbers. so cute!

baby cucumbers

cucumber flower

The green beans are growing like crazy compared to everything else I've ever planted. This is the first time growing runner beans. I figure I would try to have it run on our patio gate. They're growing in the same pot that I've planted the lime trees and some marigold.

green beans in pot

The lettuce is still growing great. I can't believe they haven't bolted yet. It's been really hot the past 2 weeks. I'm not quite sure the varieties, they were from a lettuce green mix.

baby lettuce greens

baby lettuce green

Mustard greens are so interesting. The colors and the taste. I took a bite, and it tastes exactly like mustard!!, but not us strong. I love mustard! 

mustard leaf

The tomatoes went into my stew tonight. There was a split on one of them. 

tomato harvest from volunteers

The zinnias are growing bright and cute. They're tiny little flowers, only about an inch and a half wide. 

zinnia lilliput

zinnia lilliput

Gardener Sues City of Tulsa For Cutting Down Her Edible Garden (UPDATE)

Mr. Wonderful and I recently purchased our first home. We I have dreams of filling our yard, front and back, with edible plants. Being so sensitive to many of the processed foods out there makes it often times difficult to eat out because of the unknown ingredients in the foods. Even foods that are considered ‘healthy’, like fruits and vegetables are now tainted with pesticides, and who knows what type of soil they are grown in. It only makes sense to grow your own food, especially if you have a yard to do it in. Now new homeowners, Mr. Wonderful and I understand how expensive it is to own a home. Why not use the property your paying for (overpaying, if you live in california) to grow your own food to save money and in the long run eat healthy, fresh, produce?!  It only makes sense.

So my resolution to this issue is to grow our own organic good on our property and try to be more self sustainable. I do however want to have it appealing to the eye as well, so I’m trying to incorporate flowers and decorative plants in combination with the edible plants in my design plan, especially in the front yard.
One gardener recently didn’t have much luck with her city officials. This story comes close to heart. I truly hope this would never happen to us or anyone else.  Gardener Sues City of Tulsa For Cutting Down Her Edible Garden (UPDATE) : TreeHugger. A lady who at the time was unemployed, without health insurance, and has diabetes is suing the city officials who came to her property and mowed down her front yard, full of edible plants. Watch the full report from the local news station.

I understand and respect the decisions that officials have as well as HOAs, in order to keep peace and rules in effect. I’m sure there is probably more to the story than what was reported. Maybe, her front yard wasn’t as pretty as a lot of the manicured neighbors of hers, maybe it looked like no one had mowed the lawn in months, who knows?, but looking at the big picture, it just seems so asinine if you think about it. City officials coming over to chop down your front yard because you didn’t do it yourself. I think they crossed the line doing that. Hopefully, Denice will win her civil lawsuit and the city with have to pay to get her front yard redone, then both sides win. She’ll have her edible garden back and it will be pretty to look at if done properly!

If you would like to donate seeds to help Denise regrow her medicinal garden, or would like to donate to her legal fund to help her with the civil rights lawsuit she filed, you can send it to Lori Fulbright who will get it to Denise.

Lori Fulbright
C/O News On 6
302 S. Frankfort
Tulsa, OK 74120

What would you do if this happened to you?

Stone Plant Label

I've seen this idea a lot from other bloggers and pinterest and I Love it!!! It's so cute! I only had one stone for now, but I'll be getting more, to label all my other plants.

All I did was get a really thin paint brush and some acrylic paint and paint it on the stone. Make sure you practice a bit first.

What labels do you use for your plants? I would love to see!!!

Weekly Planner - Free Download

This year, like most years, I try to get a little more organized. I love perusing the isle with all the daily planners and schedulers, things of that nature that can help me keep organized. It's insane what some people pay for to keep organized.

I bought a Franklin Covey planner a few years ago. The design is clean and sleek and the size of the paper inside was about a 5x7, not too big and not too small. I had to get a refill for the upcoming 12 months and boy they're expensive!!! So I thought, I could recreate something for myself and incorporate what I liked and leave out what I didn't need.

I like the idea of having a weekly calendar so I can see what's coming up on a weekly basis. Also, I wanted a section where I can write down the menu for the week. This really helps in preparing what to bring out of the freezer the day before. A 'to do' list and a 'to buy' list was had to be in there somewhere, as well as a section where I can just write some notes down. So, here's what I came up with and I've been using it for about a month now. Feel free to download it if you like for personal use only and not for resale. I've made a few colors variations.

5x7" teal

5x7" gray

8.5 x 11" Teal

8.5 x 11" Green

8.5 " 11" Gray

What other scheduling ideas do you have to keep organized?

No Hail to Junk Mail

If you're like me, I really dislike junk mail. It's such a waste of so much time and energy. Starting from creating it, mailing it, delivering , sorting and trashing, then have it picked up in the trash. Everything about it is such a waste.

Similar to the 'Do Not Call List', I signed up myself and Mr. Wonderful to be opted out of receiving junk mail. Here's a site where you can be removed from the mailing lists. You can go to www.DMAchoice.org, and on the right hand side of the page, click on 'Get Started' or you can give them a call at 212-768.7277.

I just signed up today and I will give an update to see if our junk mail has reduced.

Homemade Laundry Detergent

I found this awesome recipe for homemade laundry detergent from Pinterest, (which I'm totally hooked on.) Here's the original post by Jillee. It was pretty easy in fact. The only thing I found time consuming was grating the soap, but that's it. Just mix everything else and you made really cheap laundry detergent. I'm going to do laundry tonight with the Mr. Wonderful (my husband) and will definitely share our findings. I really hope that it cleans and does a good job because this can save a lot of money in the long run. 

Powdered Laundry Soap: (about 40 loads)
2 cups finely grated Fels Naptha Soap
1 cup borax
1 cup baking soda (Washing soda can be used instead as well)

Directions: Use 1-2 Tbsp per load.

Cost Breakdown. For about the cost of 1 of the name brand laundry detergents ($12 for 45 loads), I bought all the ingredients I needed to make this concoction PLUS a batch of dishwashing soap AND I still have enough of the Borax and Baking soda to make at least 5 more batches. I bought the items from a local grocery store. If I bought it online, I'm sure I could have found it cheaper.


Update: 2/2/2012
Mr. Wonderful and I did laundry last night. According to him, the laundry didn't smell like anything, just neutral, which is a good sign.  I smelled a little of the soap. So, it looked like it worked. The one thing I did notice was that there were no suds at all. I've read up on some of the other blogs and did some of my own research on the net and found that the suds are NOT what cleans, but were put into the brand detergents to say to the consumer - yes look there's suds, so our product must be working- which is untrue. 


Also, since this homemade detergent has low suds, in theory it should be fine for the high efficiency (HE) washers. 


What I would do differently is to use 2 Tbsp for each load next time to satisfy Mr. Wonderful and I do like the smell of the soap. I want to also try using Washing Ash instead of baking soda the next time I need to make another batch and experiment to see if that does anything different.

Update: 6/20/2012

So Mr. Wonderful and I have been noticing that our laundry doesn't stay as fresh and starts to smell dingy a lot sooner now.....yaaack.  I've done more research and found that many people suggest to use Soda Ash opposed to Baking Soda. The Soda Ash is the ingredients that really cleans, while the baking soda is what neutralizes odors. I will be looking for a new recipe and posting soon!


I would love to hear your DIY tips for laundry detergents!