Friday, January 31, 2014

Seed Catalog Porn




Ah, the time of year when winter is dragging on and spring is yet to be around the corner... which means, it's time to start thinking about SEED CATALOGS.  Garden porn at it's finest and most wishful.  I like drooling over pictures of beautiful vegetables (come on, I can't be alone in that regard?).  I am considering what I want to grow this year.  Looking online at all the glorious seeds always makes me want at least an acre... while I have much, much less room... probably two 8'x8' beds and a dozen 5-gallon containers.  Truth be told, I love the IDEA of having a huge garden but with my adult ADD I frequently fall short of my ideals. Last year I even lost my glorious Lemon Thyme, which was my baby.  I forgot to water it.  It is a good thing that TS has not HTF yet because if I had to eat out of my garden to keep myself alive, I would starve in short order.  Well, I guess that's what it's all about - a learning process, right?  I'd better start planting perennials, trees and bushes and work on my barter skills :D  In the meantime, I will keep experimenting and finding out what grows in my area - and what I'm capable of growing.  I also admit I keep more seeds than I need on hand to share and as potential barter materials in trade.



My favorite seed companies include:
Seeds of Change (http://www.seedsofchange.com/)
Seed Savers Exchange (http://www.seedsavers.org/)
Fedco (http://www.fedcoseeds.com/)
Sustainable Seed Company (http://sustainableseedco.com)
Uprising Seeds (http://www.uprisingorganics.com/) in WA

I do like to buy locally, so I do most of my shopping for seeds at these two companies:
Horizon Herbs (https://www.horizonherbs.com/) in Williams, OR
Territorial Seeds (http://www.territorialseed.com/) in Cottage Grove, OR
Champoeg State Heritage Area (http://www.champoeg.org/) in St. Paul, OR



Thursday, January 30, 2014

Last Summer's Success

Here's some of the successful things my son and I grew last summer!  All photos here are mine.  I grew  several types of tomatoes, several types of garlic, shallots, lemon cucumbers, slicing cucumbers, Swiss chard, blackberries and LaRatte fingerling potatoes.  We had oodles and oodles of tomatoes, but the pickling cucumbers failed which meant no dill pickle spears (I made hamburger dills instead with slicers).  When we lived a few summers ago in Pennsylvania with friends who farm, my friend Gene made fermented pickles and my goal is to make pickles as good as his!  I would also like some day to be a garlic farmer and sell to local restaurants :)





Welcome and Please Join Me!

Welcome to Thyme For Courage Now!

I am just starting to make my urban homesteading dream a reality.  We live in the wonderful Willamette Valley in Oregon, in the Eugene area.  We live in a great area for urban homesteading and homesteading in general, and there is lots of community support for endeavors such as this.  Please follow me and maybe we can help and inspire one another.  I have container gardened for years and am a dabbler in many homesteading type crafts - soap making, felting, canning & food preservation etc, and I'd love to learn more. This summer I will be planting two 8'x8' garden beds, and hopefully more!  I look forward to sharing our journey with you.