 Green Zebra tomatoes from last year’s harvest.
I put in my first seed order of the year today: eight kinds of heirloom tomatoes from Salt Spring Seeds. As usual, I’ve ordered way too much: last year I managed to squeeze five plants onto my tiny deck. And I’ve got seeds from three of those. Eleven tomato plants? C’est impossible.
Thankfully, it’s a family affair. I order the seeds. My mom starts them in her greenhouse. My grandma saves the seeds. We all grow, and share the results. (Somehow, I get away with the least amount of effort because I’ve got the smallest home, and, for my elders, online shopping seems like a lot of work.)
So. Where does that leave me? Of last year’s seeds, I’ll grow Black Brandywine and Green Zebra again. I also ordered Radiator Charlie’s Mortgage Lifter, a deep-red beefsteak slicer; Gardener’s Delight, a small cherry that is said to be consistent and flavourful, with lots of seeds and juice. Finally, I couldn’t resist the Brandywine Collection, which contains seeds from Cherry, Black, Purple, Pink Select and Joyce’s Brandywine tomatoes. I really can’t fit them all on my deck, so I’ll have to choose! Any suggestions?
By the way, if you live in Canada, you should really check out Salt Spring Seeds. I ordered from them last year, and every single seed germinated! Their seeds are untreated, open-pollinated and non-GMO. They grow all their own seeds and sell only their most recent harvest. Salt Spring Seeds also runs the Seed Sanctuary, a charitable organization dedicated to the preservation and promotion of heritage and heirloom seeds (kind of like the Seed Saver’s Exchange in the US).
Just wanted to draw your attention to a quick-and-easy craft project I spotted over at Home by Sunset. They’ve taken a plain vase and wrapped it with a natural placemat (reed, bamboo, etc.) for instant organic chic. Find step-by-step instructions here.
Photo from Home by Sunset.
Jewellery designer Abigail Percy guest blogged on Design*Sponge last week, and her posts are all themed around botanical design.
She’s pretty well-positioned to provide her perspective on the matter, too. Her own designs, which I have long coveted, are botanically-inspired — like her anemone earrings, above. (*Drool*)
Abigail says, “I love seeing just how many different ways the same plants can be stylised…from something very literal, to something really abstracted and vague – all stemming from the one source.” Her posts go on to explore the influence of the botanical on pattern design, ceramics and fabrics and more. Go check it out – it’s a guaranteed mood-enhancer for the botanically-deprived gardener!
 Jon and Elizabeth of Food Map Design wrote to tell me about their newly-released Food Map container, a modern garden planter created using green design principles. As Food Map is “committed to reconnecting residential space and food cultivation,” the container was designed for growing edibles, but ornamentals probably wouldn’t complain either. Here’s what Jon and Elizabeth have to say about the form-meets-function planter:
“We created a product that enables people with limited outdoor space to grow food at home without having to compromise on design. The container is made from nontoxic High Density Polyethylene (HDPE), which contains post-industrial reused material. The frame is 40-100% recycled steel. The product is manufactured in Los Angeles County and is 100% recyclable. The container comes in two sizes: the larger raised container allows for gardening while standing; the smaller one is great for kids and smaller scale settings. The container has rubber casters for mobility as weather and sunlight conditions change.”
I love the mobility the rubber casters add; that would be really handy. I can’t budge my raised beds. At $245-$255, the Food Map container is a bit of a splurge. Feeling flush? Buy yours here.
Joy, joy, joy! The February 2008 issue of Sunset magazine is out, and I’ve finally gotten my hands on a copy. Why am I so excited about this particular issue? I’m in it! Heavy Petal is featured in their “In the West” section, and I’m thrilled to bits.
 It’s just a short write-up, but it manages to perfectly capture the spirit of Heavy Petal. Big hugs to Jim and Jess at Sunset for making this happen!
See the full article after the jump (well, a photo, anyway – it’s not online).
(more…)
I’ve always grown paperwhites ( Narcissus tazetta) for the holiday season – force of habit, I guess. But this winter I just didn’t get around to picking up any bulbs, and before I knew it, it was all “Happy new year!” and I had no stinky white flowers in my house. On a jaunt to the local hardware store in early January, however, I noticed paperwhite bulbs in the clearance bin, and picked up a few for almost free.
I’ll never go back to forcing bulbs pre-Christmas. I appreciate my little pot of paperwhites so much more now that the rush of parties and family gatherings and excess baking is over. The house is filled with glitz in December, anyway – it’s nice to have something that I can enjoy now in this quiet, introspective month.
One last thing about paperwhites: I tried the vodka-stunting method last year, and while it did prevent the stems from growing too tall and floppy, it also seemed to reduce the life of the blooms. Or maybe I just gave them too much. Regardless, I did without this year, instead rotating the pot a quarter turn every couple days. Seemed to keep ‘em straight and sober.
Okay, I guess it’s two last things: When they’re finished blooming, I plant the bulbs in my boulevard garden. They’ll bloom again in two years.
Moss skull-and-crossbones by Ladybird at the Instructables.
I came across a step-by-step guide to creating moss graffiti at the Instructables that is different than the other two methods I’ve seen before: painting a moss slurry onto a hard surface (which I’ve tried, unsuccessfully), and removing living chunks of moss and placing them in the desired pattern. Rather, it’s kind of a combination of the two.
Basically, Ladybird recommends using the moss slurry mixture to start your graffiti on a layer compost in a seed tray. You then keep it well misted until established, then transfer to its final display space. Makes sense, and probably give your graffiti a fighting chance.
With the baby due in under three months, it’s time to start thinking about where it’s going to live. (Actually, we know the future location of its habitat: our former TV room, or “media centre” as Ben liked to call it, but what said room is going to look like is completely open for discussion.)
I’m really grooving on Amenity Nursery’s – Woods organic crib bedding. I love the gender-neutral palette, and of course, the nature-inspired print. Drool. Could this be the inspiration for the nursery’s theme? What better for a gardener and nature lover? (Photo from Design Public.)
Fabrics from the Aviary line of Joel Dewberry fabrics (via PurlSoho) would make great curtains and accent pillows.
 I also love this tree, hand-cut from vintage wallpaper, from Enfant Terrible. I think I may have to copy this, especially the little birdhouse light.
 Because we don’t know the baby’s sex, we’re going gender-neutral (though I can’t see doing a pink or blue room, regardless). We are thinking of the above palette, with a greenish yellow called “Lemon Grass” as the main colour, “Cromwell Gray” for a feature wall and “Simply White” for the ceiling and trim (all from Benjamin Moore). Orange accents would punch it up a lot.
(more…)
This is a quince fruit, in case you’re not familiar with them (as I wasn’t prior to this past weekend). They are lumpy and somewhat pear-shaped, with fuzz almost like you’d find on a peach. Generally considered inedible when raw due to their sour taste, they smell divine, however – all sweet and perfume-like – which makes sense when you consider the quince tree, Cydonia oblonga , is from the family Rosaceae. Here are a bunch of yummy-sounding quince recipes, should you find yourself with a surplus of quince but no desire to can.
One thing I didn’t mention in my review of Animal, Vegetable, Miracle is how it has inspired me to try my hand in the kitchen. As I may have mentioned, I don’t really like to cook. I live with a man who is practically a Michelin-starred chef (or would be, if they visited our place for dinner) so why even try? But Animal, Vegetable, Miracle really made me reconsider my stance. I’m not even really sure why — it expounds local eating, but no where does it say, “And make it yourself!” Although I guess that’s kind of implicit in a slow-food love poem, anyway. Which brings me to how I ended up with 10lbs (4.5kg) of quince. Ben and I were at the farmer’s market on the weekend when we saw boxes of the unsightly-looking fruit. We’d never bought quince before. In fact, the only reason we even paused was that when we were in France last May, we stayed at Le Manoir de la Maison Blanche in Amboise, where they served delicious homemade jams with our breakfast baguette. One of the jams, of course, was quince.
Memories of France, combined with my new commitment to local eating (and cooking!) somehow convinced me that buying mountains of quince was a good idea. We would make jam. It would be fun, and the results would be delicious. I could be one of those (increasingly few) people who brought a jar of homemade jam when dropping in for a visit. Nevermind that the only thing I knew about jam-making was based on a novel called Blue Jelly (subtitled “Love Lost and the Lessons of Canning”). But, I thought, how hard can it be? My grandpa used to pickle eggs. Surely jam was easier.
(more…)
Today, a milestone – the first snowdrop ( Galanthus nivalis) of the year! It seems early, but I don’t seem to have recorded its first appearance before. (Note to myself in 2009: I actually noticed the first bloom about a week ago, but it was only this weekend that I had enough light to photograph by, having to leave the house in the dark and return in the dark. Who invented this “daylight savings” time thing, anyway?)
|
|
