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You are here: Home / Archives for Gardening

Gardening

My New Greenhouse!

June 8, 2019 by NZ Filbruns 2 Comments

My boys spoil me. They do so many things for me, and I just have to keep wondering how in the world I ended up with such wonderful sons! The most recent big project was building a greenhouse. When we lived in Cheviot, we were given the frames for two greenhouses, from two different people. We used one for a couple of seasons, and Simon assembled the other but it didn’t get covered with plastic before we moved and had to dismantle it again. They were two different shapes, but when the boys started working on erecting them here a month or two ago, they figured out how to put them together to make one long high tunnel, about 40 feet by 10 feet (13.5 m by 3.5 m)! The next hurdle was to cover them. After some searching, they found the old plastic from the hoophouse, and the new plastic we had bought for the other one. They were able to cobble them together and cover everything except the lowest part of one side; Gayle built a device for rolling up the lower couple of feet of plastic on the other side, for ventilation during the summer. We bought sheets of clear plastic to finish the part we didn’t have plastic for, and they built frames for them, and hinged the frames so they can be opened in the summer, as well. Now, I’m enjoying having salads growing in there for at least part of the winter! Here are a couple of photos of the boys working on tacking down the plastic.

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This was a peek inside, during construction.

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….and a view from the same place, this week!

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This is a close-up of the bed right inside the door. I found a new-to-me variety of radishes called German Giant. They were advertised as getting large without getting pithy, and not going to seed so quickly. So far, they’re living up to their promise—I’ll sure be interested to see how they work in the summer! We’re really enjoying having radishes on our salads.4-IMG_5740

We transplanted the lettuces on the left into the ground here right after the framework was erected, and have been eating salads from that bed for a month now. I set out the lettuces, bok choy, and other things on the right a couple of weeks ago, and we’ll start eating them soon.5-IMG_5741And, here’s a fun picture! I found this leaf one day when I was washing lettuce. It was two leaves grown together! It’s hard to tell, but the midribs were stuck to each other. I had never seen one like this before.

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Greenhouse, Homemaking

Spring!

September 17, 2017 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Spring is here! Some days sure don’t feel like it, but more days are warm than a month ago, and the grass is growing.

The first garden work was done in mid-August. Simon took the rotary hoe (rototiller) through part of the garden, after I showed him what needed done. It broke after he got some done, though, so he tore it apart and took one part to a local man to get a replacement shaft made. We picked up the finished piece the day I took Simon to Christchurch to get his Learner’s Licence; that night, Simon and Mr. Diligence stayed up till midnight putting the rotary hoe back together. He felt like he had to do it because he was leaving home a couple of days later and wouldn’t have another chance!

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This is the lemon tree right outside my kitchen window. So beautiful!

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Esther babysat the day I took Simon to Christchurch. She sent the boys outside for a break at one point during school. They started wrestling, and Little Miss was telling them to stop!

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When it didn’t work to order them to stop, she tried to manually separate them!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Children's Fun, Gardening

Garden Stuff

March 12, 2017 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

I sliced a bunch of zucchini for the freezer one day, and decided to try dehydrating some. I sprinkled them with salt, and they are quite good! I did learn that it’s best to oil the trays before putting the zucchini on, or they stick tight. A couple of the children had fun putting the slices of zucchini on the first time.08-IMG_1855

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I had never seen a head of cabbage like this one! It had many small heads growing out around the stem, between the leaves.

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One of the little boys was quite impressed with the bumblebees on the sunflowers.

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One day’s harvest of cucumbers and squash.

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Little Miss helped me fill jars of green beans one day. She did a good job of it.

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We did an experiment this year with the tomatoes. After reading on the blog of one of Gayle’s cousins how she fertilized her tomatoes with sour milk and had very good results, I decided to try diluting the whey from cheesemaking and the buttermilk we couldn’t use up from making butter, and water the tomatoes with it. To make it a good experiment, we only did that with half the patch. The tomatoes on the right came from the milk-fed tomatoes, and the ones on the left came from the others. I would say the experiment was a success!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking

Mid-October Gardening

October 26, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We’ve been trying to get the garden planted over the last couple of weeks, and spending a lot of time weeding what we planted in August.  The day we planted peas, Little Miss wanted to help! She only got one packet open, and thankfully, peas are large enough we were able to pick them all up out of the grass.IMG_2114

My boys planted all the peas. It’s a little amusing, now that they are coming up, to see exactly how they were planted! Some rows have long empty spots, and other spots are pretty thick. Oh, well, peas are pretty forgiving. This is Mr. Sweetie and Mr. Intellectual, who was in charge of the planting. I dug the rows this time.

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Soon, Mr. Diligent and Mr. Imagination showed up to help. I think it was about here that the planting started looking funny!

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After I had all the rows dug for the peas, I started planting onions. The onion seedlings were a lot larger this year than most years. They’re looking pretty good.

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We’re eating stuff that we planted last year, still, as well as some Bok Choy that I set out in September. Here is Silverbeet (Swiss Chard), celery, spring onions, broccoli, and some cabbage that was going to seed (I cut off the leaves and used them), from last year’s garden. The carrots were from the shop; we ran out of our own awhile ago.

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Potato planting! Esther came out and helped Gayle and Mr. Inventor. She wanted to discuss the plot for a movie the children were making with the boys, and that was the only way she could talk to them that day.

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I’ve been cooking weeds more this spring than ever before. I harvested stinging nettle from the area in the bottom photo, as well as other areas that grew up in weeds. I also use mallow. I cook them together in chicken broth, blend them thoroughly, and freeze them in muffin tins to put in soups later. Mr. Imagination named the concoction for me—prickle mallow soup!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking

Starting the Garden

September 24, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Yes, it’s a little early, but we have the garden started. I wanted to make sure the pepper plants got big enough to produce some fruit before it gets cold in the fall, so I started them early. This is what they looked like in early September; now they are outside in our “greenhouse”, so I don’t see them every day.IMG_1808

I set out Bok Choi, kohlrabi, broccoli and cauliflower that I started, the other day when we had a warm spell. It’s turned cold and rainy now, but the little plants look great, at least what I can see of them from the kitchen window (the middle window you can see in this picture; the window on the left is a bedroom, and the one on the right is the laundry). Mr. Sweetie had fun with my camera while I was transplanting.

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Little Miss had fun crawling around on the grass while I worked in the garden.

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Mr. Imagination had fun running in the dirt, and Mr. Intellectual was working on a project.

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Mr. Inventor’s ducks have been eating the lettuce and Swiss Chard that I had growing, so we informed him last week that his ducks would be locked out of the yard/garden, or eaten. He got busy putting up a duck-proof fence, and then herded them out.

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Here is the beautiful tom turkey again. I know I’ve posted a lot of pictures of him—I love watching him display!

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Mr. Imagination on the trampoline.

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Mr. Imagination picked me a bouquet of daffodils!

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These ducks wanted back in the yard!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking

August 2015 Pictures

September 18, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Here are the last few pictures I wanted to share from August. I’m getting close to caught up!

We’ve had rain a couple of times. We’re still desperately dry, but since the weather is cool the little bit of rain we’ve gotten has been able to soak in and make the grass grow a bit. The ducks were delighted this particular morning to have water to play in!IMG_1692

I started peppers the first week or so of August. I planted the seeds in potting soil in this ice cream container, and put it, with a tight lid on, above the hot water heater. The peppers came up incredibly fast—I think this picture was taken after only a week!

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I liked this picture of Mr. Imagination peeking into Esther’s room (just before she moved back out to the sleepout).

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Mr. Handyman and Mr. Inventor have been tilling the garden. The ducks love the freshly tilled soil—they must be finding worms.

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Mr. Handyman brought this skink in to show us. I believe this is about lifesize on my computer screen.

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A goose nest. I hear that there are now two geese sitting on it simultaneously. We’ll see if anything hatches!

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Gayle frequently brings home a load of compost from work for the garden. This time, he took Little Miss out to supervise the unloading from her Bumbo. Mr. Handyman was helping unload, and Mr. Sweetie is watching.

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, random pictures

More Harvesting

May 4, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

This was the zucchini we found in the garden after our trip to Timaru. It ended up being nearly the end of the zucchini for the year, too, since we had a killing frost a few days later. We were happy to have these, since I’ve discovered a way to cook zuchini that everyone likes. I dice it in about 1/2 inch cubes, then toss with salt, pepper, fresh rosemary, and oil. Then, I spread it on a cookie sheet and bake at about 350°F for an hour or so. Yum!IMG_0573

Last week, Gayle and the boys dug all the potatoes. It wasn’t a very good harvest, but we’re thankful for what we got—and thankful that they weren’t rotting in the ground like they did last year! This is Mr. Handyman, Gayle, Mr. Diligence, and Mr. Inventor.IMG_0669IMG_0671

This is Mr. Diligence running away!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Recipes

Finishing the Harvest

April 27, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

We are getting close to the end of harvesting food for the year. Gayle and the boys are digging potatoes today. That is quite different from last year! It was so wet last year that there was water in every hole made by the fork when they dug up a potato plant. About half the crop rotted in the ground, and I had to deal with rotten potatoes in the bin all winter. Yuck! This year, the soil is bone-dry! We’re hoping for heavy rains soon, though, so Gayle decided it was time to get them dug.

The shelves in the jar room are very nearly full. The freezers are mostly full—even the “new” one we bought to put a steer in in another two weeks is a third full! Onions are braided and hanging beside the jars of food, and the pumpkins are piled in there and on a porch. We won’t go hungry this year!IMG_0602IMG_0603IMG_0615IMG_0616IMG_0617

Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking

2014-15 Garden

March 9, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

Our garden this year has produced spectacularly! As usual, I took pictures early on, with full intentions of taking more when it was at its peak, and as usual, I never got follow-up pictures taken. We, specifically the boys, have put up bushels of produce—we will have all the pickles, of three varieties, that we want, plus 95 pounds of sourkraut and about that much plain cabbage in the freezer; lots of zucchini; all the lettuce we can eat, and so far what looks like a great crop of tomatoes coming on. The onions are nearly ready to harvest, and we’ve canned a great many green beans and carrots. The potatoes have a blight, but we’re eating a lot now. Corn was too dry, and crowded out by too many pumpkins in the patch.

The early garden, in mid-December:

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Corn and pumpkins, with tomatoes to the left and potatoes beyond them.

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Cabbage, cukes, beans.

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Carrots, radishes, beets, peas, lettuce

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The entire garden, in the process of being weeded for the first time.  Below is a mound across the creek, on which we planted zucchini and pumpkins. Failure! Too dry.

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Tomatoes fill up this small garden.

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Peppers are up against the house, by the lemon tree.

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We filled in this space around the rhubarb plants with tomatoes, tomatillos, Cape Gooseberries (like ground cherries), and zucchini.

I did get two pictures recently! This was the day we pulled up all the rest of the cabbage. This one head of Savoy Cabbage was so pretty I got a picture of it.

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I’ve learned that one way to save space in the garden is to plant the cabbages very close. They can be 1 foot from each other, in every direction, and thrive. No weed problems there!

We had several wheelbarrow loads of cabbage that day, and ended up with three bushels when it was all trimmed. I read aloud a very exciting story while the boys trimmed it, and the cow loved eating all the “waste”.

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When we thinned the carrots, the boys were happy to find some funny ones:

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All in all, we’re feeling quite blessed with this year’s garden.

Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking

New Year’s Day Harvest

January 1, 2015 by NZ Filbruns Leave a Comment

First, I want to wish all of you a wonderful 2015! We’ve had a lovely New Year’s Day today. It’s a lot cooler than yesterday, which I appreciate, but sunny and beautiful. I went out to the garden this morning and found a lot of things ready to pick. We are eating well these days!IMG_0076

This afternoon, I went to the garage to get something, and made a side trip to check on the barrel of apple cider vinegar I’ve been brewing since last March. One of the boys had gotten a small cup of it this morning, and it tasted just slightly weaker than the double-strength vinegar we usually buy from a stockfeeds store. He thought there was a scoby in it (like kombucha). I looked, and sure enough there was a huge “mother” floating  on top!

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That was exciting. There were also a lot of fruit flies in it, so I decided it was time to strain and bottle all of it. We ended up with 21 liters, just over 5 gallons, for the price of a rubbish bin (maybe $15). The apples were free from the roadside, and the only other ingredient was water. To buy that much vinegar at the stockfeeds shop costs about $80. I’m pleased with this experiment!

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I put the “mother” in a jar to save till I start the next batch, so hopefully it will work even faster than this batch. Sure looks ugly! It’s kind of rubbery, a lot like a kombucha scoby.IMG_0083

Esther wanted to see what the cows would do with the vinegary apples, so she dumped them out in the paddock. They wanted to eat them, but the acid was apparently kind of hard for them to handle. They keep coming back for more, though!

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Filed Under: Activities at Home Tagged With: Gardening, Homemaking, vinegar

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The Family:


Dad and Mom (Gayle and Emma)

Girl #1, Esther, my right hand

Boy #1, Seth (Mr. Handyman)

Boy #2, Simon (Mr. Inventor)

Boy #3, Mr. Intellectual

Boy #4, Mr. Diligence

Boy #5, Mr. Sweetie

Boy #6, Mr. Imagination

Girl #2, Little Miss

Girl #3, Miss Joy

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