When the lemons rain around me, I garden.
When a globalised world with impotent local actors threatens to destabilise my sense of autonomy, gardening is my best response. It allows me to grow food for my family, thus reducing costs and dependence on the supermarket and reducing the food miles aspect to supermarket-purchased vegetables.
I also happen to really really enjoy gardening.
Over the last few days, mostly in the weekend, I sowed sunflower seeds, transplanted my Mrs Kitson's marigolds, weeded, dug in bokashi, sowed phacelia, oriental mesclun, beetroot and a shady garden scatter blend of aquilegias. I've also bought and planted seedlings of pak choi, two kinds of lettuce (including 'drunken woman' because that name has always appealed to me) and perpetual spinach. Waiting on the table outside to be planted are dwarf cosmos, two asparagus plants and some coriander.
Inside I'm tending my tomato plants on the windowsill. I don't sow much seed if I can easily buy seedlings due to time constraints. But there is something very appealing to me about growing my own tomato plants from seed. It is like the charting of spring. I only grow cherry tomatoes, as the large ones don't grow in time here without the aid of a glass/plastic house. I still think I'll get a plastic house one day...
Today I bought six punnets of seedlings. I'm totally happy to pour a little money into our local economy and gain some autonomy over our greens supply in the process.
Not local, but still feel-good, is Cake Patterns. I only discovered Steph of 3 Hours Past the Edge of the World a few months ago, but now I'm looking forward to making a dress she has designed called the Tiramisu. Today she put patterns up for pre-sale on Etsy on a generous discount as a way of gaining the finances to print her pattern. I've not done this before (technologically ancient you say? guilty as charged) but I think it is a great idea, so I've bought her pattern. Now I just need to finish knitting my Miette cardigan in the next month and source some lovely patterned knit fabric in readiness to sew a Tiramisu.
I also happen to really really enjoy gardening.
Over the last few days, mostly in the weekend, I sowed sunflower seeds, transplanted my Mrs Kitson's marigolds, weeded, dug in bokashi, sowed phacelia, oriental mesclun, beetroot and a shady garden scatter blend of aquilegias. I've also bought and planted seedlings of pak choi, two kinds of lettuce (including 'drunken woman' because that name has always appealed to me) and perpetual spinach. Waiting on the table outside to be planted are dwarf cosmos, two asparagus plants and some coriander.
Inside I'm tending my tomato plants on the windowsill. I don't sow much seed if I can easily buy seedlings due to time constraints. But there is something very appealing to me about growing my own tomato plants from seed. It is like the charting of spring. I only grow cherry tomatoes, as the large ones don't grow in time here without the aid of a glass/plastic house. I still think I'll get a plastic house one day...
Today I bought six punnets of seedlings. I'm totally happy to pour a little money into our local economy and gain some autonomy over our greens supply in the process.
Not local, but still feel-good, is Cake Patterns. I only discovered Steph of 3 Hours Past the Edge of the World a few months ago, but now I'm looking forward to making a dress she has designed called the Tiramisu. Today she put patterns up for pre-sale on Etsy on a generous discount as a way of gaining the finances to print her pattern. I've not done this before (technologically ancient you say? guilty as charged) but I think it is a great idea, so I've bought her pattern. Now I just need to finish knitting my Miette cardigan in the next month and source some lovely patterned knit fabric in readiness to sew a Tiramisu.
Comments
And I just have to say, your first paragraph had me cheering. LOVE it. This is exactly the type of mindset that will change our world, hopefully for the better. :)