Urban Homesteading Diaries

In April we began our backyard garden, and our cherry tree went into full blossom! So of course that means I have to start an Urban Homesteading Diaries series here for you all!

BTW, you’ll want to head over HERE TO YOUTUBE for a video with stunning shots and video clips of our town homestead journey. Be sure to listen to the tune too which is played by our oldest son on his guitar!

Homesteading Before It Was Homesteading

Growing up both my husbands and my family were a little different. Okay, maybe a lot different. When I was 4 my family moved from the city to a mountain top in the big woods of the PNW where we lived off grid until I was 7. Eventually my family had to move off the mountain, but we still lived the country life, gardened, raised chickens for eggs and food and my mother began making things like homemade bread which she taught me to do at age 10.

1700 miles away my husband’s family was living in rural midwest, and started raising farm animals, and becoming more sustainable.

Both our families gardened, and our mothers canned much of our families food, cooked from scratch, made bread, sewed, and were very health conscientious (back then we were called health nuts and most people though we were crazy).

Until our move away from the midwest and into town a couple years ago our family continued many of these practices. There is nothing like a productive day in the garden, or one spent canning one’s own food!

So although we are new to urban homesteading, we are not new to homesteading!

Where Did My Tomatoes Go?

Last year we were still new in town, getting situated, plus we were in the process of salvaging our homeschool year which had been disrupted by our move and lots of unexpected visits and of course colds from lowered immunity living in a new place.

But we were able to get a clothesline up. I just love having a clothesline to go outside and hang the clothes on! It’s always such a nice break. I’ve learned that it’s a good idea to hang clothing on the line at night if you don’t want it to fade from the sun.

I also went out and got my herbs to grow, and some strawberry and tomato plants.

Having become spoiled by the midwest’s lovely, humid, and long growing season and conditions, I forgot that strawberries need lots of water daily, and so sadly they burnt up.

And everytime a green tomato appeared and was about to ripen it would disappear! FYI, we figured out the deer in this town are clearly part of some mafia organization and apparently think they have the right to drop in and collect green tomatoes whenever they please.

Getting Prepared

We spent April getting serious about our backyard garden. We thought vegetable beds would be nice for the kids to get to watch things grow and get to eat from through the summer.

We have been fortifying our fortresses against the deer mafia, building raised beds (we figured in the event we decide to sell out and move to the country raised beds would be better for resell).

Making the vegetable beds and filling them was a process that took place over the course of about two weekends. It was truly a family affair! We were able to purchase some soil blended specifically for gardening from a local excavation company.

Planting

We’ve never had to worry about space before when it came to gardening. I’ve had gardens almost as big as an acre before, but knowing I wouldn’t have much room in our backyard garden I wanted to make the most of the space, so I researched square foot gardening before we started planting.

Since we only recently decided to do these vegetable beds I didn’t start any starters until late April. Ideally they would be started in late February to March. I figured late is better than never though. I did buy a few plants just to give us a little bit of an earlier harvest and I figured it would be nice to be able to stagar harvest times as well.

A few days after planting we had the most lovely gentle rain. There is just nothing like PNW rain, especially after it’s been warm for a couple days. The smell of the fresh rain here is something I forgot about when living in the Midwest. The scent is overwhelming in the most wonderful way. I wish the smell could be bottled, it’s so lovely.

Nature Therapy

I’ve always found something so therapeutic about getting out in nature and close to the earth. Gardening is one of my favorite things. It’s seriously powerful, people. I’ve learned a lot about how to improve my character while gardening, and solved a lot of problems.

A great example would be the time I was in my late 20’s out gardening one day. My husband, son and I had recently been been “excommunicated” from our church and my heart was hurting (long story for another day).

In addition to this I had recently met a super legalistic person recently who was boldly judgemental. They had been needlessly hurtful and as I sat in the dirt weeding my tomato plants mulling over something offensive they said I realized I was no better.

That was the day I realized the legalistic religious group I was raised in wasn’t special like I thought it was, that there were lots out there in the world that all went by different names and that many of them encouraged legalism. That was the day I decided I no longer wanted any part of any of any kind of judgmental, religious legalism, and that the plain, pure and simple loving words of Jesus would be just fine for me.

I don’t know what it is about weeding a garden that has a way of weeding the soul, but it does.

There is just something grounding about the earth, (pun intended, don’t you just love it when I do that?)

A wise woman once told me about how she said a prayer when she planted her seeds in the spring. I’m doing that too, and teaching the kids to.

I’ll keep you posted as to how things go. I think I’ll just start an Our Urban Homestead Diaries series….BTW, we are considering chickens next…….

To say I’m excited would be an understatement!

If you enjoyed Urban Homesteading you might also enjoy my posts on Sustainability HERE and my homemaking posts HERE.

Want homesteading ideas? Check out my homesteading board on Pinterest HERE!