Friday, November 2, 2012

Garlic!

I planted garlic a couple of nights ago. This may not seem significant to you, so let me explain how cool this really is. Get excited! It is ideal to plant garlic in October, let it winter over, and then harvest it the following summer when the tops of the plants start to fall over. Each clove planted grows into a head of garlic (you just have to buy a head of garlic that still has little root hairs attached so the garlic is alive & will grow). Some of the garlic harvest can be saved to plant a few months later, and the rest can be eaten. Yum! I love garlic. Anyway, the cool part is  this: if I keep planting some of my harvest every year, I WILL NEVER HAVE TO BUY GARLIC AGAIN! I'll tell you that this is exciting, because I am really motivated by accomplishing things that are measurable and although I am still far from being self-sufficient, I realized that I can be self-sufficient in my garlic supply. I am incredibly happy about that. :)

Thursday, November 1, 2012

Getting Started

This blog is about the journey I'm taking toward greater self-sufficiency. Read along, if you like, and live your dreams, too!

For years, I've dreamed of living self-sufficiently. I've read Laura Ingalls Wilder's books and dreamed of what it might be like to produce all or most of the things we use right here in our own little space. Of course, they had more land and didn't have to have a "job" most of the time, so they had more time & space to devote to growing all their own food, raising their own animals, spinning wool into yarn and then weaving it into fabric & making clothes out of it, building their own houses, boiling down maple sap into syrup...as I am living in different times with different resources, my life isn't going to look like that. At least, not yet. ;)

As a child, I helped plant gardens, feed chickens, can vegetables & milk goats, and I learned how to cook. I'm glad.

As an adult, I'm learning to do some of these things "for real." I'm discovering that it's different when you're the grown-up instead of just "helping," but it's tons of fun either way!