A Great Read
I read a lot of books, there’s always a stack on my coffee table of books I’m reading, those to be read, and some that I’ll probably never get around to reading. Most of the books I read are about gardening and permaculture. Some a great, some are OK, and some never get finished. One of my most recent finds is quickly becoming one of my favorite gardening books. It’s an old book, I came across the title while reading The Art of French Vegetable Gardening. The method of companion planting and crop rotation they said she used sounded fascinating.
Companion Planting: Successful Gardening the Organic Way by Gertrud Franck is phenomenal. If you’re into companion planting, organic gardening, permaculture, herbs and gardening in general I think you will LOVE this book. I cannot even begin to explain her methods, they are detailed yet simple. This book will definitely be read over and over again!
Do you have any books you read over and over again? What are they?
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The Urban Farm Handbook Giveaway
When my friend Annette Cottrell from Sustainable Eats asked me to read through her new book Urban Farm Handbook: City Slicker Resources for Growing, Raising, Sourcing, Trading, and Preparing What You Eat I gladly accepted. There’s nothing I love more than giving my friends a hand, especially when it means that I get a free copy of the book to give away to one of you!
I expected this book to be like most of the other homesteading books that abound these days. It seems everyone wants to relearn some of the skills that have been lost throughout the last couple generations, so homesteading books are flooding the market. Thankfully, this book is different. Anette’s personal style brings the information to life, unlike many other books of this genre that I’ve read. She’s passionate about why she does what she does and it comes through. Her directions/explanations are in depth enough but still simple. You won’t be overwhelmed with information and feel like it’s unattainable for you to incorporate these changes into your current lifestyle.
The book covers everything from keeping chickens and grinding grain, to growing your own vegetables and making cheese. She makes these tasks seem achievable by anyone who sets their mind to it and takes away some of the mystique that surrounds them. If you’ve ever considered dabbling in keeping goats, chickens, making your own cheese, grinding grains, growing your own vegetables and all other kinds of self-sufficient things, this will be a fabulous reference guide to keep on your bookshelf.
Annette’s book is a great resource for the newbie, especially those of you that live in the Pacific Northwest. She lives in that area provides many resources that she knows about first hand. Reading about all the wonderful groups she’s a part of made me wish I had something similar here in NE Ohio.
If you’d like to win a copy of this book for your library, comment below. I’ll choose a winner next week.
What is one area of homesteading that you’d like to learn a bit more about and possibly incorporate into your life this year?
We have a winner – Congrats to Andres from Stell Homestead.
Anette is having a year long Urban Farm Handbook Challenge on her blog if you’re interested in joining. Each month a different area is featured, it’s the perfect way to work on incorporating changes into your life slowly without feeling overwhelmed.
In case you missed it, the winner for the Victory Garden Poster winner is Chicago Mike.
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Making Good Use of Time
Mr Chiots and I love listening to audiobooks while we’re on long car trips. We usually try to pick a few that are relevant to the trip itself, the areas we’ll be driving through, the places we’re visiting, important people from the are, and books about history from the area. In the fall of 2010 when we traveled through New England we listened to Travels with Charley in Search of America by John Steinbeck. It’s the perfect traveling audio book since it’s all about his travels around the United States. We also listened to Walden by Henry David Thoreau since we were planning on visiting his little cabin.
On our way out west this past summer, we listened to Undaunted Courage: Meriwether Lewis, Thomas Jefferson, and the Opening of the American West by Steven Ambrose which explains in great detail the Lewis & Clark expedition. This was the perfect book for this journey because we traveled much the same route that they took and saw the names of rivers and mountains along our route. We also listened to O Pioneers! by Willa Cather. The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand was started, but we didn’t get through it all by the time we got home. We have yet to finish it.
Since we enjoy post-apocalyptic books and movies, One Second After by William R. Forstchen kept us riveted during one of our LONG days of driving through Wisconsin and North Dakota. During out 26 hours of driving to Maine and back this past week we listened to The Hunger Games and caught up on a podcast we enjoy listening to.
We still have a few audio books on deck, mainly for our trip to Florida later this spring. They certainly are a great way to pass the time and, when you choose the right book, to learn something about the area while you’re driving. It’s a great way to make use of that time when you can’t do much else. I don’t like audio books any time but when I’m in the car. Mr Chiots loves them and listens to them all day long when he’s coding websites.
Have you ever listened to an audio book? Any great historical books or books related to geographic regions to recommend?
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Taking a Bit of a Breather
The last couple weeks have been a bit crazy around here, with the new job at Ethel and all. I’m still trying to figure out what to drop in order to fit in the extra hours I need for that. As a result I’ve been up early working and staying up later than I should.
Sadly, my reading chair is feeling a little lonely (so it Dexter). So I took the evening off from blogging last night and spent some time reading Onward & Upward in the Garden by Katherine S. White. As a gardener, she writes wonderfully about her garden, gardening books, seed catalogs and all kinds of plants in this compilation of essays she wrote over the course of 12 years for the New Yorker. I’m thoroughly enjoying it.
Are you still busy with gardening & preserving, or are things starting to slow down for you?
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A Day to Recharge
As an introvert, being around a lot of people wears me out both physically and emotionally. One of the reasons I really enjoy gardening is because it’s a great way for me to get some quiet time alone to recharge. After a busy week last week with lots of trips out and about, I was sorely in need of some quiet time. Mr Chiots was heading out for the day to cheer on some friends that were running a race, so luckily I had a day to myself. I thought about working in the garden, but I had been doing a lot of that all week and needed a bit of a rest day out of the sun.
I checked We Took to the Woods out of the library a few weeks ago and haven’t been able to find any measurable amount of time to sit down and get through more than 10 pages at once. I decided to make the most of my day by spending it sitting on the front porch in my little folding chair finishing up the book. There’s nothing like a good book and a few hours of uninterrupted reading to restore the soul. Now I’m ready to take on the week!
What’s your favorite way to recharge?
