Search Results for: label/build%20it/2010/06/the-urban-homestead/2011/04/making-it

979 results

Shoemaking Advice?

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Domesticus
62 Comments
...ave any of you made your own shoes? I’m looking for good resources on shoe making: books, videos, etc. I’d also love to hear stories of successes or failures or lessons learned. I’d like to make leather, soft-soled shoes as first project perhaps moccasins, perhaps something more structured. I have two books right now. One is Shoes for Free People, by David & Inger Runk, published in 1976 in Santa Cruz. As you might expect, it is highly groovy. And...

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The Manzanita Miracle, or, why you should love native plants if you live in a dry climate

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Gardening, Native Plants
6 Comments
...hurry this process along, because they don’t cool the city, and they don’t build soil which can capture and hold water. We need to settle down in a comfortable in-between spot. This is not Ireland and this is not Sonora. This is Southern California and we have a whole palette of amazing, largely misunderstood plants which are ready willing and able to green this place up even in the heart of a drought. All we have to do is treat these plants right...

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A Little Free Blockbuster

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Thoughtstylings
2 Comments
...s on the Garden Fork Podcast, the host, “East Coast Eric” challenged me to build a Free Blockbuster Little Library and I finally made good on the promise. I managed to install this garishly painted DVD, VHS, CD and video game themed little free library in our parkway yesterday as the sun went down. With the exception of the hinges and Lucite, I used repurposed materials and patterned the design after a lararium I saw online. I downloaded a digital...

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Getting started with worms

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Composting, Gardening, Vermiculture
8 Comments
...bins (like Rubbermaid bins) and a drill. Here are two resources for how-to build a plastic bin. One is at vermicomposting.net. Another is in pdf form, available through this link to Oregon State Extension Services. Our favorite resources: It would take pages and pages for us to tell you how to make and maintain a worm bin, or explain the general amazingness of worms, and this information is already freely available on the Internet. So for further...

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Composting the Deceased/ My DIY Funeral Fantasies

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Composting
47 Comments
...of Composting Humans or Animals: This is entirely above ground. First you build a platform of sticks/small logs to provide drainage and aeration, about 1.5 feet high. The deceased is placed on the stick pile. The body is covered with a 1 foot layer of mixed greens and browns–the makings of compost. Then over that goes a massive pile of carbonaceous material (“browns”: dry leaves, wood shavings, etc.). This layer is to be 10 to 12 feet deep. Huge!...

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