Making It

April 26, 2011

...ctions for a wide range of projects, from building a 99-cent solar oven to making your own laundry soap to instructions for brewing beer. Making It is the go-to source for post-consumer living activities that are fun, inexpensive and eminently doable. Our goal in this book was to provide really stripped down, simple projects that use only inexpensive, easy to source materials. We also tried to use the same materials and ingredients over and over a...

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Advantages and Disadvantages of Raised Bed Vegetable Gardening

Mr. Homegrown

February 20, 2014

Gardening, Vegetable Gardening

55 Comments

...in a wet climate. Cons Requires materials to construct. Might need to buy soil–gardening in the ground is free. Roots dry out quicker in a hot climate. Lack of mineral content in bagged soils. Use of peat moss in bagged products. Unable to truly embrace the “no dig” philosophy: despite best efforts to the contrary, it seems the soil needs to be swapped out every few years. It’s container gardening, really. Going through that list of pros and cons...

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The Connection Between Human Health and Soil Health

Mr. Homegrown

September 20, 2013

Food, Gardening, Soil

2 Comments

...h of a farm and our own health. Biodiverse soils produce healthier, more nutritious food. And way too much of the food we eat comes from farms where the soil is treated as a sterile growing medium. As Miller notes, “We are the soil.”...

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USDA Soil Maps Online

Mr. Homegrown

May 23, 2013

Gardening, Soil

1 Comment

...Attention soil geeks. You can access USDA soil maps online here. Ninety-five percent of US counties are available with the rest promised soon. The web interface was pretty slow with my connection, but I’m looking forward to playing around with this tool. There are also archived soil surveys that you can access much faster here....

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More on our gardening disasters

Mrs. Homegrown

January 21, 2013

Gardening, Mistakes, Thoughtstylings

15 Comments

...short, it’s an attitude problem. Ever since we learned we have lead in our soil, the garden has been all about containment and management and safety and compromise. And none of those things say “fun.” I think the best gardening comes about through curiosity and joy. We should all be like little kids in the garden, excited to plant those seeds, out there every day to see how much they’ve grown. I remember one the first vegetables I ever planted in...

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