Project Update

I finished the indoor hanging planter made from mason jars. It looks pretty good. The final touch was to add a couple of picture hangers to the back of it and find the studs behind all the plaster to get the screws to hold. We already have a few little sprouts coming up and I'm sure there will be more soon. Here are a couple of finished pictures.

From Stuff I Made

From Stuff I Made

Another Beautiful Winter Day

So it has become apparent that Winter is passing us Michiganders by this year. I couldn't ask for anything more. With all the work I have to do before munchkin number 2 arrives, I need all the good weather and time that I can get.

I wasn't going to get started on anything important yet, since there is a high probability that we will get hit with snow in mid May! Instead, I let my anxious nature get the best of me and I got the backyard seeded. I also began working on my flower bed in the front of the house. As long as it isn't raining, tomorrow I plan on going to get a load of compost from the city yards to finish it off.

I think I need to make a checklist of the projects that I am planning to work on this summer. I need some sort of hierarchy of priority to get these things done, otherwise I'll be stuck with more than a few half finished jobs by the end of the season.

In the meantime, here are two more books I recently grabbed to help me out this summer.

From

This is how I plan to organize my raised beds this year. If it works, I'll keep doing it from now on.

From

This book has tons of amazing designs and projects in it as well. More structural stuff than gardening, but I think I have found at least 3 designs I want to make so far.

I recently came across a periodical that I am now subscribed to. I love print and I really love getting magazines in the mail. Since Readymade folded in June of last year, I've been looking for something new to fill the DIY void and this one really hits the spot for the moment. It also happens to (coincidentally) fall within the realm of everything I'm working on right now.

From Stuff I Found

It's called Urban Farm and it basically guides a person like me through all the best ways to grow a large garden in an urban environment, keep bees, raise chickens and just generally follow a sustainable farming model. While I have many of my implements already accounted for, this magazine has given me some new insights into things I might not have considered before. For instance, this summer I am going to plant all of my root vegetables in pots instead of in the garden. Not only will this save me space, but apparently roots grow tremendously well in pots.

This magazine started in 2009 and is circulated bimonthly, which is a little bit disappointing because I hate waiting, but it is worth it's weight in gold as far as I'm concerned.

I'm still looking for a really good DIY replacement for Readymade. If anyone has any suggestions, I'm open.

Chicken update

During the first council meeting, the Ferndale city council voted unanimously to approve an amendment to the ordinance banning chickens. Ferndale residents are now allowed to build a chicken coop in their back yard as long as it is at least 10 feet away from any residential structure.

I plan on getting my permit to build my coop and get it done before the end of the summer, but I think that getting the animals will wait until next summer. Between having a new baby in the house, getting the garden in order, taking care of my 2 year old son and working full time, I don't know that I'll have time to get started taking care of these high-maintanence animals. I doubt I'll want to even consider trying!

So, my plan is to have everything built and in order and then I'll see about getting some full grown hens or some pullets in the Spring of 2013. Building the coop will be a fun project for a few hot summer days when I'm not doing other things around the urban farm. And of course, I'll post pictures and instructions as I'm completing it.

Spring is here...maybe (part 2 of 2)

My indoor projects, which (in contrast to my gardening) are coming to fruition, are all relatively small and easy to do. I haven't fully determined how I'm going to build my indoor grow shelving, but I have purchased my lighting and timers to get it started. I hope to get everything in the dirt by the end of March so that it has all of April to grow and, weather permitting, I can begin transferring my starts into the garden by the second week of May.

Aside from the grow shelves and lighting system, I'm also working on finishing my pantry this weekend. It has been a long time in both planning and execution, but I should be able to make some real progress on it soon. After I'm done with the pantry, I plan on putting another built-in cupboard and shelf unit in my nook for all of my tea and kombucha storage as well as for displaying dishes.

Now, here is the part where I get to teach. I hope to use this blog as a teaching tool from now on, posting small, easy projects step by step that others can copy. My wife found this one online somewhere and pinned it in her Pinterest account.

From Stuff I Made

She wanted me to make one for her craft room, but the one I made had to be painted. So I got the pipe clamps from Home Depot. the mason jars I had were about 4" in diameter, but I wanted to make sure that the clamps would fit so I bought the 3"-5" clamps. I had plenty of room, but I am glad I played it safe.

From Stuff I Made

I used a piece of 1x6 from the planter boxes from last year. I cut it 18" long and got everything ready to assemble. The only major prep work I did was to drill one hole about 11/32" in each pipe clamp to get a screw through and into the board.

I painted the board and got my jars set into place. I then drilled pilot holes for the screws that hold the clamps to the board. I attached the clamps nice and tight and then slipped the jars through each and tightened them down. This is the final product:

From Stuff I Made

The color matches some Ikea shelves that hang in the craft room. When completely done, and hung, these will have a thin layer of gravel in the bottom, followed by a layer of peat or crumbled leaves for moisture retention. The top 2/3 of the jar will have potting soil added and we bought some short stemmed flower seeds (about 3"-4") to grow in these jars. 

And there you have it! The longest part of this project was waiting for the paint to dry. I used two coats to get it nice and covered, but one coat would have worked. In total, this project took me about 3 hours. Very simple and pretty cool looking. This is also a very inexpensive way to keep plants in the house all year long.