Planning and Goals

Mini Cordwood House: No Waste

Building a house and living in a house both produce large amounts of waste.  Not our house!  This will be as close to a no waste as possible and our finished house will produce no where near what a conventional home might produce. Since we are using almost all natural …

Food Forest
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6. Produce No Waste

The next permaculture principle is produce no waste.  No wasting things can be anything from recycling to being efficient and not wasting time.  Much of the “waste” we produce can be used for other things with just a little creativity. One of the most obvious sources of waste is simply …

Food Forest
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5. Use and Value Renewable Resources and Services

The fifth permaculture principle is use and value renewable resources and services.  I know what you’re thinking, solar power! but it is so much more than that. We always try to make the most of our renewable reources here on the homestead for a few reasons.  Anything we can gather …

Food Forest

Autumn is for Garden Bed Building

My autumn season has been incredibly busy.  Cut firewood.  Haul materials for new garden beds.  Along with all the regular chores of course.  I am preparing beds now so that the compost can start to rot in its new home and because the leaves are so numerous in the autumn.  …

Building

From Sewing Table to Kitchen Cabinets

We have this great old sewing machine table.  I especially love the fold out flap to extend the space.  I need a kitchen cabinet with a small conuter top.  Time to make some adjustments. I took out that shelf that was too close to possibly use.  It was to hold …

Gardening

Chop and Drop: Weeds for Mulching

I have many areas around the house that are suppossed to be the yard.  However, being fresh cut forest, the wild field plants have taken over.  I plan to turn these wild plants and excess of trees into mulch.  The majority of our lot is wooded, so I don’t feel …

Gardening
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Head to the Beach for Compost

We have lived in Maine for 3 years now and have not yet been to the beach.  We have been too busy working on everything to take a day or two to go to the shore.  But I finally have the perfect reason to go: seaweed for the garden soil. …

Bugs

Spring Preparations Part Two

Last week, I shared some of my spring preparations.  Well, it turns out that all we have done in the past month or two was prepare for spring.  So this week I will share more of what we have done to prepare for this year and some pictures around the …

Gardening
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Spring Preparations

  I haven’t done any real interesting projects lately due to the urgent need to improve the soil for the gardens this year and every year to come.  We are focusing right now on cleanup and garden soil.  I have been raking leaves, building compost piles, cutting the logs that …

Gardening
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Cover Crops for Yards and Gardens

We have bad soil.  The busiest project I have had so far is to try to improve the soil, especially so that we can produce food.  You can’t grow food in clay and rocks.   So I use compost and hugel beds to give the soil a boost.  But this …