I have become quite the joiner this past week! Although I love the virtual community of gardeners, I have been searching for ways to join a community of gardeners here in Portland. It’s proven more challenging than I first anticipated. I began the search with gardening clubs. To date, I have found only a couple gardening clubs and their members are mostly 60+. Probably the
May Plantings
A big highlight from this weekend was spending the day with my sweet nephew, Evan, on Saturday. Evan, Jay and I all went to check out Renn Fayre, which is an annual student celebration/party that happens every spring on the Reed College campus. The students build crazy tents, sculptures, etc and spend the weekend hanging out with friends, dressing in costumes, and most likely consuming
Rain Garden Workshop
This past Saturday I attended a workshop on building rain gardens, which was organized through East Multnomah Soil & Water Conservation District, the Johnson Creek Watershed Council, and Leach Botanical Garden. The workshop was held out at the Leech Botanical Garden in outer SE, which I have never been to before. It was a very peaceful and serene environment and I would love to go
First Farmers Market
Portland’s largest farmers market will be opening for the season tomorrow! I love this downtown market, near Portland State University along the park blocks. It is open from 8:30am to 2:00 in the afternoon. The farmers market near me, the Lents International farmers market, won’t be open until June. It is much smaller and less exciting than the downtown one on Saturdays, but this year
New Additions
I spent my Sunday afternoon at the downtown Powell’s bookstore and came away with a couple new and exciting additions to my book collection. As I went in search of the permaculture books in the gardening section, I realized there is a whole new addition in the area called “Sustainable Living”. I just about screamed in joy at this discovery! It’s a whole aisle of
Newspaper Seed Pots
This is the first year I am starting seeds indoors for my vegetable and herb garden. In the past, I have been willing to take my chances shoving seeds directly in the ground when the weather was warm enough. After my experience last year with my urban chickens digging up and eating so many of my seeds, I thought transplanting small plants might improve the
The Produce Bible/Gardening Gifts
The latest addition to my growing cookbook collection is called The Produce Bible, by Leanne Kitchen (nice name). I was wandering through the Powell’s Home & Garden location on Hawthorne and it caught my eye. Although I have a few books already with some good gardener/farmer’s market recipes, this one has been a nice addition. It was one of the staff recommendations and the photography
Back on the Bike
After completing my recent travels, my body decided to round everything out with a nice head cold today. I guess that is my body telling me to slow down a little. Ugh, I hate being sick – I get so bored at home when I can’t allow myself to do anything productive. Hopefully I’ll kick the cold quickly. Jay and I took advantage of the
You Grow Girl
My friend Erika mentioned this book to me about a year ago, called “You Grow Girl” by Gayla Trail. I was in the midst of my permaculture high from finishing up “Gaia’s Garden” by Toby Hemenway, so I didn’t really let her recommendation sink in… (By the way – just to pat myself on the back – I got “Gaia’s Garden” from Jay for Christmas