What Did You Prep This Week

We finally got to rototiller the garden!! It has been so wet this spring but finally t we got in there and now there calling for rain again this weekend =( i hope there wrong but we are tackling the garden for the next little while. Still have to get seeds though, i am really wanting to learn how to keep seeds and gather. Im going to buy the heirloom seeds and go from there. I have never kept them before so this is something new but i think it something important i really wanna start doing and stock pile (natural) seeds.

It must be the weekend for it. My mom and dad came and helped us rototill the garden. It looks humungous right now - 100 x 60 feet - empty and waiting for plants and seeds. I am feeling just a little bit intimidated by how much work it will be to keep it looking decent...but happy to have the opportunity to grow so much food.

ya i think it must be! ours is quite big to but not sure of the measurements. It is pretty intimidating though when it is empty =S We were at walmart today to grab a few things (our juice jug broke lol) and i was very disappointed, out of the hundreds of seed packs they had they only had 4 different kinda of Heirloom but i bought some seeds and going to the local gardening center for more tomorrow! We are doing mounds for each veggie, so im going to try and focus on one at a time and start at one end and work my way through. But we do have to get a fence of some sort, deer came and ate the leaves off our new cherry tree's =(

Thank you for that PDF too! Il going to print it out asap! =)

Studying up on my knowledge of local edible plants and mushrooms on a great site: http://northernbushcraft.com/plants/index.htm

heirloom seeds available at :
http://www.saltspringseeds.com/

or I got loads of different ones

6 - 22.7 kg boxes of kitty litter
20 lb cat food
2 rhubarb plants
3 watermelon plants
12 celery plants
Dried a batch of watermelon & a batch of celery
Got about 20% of the back yard gutted
Graded the old fencing that I got for free for building raised beds
Re-did 2 "gardens"
Did several hours of gardening for mom - abt 25% of her garden will be stuff for me 🙂

vanislemom here.

Recently bought myself a new sleeping bag at CanTire. I've been looking for months, finally was in the mood to spend money. It is the kind with arms and a hood, and a thin memory foam pad, supposed to be good to minus one.

At work yesterday I rescued a bagful of partially used votive candles from the garbage bin. I have been collecting candle bits for sometime now, the plan is to melt them and pour over cardboard egg cartons stuffed with dryer lint to make fire starters.

My adjustment to life on my own, since my daughter got married and moved to Seattle, has been slow. I've been feeling exhausted so my great re-organization plans have only been to move a few things here or there. 🙄

I used a gift card from my daughter to get The Back to Basics Handbook. Russells on Fort in Victoria is selling it for $7, as well as the companion about Homesteading.

Gave up my plans to refurbish my dad's old rv. The weather here finally dried out long enough for him to start looking at the motor. The problem is that when the engine is started the battery will start to boil and some other small part starts to smoke. After looking over the inside of the camper part, I realized that there is just too much wrong with the whole unit, it could cost five thousand just to get on the road. The floor is mushy in more than one spot, the whole ceiling needs to come down, tires, etc. etc. We just don't have the facilities to go whole hog on it. 😥 oh well.

Added one pair of -20 leather work gloves, 2 more partial first aid kits, a tow rope, 200 dust masks. Not much but time and money were limited this week.
Also am finally taking the plunge in a joint effort with my wife's grandmother to purchase an Excalibur and 4 dehydrating books from Amazon.

AP

Found a UFA store that had a whole batch of various heritage seeds for sale. Picked up some. Now to learn how to store them properly.

slow week purchase wise...5 packages wine yeast.
mostly working in the yard to make more useable garden space for next year.

Edited in Saturday...
Found 2 windows out for trash...perfect for the planned chicken coop!

I spend $85 at the dollar store this morning. 😮

I bought some more stuff for our 72 hour bucket. Including folding toothbrushes!
I have the toothbrush, small toothpaste, tube of advil, wet wipe and dental floss in plastic pill bottles. 1 for each of us.

Best buy was steel cut oats. 1.25 for 680 g. I bought 5 of those. I may be back for more.
5 bottles of lemon juice
3 boxes of sea salt. Now I have canning salt, sea salt and regular salt.

I dehydrated potatoes last week and then I made "instant scalloped potatoes" using potatoes and onions that I dehydrated. Just add 2 and 3/4 cup of water and 3 tbsp of butter, then bake.

Oven dried some dry goods and have plenty more to do. navy beans, black beans and great northern beans.
Also bought rolls for my vacuum sealer.

good sales at the local grocery stores....$1.00 dollar days and I dropped a couple of hundred dollars

now were to put it lol

Got the backup BOV running again...needed a new starter.
This is an old Ford Aerostar...looks like crap, hole in the manifold so very loud, power steering leaks, but it still runs and will carry a lot of stuff. The wife will take the newer Venture with passengers while I take this one with gear. The Ford is also our only vehicle with a trailer hitch, so I needed to get it going again.
It took sooooooooo much abuse before I got it that sometimes I wonder how it still runs, but you can't kill it...believe me the former owner tried!

10 chickens of laying age( 6 eggs the first day) and the garden rototilled for the second time. Also an expanded chicken tractor

Made a mini kit for my purse so that I have the necessities with me at all times (particularly for when I am at work or running errands)

Bought and planted two varieties of Haskap berries ....so now we have raspberries, gooseberries, black currants, red currants and the Haskaps.
Also bought and put in garlic chives, oregano plant, 9 Roma tomatoes, 1 Black Krim (heirloom), 1 Germans stripe (heirloom), an heirloom salad tomato, Lemon hot pepper , jalapenos and an Asian hot pepper .
http://haskap.ca/

ETA I also have put Brandywine, Marmande heirloom seedlings I started in the ground as well and some Kung Pao hot Thai type hot peppers I started from seeds.

Will be getting a 10 year old brand new 295 amp stick welder. Got it through unfortunate circumstances, but I got it with all the extras.