Recently, The New York Times wrote an op-ed about beans, A Boom Time for the Bean Industry. In it, staggering statistics like this show up: “Many canners and packagers are hiring staff or adding shifts to meet the surge in demand. Typically, Rancho Gordo receives 150 to 200 orders a day for its specialty beans….
Tag: farmhouse
What To Plant Now: A Sampling of Spring Seeds
I’m getting lots of messages and questions about planting and that makes me so happy—think of all the adults and kids digging their hands in dirt! And think of the truly immeasurable joy of giving and receiving a hand grown bouquet of homegrown food…It’s enough to make you cry, quite truly, during these times. So….
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Video: This Wild Life – A short story trailer for Eating Buckets
What do you wish for? What keeps you up at night? Where will your heart take you? Brian and I ask each other these questions often because it keeps us curious and alive, but we don’t often get to combine words and pictures and think about these questions the way we were able to in…
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Video: Farmhouse basement restoration
If you love old houses and restoration as much as I do, you’ll probably enjoy this sneak peek into our in-process farmhouse basement restoration and the story behind this big, awesome space. We’ve still got a ways to go before it’s done, but welcome, come on in! You might be surprised to find out what…
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DIY indoor coffee table garden.
This little DIY coffee table garden is making me happy today. I’m dreaming of warmer days and green shoots in the garden. This little bit of bright green life is a good reminder “Spring is just around the corner,” as Frog likes to tell Toad. It’s really easy to make: Just find a serving tray…
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Winter days in our old farmhouse: Making, resting, and planning.
Winter in the Pacific Northwest is distinctively dark. Here in our old farmhouse I like to imagine all the quiet fireside chats that have been shared here over the past 120 years while our home’s residents settled into the rhythm of “getting through” these long, dark winter days. One of my favorite parts of winter…
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Photo Diary: Buckets and Buckets and Buckets of Life.
Everything around us is bursting with burgeoning, blossoming, gorgeous, incredible, inspiring, life-giving, life-supporting, life-affirming, nature-built pieces of art. From the blackberry blossoms to the clusters of Italian plums to the Braeburn and heirloom and Fuji and Transparent apples and Bosc pears to the greens and peppers and tomato blossoms, to the first fire-orange nasturtiums, and…
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A brighter light.
The days are getting longer–morning coffee is still imbibed piping hot in the dark, but the sun has made its appearance by the time the kids are off to school. Brian missed the early ferry to work today so we had a rare morning together at the marina with extra cups of fancy caffeine from…
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This old stove.
I fell in love with old stoves when I was a kid reading about Ma’s cooking in Little House on the Prairie. I could very nearly taste Ma’s fat-fried cornbread cooked to perfection in a cast iron fry pan over an open fire. And while we’ve nearly replicated that experience at various times while camping…
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Garden planning.
I’m eating reheated shepherd’s pie and sipping hot tea with honey while browsing through the Sero Seed catalog and dreaming about spring and summer garden harvests. It’s time to start planning. I’m taking an inventory of what worked last year and I’m going to start building out our wish lists for this year. Then I’ll…
