I finally convinced my family to do a Whole 30 with me, or should I say I convinced my hubby he didn't have a choice. ;) They kids are pretty on board. As I sat down to figure out the plan I realized something. I always thought it'd be easier for me to eat Whole 30 if the Whole family was doing it, and that might be true, but it is far harder to plan. I'm way more flexible than the rest of the family, especially the hubster. This week's meal was further complicated by the fact that my two girls are doing their very first figure skating lessons this week in the form of a one week camp...they need to bring lunch. Also, an unforeseen championship baseball game will be played tonight which means I need a portable dinner. This week was probably the longest I've ever taken to do a meal plan.
One good thing was I noticed a lot of the dinners have enough veggies in the main dish that I'm not too worried about having a lot of side dishes. That makes the work easier during this busy week.
Without further ado, here is this week's meal plan:
If you've done a Whole 30 with your family and have any go-to recipes you used or things everyone liked, I'd love to hear about them in the comments!
I've said before that I wear many hats, as lots of us do. I am a mother of 3 and a wife. I left my job teaching to stay home with my kids when I had my first. I now work at home. I write curriculum, help at my kids schools (a lot more than I should), keep our home on the path of more and more natural, dream of homesteading (and therefore have crazy goals about money that take up some time), I'm a writing a cookbook, and do the millions of things that happen when you're stay at home mom who wants to eat from the garden.
While I love my life, there are times I feel pulled in many different directions and what I should prioritize becomes confusing. I find that if I try to lay things out in order of priority, I end up never getting to the stuff in some areas and that stuff needs to get done too. If I prioritize the house and kids above writing curriculum and the cookbook, I never get the writing done. I've just figured out that I shouldn't necessarily be prioritizing one area over another, but instead addressing the highest priorities in each part on its own. So I'm currently trying a new way of organizing myself. I'm focusing more what needs to get done in a month in each area, and then trying to chunk that up into weeks. Sometimes a week will be a half and half split, but mostly each week has a theme.
The main home stuff stays the same. Laundry, food, a weekly 1 - hour cleaning routine...that stuff still happens. But in between those things are chunks of time I dedicate to whatever is on my list for the theme that week.
Here's an example in the form of my May goals and how it works out in my blocks:
On the homestead:
-Get the rest of the garden planted
-deep clean the kitchen
-make our week by week summer plans (I do these every year)
-Quarterly $ report (I should have done that in April)
I have this margin thing that I just write in after I've made my list. I break stuff up into the weeks. This looks different each month. I don't always spend 1 week in each area. Right now I'm focusing more on my curriculum (TPT) because school will be out soon and I won't have much time to work on it. It's the type of stuff that needs to be done without kids around. However, I can get cooking done with the kids around so the summer months will have more of a cookbook and homestead focus. The purple in the margin on the calendar below is how I've broken down my focus each week in May.
How I chunk out the work:
This is adapted from the book The 12 Week Year, a book I highly recommend. I'll likely blog about it in some future post. It was valuable to me mostly in the motivational aspect. But this is how it looks after I've tinkered with it. I'm in week 2 of May, so my focus this week is getting projects done around the house and garden. These aren't the basic maintenance things that happen every day and every week, like laundry, etc...these are projects or yearly maintenance things.
I start by taking a blank one of these schedules. I then put in all the "hard" items for the week. By hard, I mean things that will happen at a certain time. I can't change when baseball practice is so that is a hard item. I can be flexible about when I water the garden so that is not a hard item. For simplicity's sake, I usually put all the hard items in one color. I don't color code these, I just choose one color for the week. This week purple was closest to me so all the hard items are in purple. Next week it might be a different color. Choosing a color is not a stress point here. Just seeing the division between the 'must be at' items and the rest is what I'm going for.
Once I have all the hard items, I put in my morning and evening routine times (pencil) and then start to find chunks of time I can work on my list of projects for the week. I try to look for chunks of about 3 hours. So in this example, all green items are the major to-dos for the week, coming straight from my list of 'on the homestead' items above. In an effort to be realistic about the fact that things come up last minute, I get tired, etc...I try to plan in a large rest block and a catch up block later in the week or on the weekend. That allows me to read or watch YouTube without feeling guilty, and give me a time to finish up something that didn't get all the way finished during its scheduled time earlier in the week.
I'm attaching a PDF with a blank version of this if you'd like it:
I've been doing this for about 6 weeks now. I have to say, it has given me more balance. I don't get everything done, and I let go of that expectation a few years ago, but I do feel like I'm moving forward for once in all my goal areas rather than just maintaining. Does that make sense? I'm going to try it for at least another 6 weeks before I decide for sure to keep or toss this system, but right now, I don't see it going anywhere. Moving forward actually keeps me more motivated so I waste less time and enjoy productivity more.
I started more than a year ago purging 100 things a month. I've kept it up for about 16 months now. I've only been short of my 100 items two months but most months I've gone over. You'd think I'd have hardly anything left around here. But no, I still feel like the clutter closes me in. ;)
I haven't kept as good of track this year, but I have made myself a few notes and taken a few quick pics with my phone.
Here's the run down on what I've gotten rid of in 2016:
January:
Fall/Thanksgiving/Christmas items
a few articles of clothes
trash from kitchen clean out (random toothpick in drawers, mis-matched silverware, etc...)
a purse (I replaced it though)
place mat
cookie cutter
2 sandwich cutters
pot holder
cone shapers
spatula
mommy hook
office supplies (pens, erasers, cds)
make up
hand towels
beach towel
2 small Tupperware sauce containers
cleaned out my deep freezer (didn't count but it was a lot)
February:
I cleaned out part of the garage which enabled me to combined stuff to let go of one box and some old teaching stuff. I also got rid of 5 cleaning rags and 2 cookbooks.
Those boxes above are all empty and going to my mother in law for her up coming move. Way more than 100 items this month.
March: Got rid of so much that it looks like we're moving!
a few pairs of pants
assorted trash from my girls' room
We had a great kids' rooms clean out - most of which I sold at a consignment sale:
tons of kids clothes
20 kids books
3 toys
play kitchen
10 toys went to the trash
April:
I cleaned out a cabinet in the kitchen- one of those that ends up being a catch-all for things. This bag is entirely from that.
and I also got rid of some extra towels, shoes, decorative items and 23 articles of my clothing.
It's been freeing to get rid of stuff. I look around now don't feel as much fear or sentimentality connected to my stuff. I'm hoping to get to the rest of my garage in May as well as my bedroom. I have lots of clothes that are too small and too big, and lots of not bedroom stuff that got dumped there during the holidays.
This week we have two weeknight baseball games! :( I'm hoping coach cancels practice on Tuesday since we have two other nights going but I can't count on it. I also have a PTA meeting on a practice night and we have school carnival set up this week. It's that crazy time of the school year! I also planned a craft retreat week for myself so that I can relax a bit. I'm getting overwhelmed. Since my craft room is at mother in law's it's easy to feel like a retreat without leaving town. That means today (Monday) I'm finishing up a bunch of home stuff and the rest of the week I will be at my craft room when the kids are in school (during the time I'm not also at school volunteering or running errands).
That said, dinner plans this week took some creativity.
Here's what I came up with:
Note- For my own menu I'm streamlining this week to make it easier. I'm having eggs with roasted veggies and greens all week except Wednesday and Friday, which are days I can eat what the kids do. I'm having a juice from the juicer or smoothie and either nuts or veggie sticks for lunch daily, and for dinner I'm having a salad with chicken except Tuesday.
Monday: the kids have cereal every Monday, We have a baseball game so I'm taking chicken parmesan sammies and fruit to the fields for dinner on the go.
Tuesday: the kids have french toast for breakfast and I'm putting in a 3 envelope roast for dinner. I don't actually use envelopes. I make my own dry mixes for this, but I still call it three envelope roast. I need to make mashed potatoes in the morning and put them in the fridge to just reheat for dinner. We have a PTA meeting after school and baseball practice so I will have no time except the morning for any dinner prep at all.
Wednesday: All of us will have no nitrate bacon and various fruits for breakfast. Hamburger chili dish for dinner.
Thursday: Another baseball game day . The kids will have cinnamon toast, fruit, and yogurt for breakfast. I'm inventing a chicken broccoli noodle bowl to take to the fields for dinner. There are a ton of recipes for this type of thing, but I'm going to wing it.
Friday: We all have homemade turkey sausage and applesauce for breakfast. For dinner we'll have Mexican chef salad. It's quick and easy and we'll be coming home from carnival set up about half an hour before dinner.
See yesterday's post if you'd like to know what I do for weekend meals.
What are you guys planning for this week? If you've created a blog or YouTube post about I'd love to see a link in the comments! Or even just a rundown of you plan in the comments!
I belong this Facebook group called Frugal Family Food. I just posted the update that I'm copying and pasting here because I realized this morning that I've had a routine for saving money on groceries for a few years now that helps me save not by menu planning (though I do that diligently), and not by shopping deals (which I also do diligently), but by just wasting less. I've built a refrigerator cleaning routine and menu planning routine that builds in the need to use things up. Just wanted to share it!
Here's what I posted:
Sunday is always my clean out the fridge and menu plan day. I realized just today that my whole method for meal planning and fridge cleaning is built around frugality.
I only meal plan Monday through Friday (basing it around deals, the pantry, and freezer of course) and take note of any special things for the weekend that might need a plan. Then on the weekends we eat leftovers or I reinvent stuff. Doing this every weekend has made me be more consistent about using stuff up.
An example: this weekend we had a leftover buffet for lunch Saturday because we had enough leftover things to choose from. I had to use up some blueberries so I made blueberry muffins for breakfast and put the rest in the freezer for smoothies. Today for breakfast I roasted the leftover half of a red bell pepper and half a container of mushrooms. Then I pan fried a chopped up leftover baked potato and scrambled eggs with the potatoes red bell and mushrooms (so good!). With remaining stuff in the fridge I'm making an appetizer night for dinner that will have a crudites with tail ends of veggies, deviled eggs made with a few hard boiled eggs, mini pizzas on leftover hamburger buns, and mini fried rice bowls made with leftover brown rice and half a package of frozen mixed veggies. I might put those on romaine spears I have instead of in small bowls.
I don't know if it helps anyone to read that very long post, but I really always just recommend the stocking up on sale items thing when talking about frugal cooking and cooking with cheaper ingredients like potatoes. It wasn't til today that I remembered my whole routine building a few years ago in an effort to just waste less.
In the last few years my canning repertoire has broadened. I used to make two jellies; now I create my own recipes for jellies, and also make pickles and peppers, and can items from my garden. As any canner can tell you, I have a lot of those lids left after opening a jar of homemade goodness. The bands are reusable but the lids are supposedly not reusable. But I do...reuse them. Gasp! Here's how:
1- I reuse them for canning. I know! I'm not supposed to do that. I don't recommend doing that, but I had to be honest here. I check them carefully and if the there are no dents, rust, etc...and the rubbery part around the edge seems totally in tact and not dried out, I reuse it for canning. I've never had a problem. Again, do so at your own risk. This is not a recommended practice from any canning agency.
2- I reuse the ones that have dents (like the one below) for fridge and pantry storage. What do I store? Anything I put in mason jars! Not everything in a mason jar is canned. Have you ever frozen a smoothie in a mason jar? I put bulk spices in mason jars. I put dried beans other dried goods in mason jars. These non-canned items get my reused lids. The picture below is a juice I made and stored in the fridge for the next day. If you don't need some crazy awesome seal for shelf life, you can reuse a lid that has already been used.
3- I use the lids for storing things in the freezer. I make large batches of chili, pasta sauce, bone broth, etc... and I freeze them instead of canning them. For these I use the 'second time' lids. Make sure you leave more head space here for expansion while freezing.
So when do I throw them away?
1- When they're rusted. For some reason that just grosses me out.
2- When they're too dented to keep liquid in the jar. Sometimes I (or my kids) really bend a lid. Out it goes. But if I can put a juice in a jar and put on the used lid and band and lay it on its side without the liquid leaking out, I still use it.
I haven't planned side dishes yet, but I'm going with salad and fresh veggies with ranch and fruit salad with whatever fruits and veggies are on hand this week. It's baseball season and life is too busy for fancy meals.
I'm streamlining my Whole 30 eating for this week too. I'm either having the same breakfast, the same lunch, and the same dinner, or having what the family is having if it's Whole 30 friendly. I have too much to do this week to take joy in cooking and eating. I'll be eating in a rush most days this week. Next week I'll try to slow it down a bit and be more conscientious.
So here goes:
Monday: Breakfast - cereal for kids and eggs for me
lunch for me - a smoothie and nuts.
Dinner- Korean beef over rice for the family and lettuce wraps for me with avocado and pastrami
Tuesday: Breakfast - bacon and fruit for both kids and myself
lunch for me - veggies and hard boiled egg
dinner - cereal for the kids - don't ask - they talked me into it. And it's a late baseball night so it works for me. I'll have the same lettuce wraps with avocado that I'm having Monday.
Wednesday: Breakfast- Oatmeal cookie bake for the kids (it's healthy, I promise), and roasted veggies in scrambled eggs for me
lunch for me - smoothie and nuts
dinner - chicken and broccoli bowls for the whole family
Thursday- yogurt parfaits for the kids, roasted veggies and eggs for me
lunch for me- vegetables and hard boiled eggs
dinner - steak sandwiches for the family, steak on lettuce wraps for me
Friday: Breakfast - Sausage and applesauce for kids and myself
lunch for me - smoothie and nuts
dinner- homemade pizza for everyone - family movie night - Mine will be on a cauliflower crust
Saturday - breakfast - eggs and toast (mine without toast)
lunch for me - we'll be at a carnival type thing and the kids and hubby will have hot dogs, etc...I'll bring nuts and fruit to have
dinner - out after church
Snacks for me will be fruit and dried seaweed snacks.
Snacks for the kids will include fresh fruit and cheese (Babybels or string cheese) and the occasional nuts.
That's quite the title isn't it? I decided to not simplify or be catchy, but rather to go with something as complex as my life. I think all moms should, at some time, acknowledge how complex and all-encompassing it is to run a household.
This post has been rattling lightly in the back of my head for a while. You know why I did it today? Because it's an imperfect day. I was waiting for a great day that flowed smoothly and I was productive and...and while I wasted time waiting for that day, I realized it also wasn't real. It's not the reality of my day to day. My day to day rarely works out as planned. When it does, I've noticed, it's a day that doesn't have much planned because of some event, like an all day field trip.
So here's the truth about how today started. (I started this post last Thursday, so it's really about how last Thursday started.) ;)
I woke up a little after 2 this morning to go to the bathroom. That happens almost every night since having children. ;) But I couldn't get back to sleep for quite a while. I fell back to sleep around 4:30, but my alarm goes off at 5.
5- got up and tried to go back to sleep on the couch
5:30- couldn't get back to sleep so I got up and made lunches, sent my hubby on his way, and started the kids a breakfast of waffle sticks (homemade and frozen waffles from another time make a fast school morning breakfast!). I reviewed my day and prioritized it, and wasted a bit of time doing something I can't remember right now.
6:45- Woke up the kids for school. Got them and myself ready. Swapped a load of dishes.
7:30- Took the kids to school and then went to Trader Joe's for just a few items I forgot on Monday. I don't usually forget items. I am a great list maker. But this week is somehow off. My husband thinks I'm getting sick. I'm in denial about that because I've been eating healthier and that has relayed into getting sick less than everyone else in the house. I carry a bit of pride about that. I might soon be humbled.
8:30- Stopped at Starbucks on the way to home to treat myself to a mocha. I've been Whole 30 -ing January so at the last minute I ordered a hot tea instead. I'm proud of that one. I pulled into that drive through fully intending to break my no-sugar streak.
At home I unloaded groceries, and realized that I never started the dishwasher so I did that. ;)
9 am - Put dinner in the crock pot and sat down to waste a bit of time going through e-mails and watching YouTube. My plan was to work on a Social Studies curriculum unit I'm writing and I got stuck on it so I sent a survey out and took a break.
I wasted a lot of time on You Tube. I was really tired. I put a load of laundry in and that made me feel less lazy.
11 am- I was waiting for dishes so I could start some chili for myself. They were still drying so I put some apples in a pot to make applesauce. I scored organic red delicious apples at Sprouts yesterday for $0.48 per pound! They're not my favorite to eat but they make good sauce and we eat applesauce so I decided to make some. They also had organic Braeburns and I do love to eat those so I got those too ($0.98 per pound).
Once that was simmering on the stove I decided to take my iPhone outside to the backyard and do a quick tour of my backyard suburban homestead. Over the last few years, and with a Back to Eden no-til garden, I've had great summer gardens that are constantly expanding. That has given me a little more confidence to add more in to my yard and try a fall/winter garden. Here's the YouTube video I made of that tour.
I am slowly adding more, but not too much. We plan to start looking for property to move to in about 5 years so I want to plant stuff I'll be able to use a lot between now and then. I can't have chickens in my area of the city and I have elementary aged kids who love to play outside so there is only so much room for growing, but I thought it'd be nice for someone in the same situation to see how I make it work as much as possible.
This video tour doesn't include my front yard, which is slowly getting fruit trees, a butterfly garden, and an herb garden.
Then I sat down to write this post. I stopped in the middle to turn off the apples while they cooked so they could cool and be blended and I switched the laundry.
At 11:40 I realized I hadn't eaten much today and was suddenly starving. I do that sometimes. I started the chili and contemplated waiting for it to finish and decided that was a bad idea. Waiting for food when I'm hungry usually ends up with me making bad food choices. I made a few of these prosciutto wraps with arugula from my backyard and avocado. I made them earlier in the week with apple instead of avocado and I like that better.
While the meat in the chili was browning I started back on this post. Once caught up I started working on my Social Studies unit again.
1 pm-I worked for an hour on my unit, stopping occasionally to stir the chili. Then I felt the sleepless night hit me like a wall. I tried to lay down and get a quick power nap in before getting the kids. It's about balance here, trying to give myself grace and still be productive.
1:30- Got up, wasn't sleeping. Starting catching up on itemizing my expenditures.
1:45- got snacks and water and left to get this kids from school.
3:00- return from getting kids from school and got them started on homework.
While I was helping them with homework I was putting the final touches on dinner and swapping laundry and dishes...again.
5:00 By the time all this was done it was 5 and time to actually sit down and eat.
Anyone else fee like they spend far more time preparing food than eating it?
After dinner (5:30 ish) we took the dog for a walk.
By six we were home and I was having kids put their laundry away while I did mine, making notes for tomorrow, etc...
6:30 showers were started and rooms were getting ready. Some electronic play time was going on as well as some snuggle time. I got in the shower at 7. I prefer night showers.
7:50- prayer time and off to bed at 8.
The hubby got home right after 8. While he kissed the kids goodnight and read the Bible with our oldest (who actually has time in his room until 8:30) I got his portion of dinner heated up. We watched a recorded show, I think it was Fixer Upper and then I was in bed by 9.
I read My Utmost For His Highest in bed, but barely kept my eyes open. Lights were out for me by 9:15.
That's an exciting day around here. ;)
Every day looks different, some more productive than others. But I find that I'm often productive on some fronts but not all. I may nail my curriculum writing time but don't get much done around home. Or I get house projects done but not much of anything else. One day soon I hope to get into my craft room.
Is it just me, or is January a financially long month this year? It feels like it's taking forever for the new month to start! What do you do when you still have a week left and you're almost out of your grocery budget?
Normally I'd try to shift from other areas, but this month I decided to do my best to stay in budget before pulling from other categories. That's me being disciplined...my word of the year. But seriously, I have $40 left in the grocery budget and a family of 5! I had to get a lot of staples to get at the beginning of the month and that is hurting me now.
So here's my plan:
1- Scour the pantry and freezer to plan well...really well.
After looking around I have spaghetti, sauce in the freezer, potatoes, leftover roasted chicken, leftover chili, and some other odds and ends.
2- Figure out what you can make with those things - duh!
The chili needs to be used up now or frozen so chili baked potatoes will be tonight's meal. We had cereal and milk on hand for breakfast this morning.
Tomorrow (Tuesday) I'll use eggs I have on hand and a partial package of English muffins for breakfast sammies. The leftover roasted chicken will be mixed with bbq sauce and the cheese and tortillas in the fridge for bbq chicken quesadillas and fruit salad with the random bits of fruit I have in the fridge.
Wednesday I'll make breakfast cookies - already have all that stuff. Dinner will be spaghetti. I have one box of noodles in the pantry and I have plenty of homemade sauce in the freezer. I'll pick up one more box of noodles, which is cheap and budget friendly, for dinner. Green salad too. I make two boxes because my family now eats a crazy amount and my hubby and kids will like the leftovers in their lunches.
Thursday - I have waffles in the freezer from a batch I made a while ago. Time to use them up! This will be the one dinner that will cost a bit, but I'm out of meat at this point. I'll get the chicken on sale, and buns too, for Cafe Rio Chicken Sandwiches. It's a crock pot meal and I have all of the other ingredients that go into the chicken for it so I only need those two ingredients. Since I'm eating Paleo, I'll have this chicken on a salad. It's super on anything!
Friday- I got breakfast sausage this morning and I already have applesauce in the pantry. For dinner we'll make homemade pizza. I have everything I need except the pepperoni, ham, and some pineapple. I need ham for lunches anyway so that one package of lunch meat will last us this week.
Saturday I'll make either eggs or pancakes for breakfast, whatever the mood is at the time. There will be no bacon or sausage with it but I'll have some fruit still. For dinner we eat out after church Saturday night.
On Sunday the kids have cereal bars for breakfast, which we have enough of in the pantry, and I make random appetizers for dinner. Looks like appetizers will be mini sandwiches, fruit, veggies and dip, maybe more quesadilla slices if I still have tortillas at that point, crackers with some spread I'll invent with the leftover cafe rio chicken.
3- Scour the ads to get what I need at the cheapest prices possible.
This week I am making an extra trip to another grocery store to get chicken and strawberries that are on sale for a really great price. So good I'd normally stock up, but I can't right now. ;)
So I got a lot at my normal Trader Joes trip and spent $28.11. That leaves me with a little more for the chicken and strawberries. I'll hopefully remember to report back later this week with my final numbers.
4- What I won't be doing
There are a few things I'll skip this week. I have one gallon of milk so I won't buy more. Normally I would but I don't have room for it and it'll be close to the end of the month when we'd start the new gallon anyway. It won't hurt us to have water with breakfast for a few days if needed. It won't hurt me to not have milk for cereal next Monday, my lazy school breakfast day. I can make oatmeal or something instead.
I won't be getting crushers (or go go squeeze) for lunches. I get lazy and do that a lot. I'll be pulling from fruits and veggies in the fridge for lunches. I usually put one crusher and one fresh fruit or veggie, not this week. I'll find other stuff.
I won't grab extra fruits "just in case". If we run out, we'll really only be without it for a day or two. We'll live. It's not the end of the world.
As the past decade has gone by, I find myself more and more wanting to live a simpler life. I find myself less and less trustful of what big companies and government provide. Changes in thinking have me slowly doing more of my own food growing, buying at farmer's markets, planning for taking care of myself, not counting on the government to do it, etc...
This is not my yard. I found this picture online and used it for a vision board and thought I'd share. I think it's beautiful.
Along the way I've become a bit of an urban homesteader. I live in a fairly big city in southern California. While I've recently begun to dream of moving to some place with seasons and more space around me, I know I'm stuck here for at least 3 more years. I might address this in more detail another time, but this post is about what urban homesteading looks like at my place.
Just so you know, homesteading, urban or otherwise, does not have to reflect one hard and fast look. It can be many levels and take on many different looks. I started with a small garden plot, that is now double what it used to be. I'm in the middle of a two year plan to put a mini fruit orchard in my side yard. I can't have chickens in my area but I hope to (some day when we move). ;)
I also do more cooking from scratch. I make more chicken stock, can items, freeze things, etc....And I've found that the things I started canning and freezing and such, are really not as time consuming as I thought they'd be. Cooking and freezing dried beans instead of buying canned is way cheaper, way healthier, and pretty much all inactive time. Sometimes, in the midst of food preservation, I can't believe I thought I didn't have time for these things before.
Ok - again, not my picture. But beautiful!
So how do I "homestead" with a regular city tract home lot? Let's start by listing what I have to contend with:
-small lot- slightly less than 1/5 of an acre. It's around 7,800 square feet if I remember correctly. The house takes up quite a bit of that.
-City codes do not allow chickens on my lot size, or anything other than regular pets like dogs, cats, fish, etc...
So if I don't have room and can't have animals, what do I do?
- Last winter I started a mini fruit orchard using bare root trees. They're not producing for a another 2 years because they're bare root, but that allowed me to put in 5 trees in one month. That was nice on the pocket book. If you're not familiar with mini fruit orchards, I highly encourage you to go to YouTube and watch Dave Wilson Nursery videos. He has a whole series on high density fruit tree planting that will rock everything you think you know about having fruit trees. In the back I planted a peach tree several years ago that I espalier along the back wall to save space.
peach tree
- I also have a garden in the back. I takes up a strip along one side of our patio so there is still room for the kids to play in the grass, swing set, etc...
I know it's ugly right now, but it's still in the late summer die off phase. I'll hopefully get cool enough weather to plant fall stuff soon.
-Besides gardening and growing fruit, I do a lot more 'from scratch' cooking. I like knowing that when I cook and freeze beans, it's just the beans. There's no salt unless I add it, and even then it's good quality salt in the amount I want. There's no BPA from the can or plastic; there are no chemicals that aren't required by the government to be on the label. You get where I'm going? I know exactly what's in it, and that's just hard to know anymore when you buy stuff at the store. The labels are full of stuff that isn't food and not everything is required to be on the label.
I do the same with chicken stock as much as possible. After roasting a chicken, a carcass simmering away for a while with fresh herbs from the garden makes great chicken stock that I can trust. Saved money too.
-I bake a lot of bread, but not all of it. Someday I will. ;) I don't bake the regular wheat sandwich slices very often, but I frequently bake rolls, biscuits, and other loaves like dill bread and french bread. Again, have you looked at the ingredients for bread in the store? Bread shouldn't have an ingredient list more than about 5 items long.
-I make a lot of cleaners, but who doesn't these days. I still buy bleach and laundry soap, and furniture polish. Does anyone have a dusting spray recipe that's good? I haven't liked any of the ones I've tried but I don't want to keep using Pledge. :0 I do make my own rinse aid, fabric softener, room spray, and all purpose spray.
There might be more that I can't think of at the moment, but maybe I'll make a part 2 of the Urban Homesteading blog post. I might go more in depth about the cooking part. We shall see.
Do you homestead? Urban homestead? I'd love to know what 'homesteading' things you do!
