links for 2010-04-16

Continue Readinglinks for 2010-04-16

Local Food Indianapolis and Green Indianapolis links

In the process of signing up for a local food co-op, we’ve been reading several local blogs about local food and green living.

Local Food Blog for Indianapolis – http://www.goinglocal-info.com/

Local Food Blog (not based in Indy) – http://www.eatlocalchallenge.com/

A Guide to Local Foods in Indianapolis – http://www.goinglocal-info.com/my_weblog/indiana_food_guide.html

Finding Local Food Markets in Indiana
http://www.indianafarmdirect.com/index2.php
http://www.goinglocal-info.com/my_weblog/community-sponsored-agriculture.html

Indianapolis Green Blogs

http://urbanindy.blogspot.com/

http://www.green-lemonade.com/

Local Green Email List – http://www.greenpieceindy.com

Local Green Magazine – http://www.indianalivinggreen.com/

We ended up signing up for Farm Fresh Delivery, which our friend Jen signed up for a while back. They’re a local farm that delivers a bin of their produce on a weekly or every-other-week basis, and you can add some other groceries like fresh baked bread, eggs, milk or yogurt from local farms if you want. I’m happy about this because I’m wanting to change my regular eating habits to focus more on fruits and and lean meats, with fewer processed foods and fewer starches and refined sugars. It’s also nice because we’re supporting local growers and our food won’t be traveling as far and burning lots of gas to reach us.

I picked up Michael Pollan’s “In Defense of Food” the other day (with a gift card! I’m not violating my New Year’s resolution) and it outlines what many books I’ve read about eating cover – leaner meats, fish, more vegetables, whole grains, less processed foods and less sugar. That fits nicely with The Okinawa Diet and You: The Owner’s Manual, which I’ve read previously.

Continue ReadingLocal Food Indianapolis and Green Indianapolis links

Gardening

You’ll have to pardon me – this is on of those posts that’s just making notes for myself to refer back to later. Last night I planted in the front flowerbeds:
1 purple lavender
1 orange symphony
1 summertime pink charma
2 Dianthus – Confetti Deep Red
2 Dianthus – Spangled Star
A seed packet of Butterfly Flowers
2 Broadway Lights Daisies
3 Shasta Daisies
2 Coreopsis – Rising Sun
2 Pensteman – X Mexicali
1 Delphinium – Summer Blue
1 Delphinium – Blue Mirror
4 Delosperma – Cooperi Yellow

Over the weekend, we planted lettuce, cucumbers, radishes, sugar snap peas, rhubarb, and green onions. Still to plant are seed packets of Columbines and more Blue Mirror Delphiniums. I also plan to buy and plant hostas and Pachysandras in the back corner of the house near the deck to fill in the space and reduce mowing in that awkward corner. Clematis will go next to the deck to climb up the trellis. Additionally, I need to set up the copper pipe trellis from the garage and start some Clematis growing on it at the side of the house. I still need to finish weeding the side bed and get some small fencing around the vegetables to keep the bunnies out. After all this work, I’ll need to arrange for garden rubbish disposal in Auckland to keep everything neat and tidy.

Continue ReadingGardening

2007 Spring Flowers

Hyacinths

April 2007 flowers

The 200 bulbs we planted last fall are coming up nicely in front of our house, and last night I planted 2 daisy plants and a lavender plant in the front. I also bought seeds for Columbines, Butterfly plants, and Delphiniums, and the other day Stephanie and I planted seeds in a starter kit for Texas Blue Bonnets and Aster.

I need to get some topsoil to prepare beds for our vegetables; we’re planting lettuce, cucumbers, sugar snap peas, green onions, rhubarb, radishes, oregano, parsley and basil. I hope. We need to get started soon. This is the first year I’ve planted vegetables, so I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing.

Continue Reading2007 Spring Flowers

Projects Around the House (Revised)

Revised list of stuff I’d like to accomplish this weekend, if I have time…

  1. Help the neighbors clean up brush
  2. Sweep out the back of my truck
  3. Put my truck bed cover on the truck
  4. Rearrange the living room furniture
    We got part of this done. We still need to move my desk
  5. Rearrange the library and move my desk in there
  6. Clean the kitchen and downstairs bathroom
    We got a lot of work done in the kitchen
  7. Vacuum whole first floor
  8. Take more stuff to the basement (chairs, tools)
  9. Vacuum in the basement
  10. Bring extra waste basket from garage into house for recycling
  11. Clean the aquarium
  12. Plant the rest of the bulbs in the flowerbeds
    I planted 25 Muscari bulbs, 30 daffodils, 2 bleeding hearts cuttings, 2 bearded Iris cuttings, 1 peony cutting, 6 hyacinths, and about 50 tulip bulbs. I have about 75 more tulip bulbs to plant.

    I finished planting all the bulbs.
  13. plant edging pavers into side flower bed
  14. Add step to bottom of basement stairs
  15. Install coat rack bar in Dining Room Closet
  16. Install additional shelf in Laundry room
  17. attach lattice to the back porch
  18. install towel hooks and toilet paper holder in upstairs bathroom
  19. examine top two basement stairs and measure for replacement
  20. hang some of the framed artwork
Continue ReadingProjects Around the House (Revised)

Amending the Soil

Me and my load of crap.
Our flower beds have very depleted soil, so I picked up a load of compost this morning and spread it around the beds after overturning all the soil. It’s amazing how much compost this requires, really. I’ll need to get another load of crap for the front beds; a truckload only covered the beds on the south side of the house. Technically, it’s not just crap – it’s a mixture of compost, peat and topsoil. But it smells like crap and attracts LOTS of flies, so basically it’s crap.
You can see a bunch more pictures of the work I did here.
I got it from Indiana Mulch Company, because I priced it in comparison to the bags at Lowes and this is a way better deal. They also are handy because they’re right downtown (we pass them on the way to the recycling place) so I don’t have to drive all over to get it.
Homestarrunner's poopsmith
I in no way resembled this character while shoveling shit.

Continue ReadingAmending the Soil