Square Foot Garden Begins!!!

Here is the first step in my square foot garden...building the frame. I took two 8ft, cedar 2x6's and cut them in half. Screwed them together with galvanized screws, lined the bottom with burlap and tadaa! Instant site for a garden! I am going to add the soil mixture later, but here's a good start. This could be used in an entry way, on a patio, on the side of the house, think of the spots that you have 4ft x 4ft in you yard or patio and you could build one of these. OR! Just build a box as big as you want and plant whatever you want as well! Enjoy mini gardening.

Here are some plants that I am starting indoors, so that later I can plant them outside. Garlic (the tall ones), carrot tops (maybe they'll sprout?), and some onions and beans in the container. (which is some leftover deli containers filled with vermiculite, on top of each other to create a mini green house). The onion seeds have started to sprout, the beans are taking a little while longer.



I will continue to post updates on how my progress is going! I am curious to see how much produce I can get from this one garden and in future gardens!!!



I got all these fun ideas from:



the All New Square Foot Gardening book and website!

Have you checked out T-Bag lately? Biker friendly!

There's a group in my hometown of Tempe, AZ thats trying to raise awareness for bicycles as transportation and fun that has a website you have to check out!

TBAG

Good People!

How many paper towels do you use in the Bathroom?

Just a little check to see if everyone can cut back on their paper towel usage after using public restrooms. Just think how many trees would be saved if we all only use one paper towel at a time...or better yet, just wipe your hands on your pants!

Composting is Fun! and good for the green lifestyle!

Composting: the collecting of ones kitchen scraps and paper products, mixing together for a few months and creating black gold! If you don't know already, composting is a great way to be green! Not only are you not throwing your organic garbage in the landfill to rot and add to the escalating amounts of methane, but you're creating the worlds best fertilizer! It's the circle of life all inside of a garbage pail. You ad organic material, add water, add more material, wait, stir, wait, stir, add, wait, stir...when your compost is a nice shade of black, you are ready to put it in your garden where you will grow tasty, healthy vegetables that you will cut up and throw the scraps into your compost pile and thus, the circle continues.

My wife and I have been composting all of our non-cooked kitchen scraps (minus meat product and dairy) and all of our shredded office paper in our backyard composter for the last three months. We have noticed that we are taking the garbage out less and less each week and truley destroying our disposed financial documents (who wants to dig through my compost for my credit card number?) We also throw in all of our dryer lint, paper towel and toilet paper tubes, weeds, dead leaves, egg shells, fireplace ashes, etc.
So far, we have only filled our 25 gallon trash can less than half way. You can use any container you want to hold your compost, we chose this 25 gallon Brute trash can for its compact size and tight fitting lid. We just leave it in the back yard and let it do it's magic. I stir it about once a week to airrate it and to mix all the good stuff together. I added a little water to begin the pile with and haven't added any more lately. You want it moist, not wet, but moist. If you have to much liquid drain it off into a bucket and dissolve 1 cup of the tasty brown liquid into one gallon of water to make "compost tea." You can then give all of your plants a drink of this perfect food. It's like a V8 for your plants! You want to make sure you have a good 1 to 3 ratio of greens (kitchen scraps, weeds, lawn cutting, etc.) and browns (carboard, newspaper, office paper, etc)... This makes sure you have a perfect mixture of carbon and nitrogen, which make the compost alive. I have thought about adding some red worms to the mix, but I am afraid I will bake them in the container. I am looking at some worm farms to help break down some of my waste sooner.

I will be updating everyone on the progress of my compost bin. I plan on using it in my Square Foot Garden...Coming Soon!!!

Here's a couple links for extended reading on composting:

How to compost.org

Tree hugger.com

Anti-Radiation Diet

A friend of mine send this link over to me today... It includes some information on what foods are good for you and which vitamins are essential to fighting old age. I use some of the foods and vitamins in this article, but I am definetly going to up my intake after reading it! Click, Live long and eat good food!

bbgb's Organic Humus Recipe

mmm....humus.

1 can of organic garbanzo beans (drained, save liquid)
2 cloves of fresh garlic
2 tablespoons of organic tahini
2-4 tablespoons of organic olive oil
Juice of 1 lemon
1 blender
1 big bag of pita chips or flat bread

Blend all ingrediendts in blender on medium, adding garbanzo bean juice to thin consistency. Garish with tomatoe's, olives, cucumber slices, etc. Try not to eat it all at once, no one will kiss you for a long time:( If you like it let me know!!!

Eat less meat, Ride a bike!

As said by Rajendra Pachauri at a Paris press confrence, "Please eat less meat -- meat is a very carbon intensive commodity," Read the article here.

Welcome to Bob's Big Green Blog!!!

This is the first post on bbgb! I am a newbie at blogging and am using this as my test subject...(wahaaaahahahah...evil laugh:) I wanted to start a blog to tell the world of my opinions of living the green lifestyle. I am not perfect, (as none of us are), but am constantly striving to do something everyday to lessen my impact on the earth. Check back often for new posts and tips!!!

Thanks for checking,

Bob's Big Green Blog