Forest Grove Farmer's Market Part 1

Finally made it out to the Forest Grove Farmers Market yesterday. This was the second week for the market but I was unable to make it last week because I was at work late, was tired, I think it was raining (can I come up with more excuses). Not that I don't enjoy the Grove market, but I think I was spoiled by the Beaverton Farmers Market as you can see from previous posts from last year. I am glad to go to my local farmer's market but it is small as compared to Beaverton's which is the largest in the area, probably the largest in the region if not the state.

The market is located on Main Street just north of Pacific Avenue, they close the entire block. I first did a walk through to see what was there and then went shopping. I only found one booth that had some potatoes and rhubarb, since I still have potatoes I got about a pound of rhubarb. I have some apricots and strawberries at home so I'll make a nice fruit pie using this recipe. A number of the vendors who have farms were selling starts but since I've got all of my seeds in the ground or ready to be planted I didn't get any.

My wife was talking to a vendor who was selling pepper plants so I got a jalapeno plant to try out. I like jalapenos but don't eat too many, mostly slice some up when I make fajitas. I might put in a pot to grow or I think I have some room after the last fennel plant to put it in the ground. I''ll see how it turns out, the guy running the booth told me how to dry the seeds and I can plant from that next year.

Also got a "Buy Local" bumper sticker with the Forest Grove Farmers Market logo on it, put that on the car as soon as I got home. I also got into a conversation with Dori owner of Creations by Dori since I was carrying my Peak Oil bag. My wife bought two bracelets, one for herself and one for her sister. There were a number of other vendors selling food and one that had a bunch of organic eggs and a few selling crafts, candy, jerky and other nice items.

As the season goes on I know there will be more items to choose from, waiting for peaches and especially eggplant. Can't wait for eggplant to arrive. I wish I planted some this year, but I am trying to start walking before breaking into a full sprint. Wonderful eggplant, I am waiting for you.

Tearing Up My Lawn Part 1

One of the main reasons why my wife and I purchased a house was for the opportunity to grow our own food. We took our time and found a wonderful house that we love and has a full southern exposure in the backyard. The yard has about 3000 square feet of lawn, I decided to start at the eastern end of the yard to start tearing it up. Not having any experience but a strong determination, I got started.

Having shovels, rakes and implements of destruction, I mapped out strips where I would grow my "crops". Talking with a co-worker, I was advised not to remove all grass but to leave strips in between. He has a small yard and has to put down straw to keep things from getting too muddy. I dug up rectangular strips about twelve feet long and about two feet wide. Of course sticking to my peak oil principle of reducing my carbon footprint I didn't use any electric tools but good old fashion hand tools.

I first marked the area with a shovel then went through and dug up the grass trying to leave as much soil as possible. I took the strips and added them to my compost pile which gave it a large amount of brown mixture to combine with my mostly green mixture pile. I was also able to bring a bunch of worms over which I believe is necessary to help my compost. I should have read more up on this, I'll have another post about my trials and tribulations with composting later on. I think it may be starting to work, but I want to be sure before I write about it.

The process took a few days. I found out my soil is clay which makes it a bit hard to dig and move around. Hopefully next year when I get that compost pile to start working I can use it to mix with the soil. But even with the soil not 100% perfect for growing you can still grow something. I dug up the first three strips to plant garlic, lettuce and onions. After preparing my seed in a mini style greenhouse I had a lot of onion starts but didn't have many lettuce starts.

I then put a few lettuce start in the north side of the middle strip and some fennel in the south end. I put in about thirty garlic cloves in the eastern strip and about fifteen onion starts in the western strip. All but one of the garlic cloves have shot up, a few of the lettuce are growing and now most of the onions are starting to grow. I did add more onion and lettuce seeds, some of the starts just did not take.

The plan is for this weekend to tear up two more strips for the twelve tomato plants that I have growing to get them in by the end of the month. More photos to come.