Thrift-Cycling

 I did a short tutorial last time. As I said, I love designing things in my head. Often, it's cheaper to get fabric from thrift store clothes, and re-purpose them. Cheap and Eco-friendly usually go hand in hand. I just wanted to post some of the projects I did last Saturday. These ranged from easy to more difficult.

Here was the easiest sweater I did. I took a XL sweater from the thrift store, because of the shoulder seem, I really just outlined my measurements, turned it inside out and sewed down the line.

 

This is a dress I found and loved the design of the fabric. So I made into a dress I could wear to work...

 

 

And I am in love with tunics these days. Here are three 'items' I got from the thrift store, riped to shreds and re-fashioned.



Sewing: Not as hard as you think

Flannel Dress

This will be the worse tutorial you have ever read. The point is, you can do it yourself.

I am the laziest seemstress in the world, i only measure for pragmatic reasons, not as a way of being precise. I do not use patturns, but i love trying new things.

I cannot justify simply going shopping anymore. I have accumulated way to many clothes. When I need something, I find it, but other than that, I am beginning to hate clothing stores.
 The problem is, I often get an idea of a dress or skirt in my head. Sadly, usually the things in my head don't exist.

For example: I really wanted some flannel dresses I can wear with leggings and boots. I can't find anything remotely resembling what I want. So here is what I do...

1. Go to the thrift store and buy an XXXL shirt. Skinny short peeps could go with a double X. Usually the thrift store has cuter patterns anyways!

 

 

2.  Cut the shirt up to the way you want it to fit. Cut the sleeves off at the seem.

Measure your waist (wherever you want it to to gather)

Measure your neck to your shoulders and also measuring yourself from the shoulders down to where you are cutting. At that point take that corner to the far edge of the bottom

If nothing else, at this piont, you have a fab redneck holloween costume!

 3. Cut the sleeves to the width the fit your arms.( leave the cuff alone- I don't cut it at all)

4.. Turn the body of the dress inside out. Measure the sleeve width at the top, and match it to the body of the fabric. From this point, simply sew a seem down both sides all the way down. (inside out, so the 'good sides' are hidden and facing each other.)

(begin seem at the 10 inch mark is where i will begin my seem, leaving a hole for my sleeve.)

 5. Turning the sleeves inside out sew a seem down them as well. Turn the sleeves right side out again.

6. This part is a little tricky- with you body inside out, and your sleeve right side out. Now you will fit your sleeve into the sleeve hole in body, putting the sleeve cuff in first. Wiggle it all the way in so the 'good side'  large end of the sleeve lines up with the 'inside and good side' of the bodies arm hole. This should make two same sized (10 inches = 20 inch circle) where the 'good sides' of the fabric are hidden facing each other) making a circle of 2 fabics on top of the other.

Sew the circle, and turn right side out. Add your favorite belt, and Wallah!

To my job.

  I blog mostly about my life at home. However, circumstances at my job have escalated my time spent there, and discontentment has crept into my daily perspective. This is absurd due to the fact that while currently demanding, I have the second coolest job in the world...

 4-Her's at the Plant a Row for the Hungary Garden

I get to teach kids about gardening. Who does that? My actual job is an environmental educator with the 4-H program in UGA Extension Office in Fayette County. Most people have no idea that my office even exists which is a darn shame...

Booth Middle School Garden

The cooperative extension offices of the University of Georgia started in the early 1900s to help people me knowledgeable about farming. Now, there is an office in every county in Georgia (and America) Who's soul occupation is to service the community in their farming, gardening, and horticultural needs, and to motivate the youth in that community to learn and engage in the world around them thought th 4-H program. Nice thing is, we are free. Yep! Thats right. Your hard earned tax dollars at work.

 

So this mean I get to go into the school systems and teach kids about all sorts of things, recycling, water conservation, soil sciences, ecosystems ect. And I get to do after school clubs teaching everything from cooking to goats, and community service! So as my job is a little more time consuming than I would like at the moment, I'm remembering how faithful God is, and how much he has blessed me.

Before - pile of with weeds       After: respecable fall garden

                              

Fall Gardening

After a sweltering summer of humidity, the fall is a welcomed seasonal change! Fall is my favorite time of year, a time of warm hardy food and crisp air.  For those new to my blog, this is my attemp to live off the land, even through my land is only a half acre.I just wanted to post a 10 step guide to Fall planting. It is too late now to plant anything besides onions. But maybe this will help you guys out for next year.

1. Look at planting Dates. Planting dates vary from region to region and what crop you want to plant. This is my favorite publication on planting dates. It is from the University of Georgia so is has what seed varieties that work best here in Georgia specifically
   http://www.caes.uga.edu/applications/publications/files/html/C963/C963VegeChart.pdf
2. Decide what you want to plant- This year I devised on root veggies- Carrots, Radishes, greens: Kale, Lettuce, Cabbage, Spinach. Country Plants: Collards, Turnips. Tree veggies: Cauliflower and broccoli
3. Prepare Soil- If you are just starting out, you can check out my post on soil prep (march). There are no crops in fall gardens that are heavy feeders, you can fertilization again but I did not.
4. Decide what you will plant form seed vs. Transplant-Some plants do better from transplant and some don't. Carrots and Radishes must be planted from seed, but broccoli want to be from a transplant. Everything else is just your choice. I recommend you TRY all (besides broccoli) from seed! Its cheaper and more rewarding.
5. Mulch- Mulch cuts down on watering, weeds, pest and keeps the roots warm - Since I use plastic mulch, this is laid down before I plant. In my case I just used what was already there from my summer garden. You can practically any substance from wood chips, start. Hay, or newspaper- whatever is cheap.
 6. Plant- SEEDS-Depending on the spacing guideline there are two different ways I do it. Carrots and Radishes: these only have 1-4 inch spacing because of this is sprinkle the seeds in a line. Make a furrow in the soil (I had to cut lines in my plastic). Sprinkle the seed along the line. Cover with soil and water soon. Everything Else- all the other fall crops fall in 6-18 inch spacing category for these a poke holes in the plastic where I want the plants, dig a small whole with my fingers, drop in 3-6 seeds, cover with soil and water. TRANSPLANTS: When buying transplants, get packs that have more seedlings in each space. This saves money! Make sure you are gentle when pulling apart the roots systems. water!
7.Water- You must keep you seeds moist: water every day for at least 1 week. 


 (below: example of multiple plants)

8. (3 weeks later) Thin Seeds- Once your seeds have sprouted andd have 2 true leaves (not the first 2) you need to thin them out. Carrots and Radishes: Just pull up the seedlings fr the proper placing. For all the others- just leave one healthy seedling in the whole. I hate this part it feels like seedling abortion.
9. Plant transplants for seeds that did not make it. Now you can see what seeds made it. None of my spinach, Lettuce, and cabbage made it from seed, so I just panted them from transplants three weeks later.
10. watch and eat- yum          

Baby Carrots

Pictures: Garden Plots

  





Green House Curb Appeal

Me and Jesse finally re-landscaped the front yard. We bought (stole) this house as a forclosure 2 years ago and the yard was in bad shape. The bushes were over 20 feet tall and completly covered up the sidewalk. So we choped them down with a chainsaw so we could make it to the front door. We also tore off the stucco and added hardi-plank.

While we were paying off our student loans we couldn't spare the money. When we became debt free this spring the weather was so hot in early may, that we didn't want to loose our new exspensive bushes to Georgia's Heat.

So Fall rolled around and we were so exited. Our yard has looked horendous for two years! So we rented a 2-man power auger, planned our landscape, bought our bushes and wallah! We were going for a cottage-like look- wear everything is messy and whimsical. Everything we bought was an evergreen or a perrinial. we wanted lots of messy color and didn't want to depend on flowers.

 We choose Loropetalum as our backdrop plant against the (green) house because it is deep purple. Then we interspesed Nandina (red) Artemesia (silver) and put Golden-mop Cypress (yellow) on the edges (with an ornamental grass in various locations). Then we mixed in lots of messy perinials of all colors - Russian Sage, Guaru, Coreopsis, Veronica ect. We chose variagated Jasmines for our windowboxes and Swamp Jasmine for our trellis. It will take about 2 years for it to start looking like a 'cottage garden'. But i am very happy with how it all turned out!

                               Before                                                                 After

Cantaloupe & Watermelon & Strawberry

They are easy and are a sweet bounty. These are the easiest fruits you can grow.

Strawberry. In Georgia, they suggest you either plant these in two rows,with a ditch between to rip up their runners, or plant them with space around them and let their runners develop into new plants, I really don't get why it is one way or another, I guess they just want you to stay organized?
The only issue I had was that in early spring, they are the only food out so the birds nest I made around my garden (although they did eat bugs) had a strawberry dessert! In late spring they found other things to eat, and I could beat them to it! Me and jesse joked that they just sat their in their littl house all day, and as soon as a berry turned red, they pounced. Next year I am going to get a fake snake ( you can also net them) and see if that helps.


Cantaloupe & Watermelons
I planted these on the edge of my garden because they are vines and they get messy. They are placed in what's called a hill. I used a mound of dirt (with a drip line trough it) and covered in in black plastic. Plastic is essential to melons because it wants a long growing season, but also warm soil. Also, when that watermelon develop, they need to not be touching the dirt, so the plastic protects then from rotting, Hills are about 6 feet apart.



I planted a few from seed, and a few from transplants (at least 3 each hill). We had two waves of crops, so trying to eat 11 cantaloupe at a time was funny, good thing Soren liked them!
When to harvest: Cantaloupe come of the vine really easy when they are done, get them or they'll split. Watermelon was a bit of a guess, sometimes they were just small, one of the babies, we gave to soren and he plays with it like a ball.

UGA recommended varieties:
Watermelon: baby doll crimson sweet, icebox, imagination, jade star
Cantaloupe: Athena, Ambrosia Saticoy Early

They are on the edge closest to patio, and the opposite edge. I did not used raiesd bed, the hill system works great.

Pumpkin disclaimer: pumpkins are similar to melons, my pumpkins died out this year, vine borers and the shade caused by the tree above did them in, i got two baby pumpkins, both rotted on the vine, Next year i will be victorious!

Successful Tomatoes

sorry for the delay! I have had some computer issues and been working full time for the last 2 months, it will be over soon! The garden has been great, so i have alot of crops to catch up on, so we will start with tomatoes.

Tomatoes are a crowd pleaser, and no one can deny how wonderful homegrown tomatoes taste. I had great production in tomatoes this year. People say their easy to grow, but if okra was a 1 (easy) and peach trees a 10 (hard). I would give tomatoes a 5. They are reasonably drout tolerant, but if they get dried out. They will succumb to blossom end rot, once thats set in, the plant will not give many if any good tomatoes. So constant moisture to the roots is your best way to care for tomatoes (used plasticulture-see march blog). This is difficult to do with container gardening. They need at lest 8 hours of full sun. I did not fertalize past my initial soil enrichments.They are one of the most diseased edibles in Georgia, they have an early and a late blight, and they can have pollination issues.

The best advice is ...
1. use good varieties
2. Mulch and water propperly (use drip irrigation and plasticulture)- dont overwater either, give them a good soak every 5 days.(with the use of plastic mulch this should be enough.
3. Use fungicide - i use daconill dilluted with water- see instructions. You just gotta with tomatoes

I planted 18 transplants (6 Beefmaster 6 Better Boy, 6 Celebrities). Tomatoes come in determinate and indeterminate varieties. Determinate varieties like Better Boy and Celebrity tomatoes stop growing at a determined point, although they can still be pruned, they don't need it as much as indeterminate varieties like Goliath that just keep growing.

Pruning- some people prune their plants, I did a little, it is supposed to insure that you get larger fruits rather than tiny ones. When the plant is around 3-4 feet you will see that a branch has to stems coming out together, the bottom fork called a sucker can be pulled off at the node.

Harvesting- although vine ripened tomatoes sounds great, it is actually better for my garden to pull them a few days early. The redness attracts the bugs, and if it rains your tomatoes will split and may begin to rot within a day. I pull them off in their orange/red phase. Just put them on the counter (a sunny window is unnecessary-its better if their in a cool location) This diminishes none of the flavor loss you experience with store bought tomatoes.

Using the little red boogers- Tomatoes have unlimited uses- spaghetti, pizza, pesto, salsa, tacos, burritos, omelette's, sandwiches, and I just eat them raw. Since I had so many, I started processing sauces and freezing and canning. You can also refrigerate them one ripe so they will last longer. More on preserving and freezing later.