As you may or may not know, my husband and I are currently living in a tiny 2-bedroom apartment (shared with our two cats, Mike and Butters).  We have no outdoor space, save for our tiny patio and lil’ windowboxes, which don’t provide us with much gardening opportunity.

As someone who grew up in a home with lots of garden space and a little “plot” of my own, it’s heartbreaking for me to not have a bit of dirt.  Thus, it’s become our goal in the next year to have a truly viable spot of land on which we can grow things.  Along these lines, I was reading the WSJ yesterday (no, this is not a habit of mine, though it probably should be) and stumbled upon an article on composting.

{Photo via greenbudget}

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The perfect Saturday morning in Omaha includes a visit to one of two popular Farmer’s Markets. This past weekend my parents came to visit, and I made sure to carve out time for us to check out the local produce and meat at the market in the Village Pointe parking lot. Granted, it’s not as extensive as, say, the Ferry Plaza Farmer’s Market in San Francisco, but it’s a great way to support local farmers and spend some time outside when the weather is cooperating. I think my parents were impressed by the friendliness of the farmers selling their good and at the sheer variety of vegetables. We filled an Envirosax with ingredients for homemade salsa, eggplant parmesean and assorted grilled vegetables–plus a beautiful zinnia for a mini vase that sits on my living room table.

Are you lucky enough to have a Farmer’s Market in your town?

(photos by me)

Photo from P.J.McAdie’s Flickr

There are so many uses for a glass jar: storing leftovers, using as vases, or even lining up empty on a windowsill to show off.   Save your pasta sauce jars, jam and jelly jars, and other glass bottles.  It’s like your own home has become its own little recycling center!

It can also be a fun weekend activity to troll the antique and flea markets for old jars to add a bit of personality to your collection–I’ve found cool chemistry beakers, old mason jars, and even old Vapor Rub jars.

Here’s the trick to getting the sticky labels off: Wash in warm water, and peel off as much of the label you can.  Apply your run-of-the-mill hair conditioner to the remainder of the label, let soak for about half an hour, and scrub off with a course sponge.

Enjoy!

Much love,

-B

Sometimes, there’s nothing quite as nice as a clean, fresh house that smells bright and lovely.

{Image via ApartmentTherapy}

However, getting there isn’t always so easy.  And with all the cleaning products available today, it’s almost impossible to choose one that doesn’t smell overly strong, is effective, affordable, and not harmful for the environment.  Well get ready for this…a whole slew of all-natural cleaning possibilities with just a handful of good, old-fashioned products.

I’ve been using these “recipes” for the last few years.  I was motivated to find an alternative all-purpose cleaner after cleaning my bathtub one day, inhaling a few too many fumes, and deciding that it just was NOT healthy to have that floating around the air in my home!  I’ve found that the biggest hurdle to using these types of cleaners was that they didn’t have that Clorox-y clean smell that we’re all used to associating with “clean.”  If you choose to try any of these recipes and encounter the same problem, try adding a drop or two of eucalyptus or tea tree oil to make it smell more fresh and bright!

Without further ado…you will need: (to clean your ENTIRE HOUSE!)
-Baking Soda
-Borax (found in your grocery store’s laundry detergent aisle
-Tea tree oil
-Lemon oil
-Lemons or lemon juice
-Toothpaste (paste, not gel; with no tartar control or whitening properties)
-Table salt
-Distilled white vinegar
-Castile Soap

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This is one of those posts that I can’t believe I’m writing.  Cleaning products?  Really?  Cleaning products?

Yes, yes, I freakin’ pink-puffy-heart a cleaning product.  There.  I said it.

The website for Mrs. Meyer’s Clean Day Aromatheraputic Household Cleaners says that Mrs. Meyer’s products make cleaning your home “fresh, fun, and fragrant.”  Now, I don’t know about the “fun” part, but these wholly organic cleansers do make scrub-a-dub-dubbing a bit more enjoyable with their fabulous scents and aesthetically pleasing packaging.  Eco-friendly cleaning never felt so good!

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via Dwell Magazine

I love the following about this 400 square foot barn-turned-house: exterior siding, extra deep window sills, concrete floors, and exterior living space.
I hate the following: the couch two feet from the dining room table, the six inch sink.

Could you live in a space this modern (or this small?)

This is the second year that my husband and I have had a little vegetable garden in the back yard, and tomatoes are one of our favorite things to grow.  One problem is that the plants get very large and need to be staked or put in the support cages to keep them upright, so every time we saw the “Topsy Turvy” commercial on TV we thought it sounded like a great idea!

This year, we decided to give growing tomatoes upside down a try.  But instead of ordering a plastic green bag to plant our tomato plant in, we decided to build our own.

(You’ll notice the more traditional tomato cage around another tomato plant in the background… we were hedging our bets in case the upside down tomato growing didn’t work.)

What makes a “topsy turvy” is a planter with a hole in the bottom, large enough for the plant to fit through, and a hole or opening on top for water.  You then hang it up either with a hook onto a patio or a shepherd’s hook in the garden (as you see above).  Tomatoes are very resiliant and hardy plants, and will start to grow back upwards towards the sun which doesn’t affect them at all.  All you need to do is make sure they have enough water!

We took a wire hanging planter with coco mat lining and cut a hole in the bottom of the coco matting.

We gently fed the green part of the plant through the hole from the inside of the planter, leaving the roots inside, and filled with potting soil.  We then covered it with a little mulch to help retain moisture, and, voila!  Our own topsy turvy planter!  And I might add, I think it looks nicer than the original.

Ours:

Theirs:

So far, so good with our little experiment!  In fact, my husband swears that this tomato plant is doing better than the others - it even has its first blooms!

The cost of this will depend on where you buy your supplies.  We bought our planter and shephard’s hook at Big Lots, and probably spent about $10 to $15 for both, which is not a huge savings over the original Topsy Turvy, but we both think it looks nicer in our garden, and if we don’t re-use the planter for tomatoes next year, we can use it like a regular hanging planter again.

Looking for an eco friendly gift for the mothers in your life?  Craft Pantry has an entire shop stocked full of tote bags, lunch bags, produce bags and stationery.  Prices range from $8 to $30 (for custom bags).

Basket of Goodies {photo from Author’s Personal Collection}

Sorry to have kept everyone in suspense. I had to go out-of-town and our first CSA delivery was delayed.

We decided our first foray into Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) would be with a farm called Re Rustica. Re Rustica is a farm located in Squaw Valley, California. We chose them based on the recommendation of a good friend. We also selected them because they don’t require us to work on the farm. As much as we’d like to have that level of involvement, our schedules won’t allow us to participate in that manner. Additionally, they allow you to select from what is currently in season. Many CSA farms select your fruits and vegetables for you. As a few EAD readers have mentioned, that can be part of the fun of participating in CSA.

Food straight out of the box {photo from Author’s Personal Collection}

Last Friday, our first delivery arrived via UPS. According to Re Rustica, they use UPS because they have a low carbon footprint. Originally, they used to deliver the produce themselves in their bio-diesel truck. Talk about dedication! The produce arrived in Ziploc bags inside of Styrofoam cooler. The packaging was a little less eco-friendly than we expected, but the produce looked amazing. Re Rustica sells their produce by the box. Their website does a great job of helping you calculate how big of a box to order. We selected the smallest box they offered.

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One of my new favorite blogs is Crafting a Green World.  Written by a team of really crafty people, I know I can always find cute crafts that are easy to use in my daily life.  Here are a few of my favorites…

Vintage Suitcase Crafts

Recycled Plant Markers

Brown Paper Bag Recipe Cards