Our Little Urban Homestead Is Taking Shape

I am getting super excited and hopeful.  It appears that our hard work is beginning to show that all of our efforts have not been in vain.  For one thing our little patch of lawn is a lawn once again.  After several days cleaning up the yard in February you may recall that we had raked and prepared all of the dead spots (there was more dead than alive) and then we all three hand sprinkled grass seed and covered it with pine shavings.  Our hope was to get an early enough start to take advantage of the spring rains and cooler temperatures and improve our chances of success.  The dead spots we worked on are now filled with grass and it looks lovely.  I bought more grass seed a couple weeks ago and we are working on stage 2 which is the other side of the lawn.  It isn't as bad as the part we've already worked on.

This is what we started with.

We have also been working on cleaning up the overgrown weed infested flowerbeds and have been delighted to see that some of our perennials have come back to us this spring.  In the fall we weren't certain what had survived and what hadn't.  I bought annuals to fill in the gaps as well as a couple of new hostas to add in.  The girls got me some pinks and carnations for Mother's Day.

This is the first flowerbed we did.

Our poor backyard and deck was pretty much the landfill.  Our tenants had used it to store trash, not sure why since I paid for trash service.  Unfortunately we weren't able to get to the backyard before the first snowfall so that mess wintered over.  An early spring allowed us to finally get back there and over a period of two weeks we worked diligently to get it all cleaned up back there, make repairs and by the end of March we were able to get some semblance of order in place.

At the end of February we also brought home four chicks and despite a rough start and the addition of two new chicks we have now established a flock of hens.  They lived in the house with us for two months and then we moved them into the coop at the first of May.  They love it out there and are a happy flock of birds.  Within the next few months we should see some egg production.

We planted our raised garden beds.  In March we used compost to amend all of the soil.  In April we planted strawberry starts I ordered from a strawberry farm in Oregon.  I ordered 10 starts, they sent 12, our naughty squirreled stole one and hopped over the fence with it and the remaining 11 took just fine and are growing well.  We even have a few strawberries already.  I'll fill in the 12th spot once we produce a jumper.

Pears

We started tomatoes and cucumbers from seed and transplanted them into the garden.  We've also planted carrots, beets, radishes, spring onions, bell peppers and jalapeno peppers, yellow squash, watermelon, cantaloupe and sugar pumpkins.  We still plan to clear more space and plant more seeds.  The peppers we bought as plants from the feed store and we already have two peppers growing on them.  The radishes, beets, and onions are coming up as well.

We added a lettuce bed in front of one of the raised beds and planted two rows of seeds which are already coming up.  We hope to keep us and our chickens in lettuce throughout the summer.  I also want to plant an herb garden.

At the end of April I bought blueberry bushes and a pot of raspberry starts which I was able to divide into three separate plants.  I'm not sure I'm happy with where I've put them so I'll probably be moving them.  I planted the two blueberry bushes on each side of the step leading up to the deck.  They are happy with their new location and so am I.  They are already producing berries.

Blueberry bush

Our fruit trees have been sprayed with organic pesticide in hopes of keeping them bug free this year.  Our pear tree is loaded with fruit.  Our apple tree, which was not healthy, received a big pruning a couple years ago in an attempt to save it.  It looks really good this year and we have apples on it now.  If we can keep the pests and squirrels at bay we may just get some fruit this year.

Apples

There is still work to be done, but the three of us girls are certainly up for it.  And the excitement of seeing food growing just adds to our momentum.  There is a great sense of satisfaction in a little sustainability.