The victory garden...

Yesterday was a good cheat day.  Actually I had a couple of them.  I was helping out at Filomena's with the open house and I was overwhelmed with holiday spirit and ate some of the baked goods everyone had made.  I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  I didn't really even feel much guilt either.  It's the holidays.  I'm not a pioneer or a survivalist or a prepper.  The goals I have of being food secure, I have set for myself.  I can brake my own rules.  

I admit I sometimes am living in the past.  I live in this old house with all this old stuff with these old souls.  I feel like I have to preserve these things to not let history disappear.  I drive by old houses and they've been stripped of their history with their vinyl siding and plastic windows and drywall.  It hurts my heart to think of the families that lived in those old houses and how hard they worked to make that house as pretty as it once was.  The details.  

Things seem to come so easily to people now.  Everything people buy now is thrown away when it bores them.  Then they go buy more.  That's why they love those dollar stores, I think.  

Part of this food preparedness thing I've been trying to accomplish stems from the feeling I have that I lived through the depression.  Of course I was born in 1974 and wasn't even close to living in that time period, but somehow, I have a connection to it.  It could be the stories I've heard, the times we're living in now, or my old soul, but I feel driven to having that feeling of being prepared for things to come.  To be able to survive through it.

Even though this year may not be so successful, I feel like I'm on the right track.  Next year will be another summer and I can plant more.  I am going to focus on perennial plants that will just keep on producing for the rest of my life.  This fall I planted some new trees.  Another apple tree, a pear and a peach tree.  I'll plant more in the spring.  A lot of fruit trees do better if there are several of the same species for pollination.  This is an investment in the future though because it could take 3 to 5 years for me to see any fruit.  But fruit is kind of expensive.  And it's better if you grow your own.  It's worth the wait.

Blueberries are a shrub.  Anyone can grow blueberries in a small yard.  Just rip out those high maintenance shrubs that you get nothing from, and plant some food.  They flower in the spring.  Then you get berries.  

As it gets colder and I sit in front of the woodstove more, I get antsy to start looking at seed catalogs for next season.  This is my favorite winter pastime.  Of course, I always get over zealous and buy way too many seeds than I'll ever plant, it's still really fun.  Planning my "victory garden".

Until tomorrow then.  Go find yourself an adventure.

Day 3

Well.   Day two is now over.  Besides the headache that never goes away, I'm doing just fine.  I have the same amount of energy and everything.  My brain feels a little fuzzy but that could be the headache.  

I kind of just foraged all day long yesterday, starting with some blackberries pureed with oat grass that I grew on my counter and some lentil sprouts.  It didn't taste very good but I just chugged it.  My blackberries were sort of sour this year because of too much rain in the spring.  The rest of the day I just ate whenever and whatever.  Some parsley leaves, beet and dandelion leaves.  Some wild stuff: lambs quarters and malva.  A few tomatoes.  My dinner was a potato.  It's shocking how little food I can get away with when it is really fresh.

My constant is the herbal tea.  I drink that almost all day.  Plus one 18 ounce glass of water in the morning and one after dinner.  

Oh, and I had an apple.  I only had a few apples on my tree this year because most of them fell off the tree early in the spring.  This apple was perfectly ripe.  It was the highlight of my day.  It takes so little to make me happy.  

I think it's a little easier on me psychologically if I don't leave my house.  There is just too much out there to be tempted by.  I am selling this Saturday at Peddler's Market in Caledonia.  I have to leave the house at 6 in the morning, so we'll see what I come up with for the day.  I'll just have to plan ahead because I won't be home to forage until 7pm or so.  Long day.  Maybe I'll see some of you out there!

Let's see how the day goes.  An enchanted one, to everybody.

Day Two of Eating What I Grow. Caffeine Withdrawal.

I made it to day two.  I can't believe it.  Yesterday was hard.  But not in the ways I thought it would be.  I thought I'd have sugar cravings, or carb cravings.  Something.  No, I was too busy with my caffeine withdrawal headache to think about anything else.  

I really could only imagine what it was going to be like.  I didn't realize how much my life revolved around food.  Not just food.  Food from stores, restaurants, gas stations.  I had about a million choices yesterday just leaving my house and going to Medina to take down fall stuff at Filomena's.  I drove by my favorite Amish store on the way there.  All food.  I had to put gas in the van.  The gas station is full of food.  And coffee.  I went to Filomena's.  Danette had food out for all the vendors working on their space.  Plus, she always has cookies and coffee for the customers.  I had to get cat food at Tractor Supply.  Food all over the check out.  Then I had to go by every fast food and food place on earth on my way home.  I'm going to buy myself some of those blinders the Amish put on horses so cars don't freak them out and I'm going to wear them myself.  

I never thought of myself being a food dependent.  I mean in the way that I reward myself with food.  Don't want to get out of bed?  Well, coffee is waiting.  Had a rough day?  Well, maybe I'll just eat cheese cake for dinner.  I know I was doing that with wine.  Especially with the stress from when I had the store.  I quit drinking 2 months ago, and it was the best thing, because I was definitely rewarding myself with wine on my bad days.  And I had a lot of stressful days.

So, I got through my first day and I'm about an hour into the second.  Yesterday was not what I expected.  I woke up tired, and then I drank no coffee so I was really sleepy all day.  But the time I got to Filomena's in the afternoon, I had a headache.  By the time I got home, my brain exploded.  I couldn't function.  I knew it would go away eventually.  I just had to wait it out.  So I slept most of the night.

My breakfast was completely fresh stuff out of the garden.  Broccoli, mustard greens, zucchini, and a few cherry tomatoes.  I cooked it slightly with a little salt.  Surprisingly, I wasn't starving all day or anything.  When I got home, I thought carbs might help my headache so I ate a baked potato with salt.  It was really good.  I drank some of my grape juice I made and that sort of lifted my spirits because I was actually feeling a little sadness.  Weird.  Another thing that was weird is that I wasn't really hungry during the day.  Actually the thought of eating made me a little nauseous, but I ate what I could and made sure I drank lots and lots of herbal tea to get my vitamins.

So, that was my first day.  The headache seems to be pretty much gone, but I can almost feel it coming back.  I'm drinking some dandelion & calendula tea for breakfast and I am going to go on with my day.  I got through my first day.  I'm feeling a little proud of myself, but I know there is more challenges to come.

Until tomorrow then.  Have an enchanted day and thanks for reading!  Now go eat some vegetables!

Day One of Eating Only What I Grow

Well, my last night of eating whatever I want is over.  Seems fitting that it was my favorite holiday, Halloween!  But I didn't really go crazy with food or anything.  I ate some candy of course.  It was Halloween, after all. And I drank a small can of Pepsi.  I don't drink soda very often, but it was my last night.  I had to try being bad.  I was carving pumpkins and roasting the seeds so I ate lots of those.  I didn't really even eat dinner.  I guess I was just excited for this adventure to start.

Mike is in the kitchen cooking something that I can't eat right now.  Oh, I think he's making tuna or something.  He must be finished though because Little (the cat) is watching me type.  

My morning so far has been uneventful.  I am drinking blackberry leaf and plantain tea instead of coffee.   No sugar.  No milk.  I really like it.  Blackberry leaf is most similar in flavor to black tea.  These are some of the leaves I dried during the summer.

I'm going to eat fresh stuff from the garden today.  I don't want to break in to my stored food until I have no other alternatives.  I have celery, parsley, turnip and beet greens, broccoli, onions and garlic in the garden still.  I also have oat, lentil and sunflower sprouts.  My breakfast this morning will be some of those things.  And what ever wild food is out there still.  

So here I go.  I'll update you tomorrow.  Have an enchanted day everyone!