Learning to Grow
Our journey growing our own food and designing solutions to support a more sustainable life.
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The Curious Case of Bidens Alba
An introduction to Bidens alba Bidens, as in two teeth. Alba, as in white. I call attention to this plant because it is a favorite of beneficial insects. It grew wild in my life before I knew what it was. I called it the assassin host daisy because it always seemed to have the beneficial…
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Gardener, Entrepreneur
Those two words in the title seem complementary. They capture what I am trying to do. Why can’t I merge them nicely? Gardenentrepreneur or a gardeneur or a gardeur. I kind of like gardeur. It also sort of sounds like ‘gar doer’. As in ‘I do a lot of gar.’ What about entreprdener? Hum, ‘prd’ in a…
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When To Harvest Collard Greens
As I mentioned before. I have more collards than I can eat. That may not be accurate. It would be more accurate to say I am growing more collards than I am eating. So, when to harvest collard greens? I wait for the plant to be established, and this timing is completely variable. The seeds that I…
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Dream Garden
There are so many wonderful plants that I want to grow. Gardening in Houston, Texas is full of opportunity because theoretically we can grow just about anything from warm loving tropical plants like plumeria and hibiscus to sweet temperate plants like lettuce and radishes. There are the commodity cash crop plants that are so interesting…
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Copying my WordPress blog to my own computer
My previous post regarding moving a WordPress site may have been both vague and abstract. Here are some more coherent steps. These are not a tutorial but more of a documentation for myself and any others who might be trying to understand how the internet works. Have a SQL database for WordPress on both…
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When To Transplant Veggie Starts
Transplant veggie starts when they have four true leaves. The first two leaves that emerge from a seed after it germinates are called cotyledons. They are special and wonderfully encouraging to see but don’t count them. The true leaves will have a similar leaf edge and leaf shape to the mature plant. If you are…
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Julia Child can’t cook
I am certain I heard somewhere that Julia Child actually wasn’t a great cook. My point is not to defame Mrs. Child, but instead to free myself from expectation. She is synonymous with cooking and maybe wasn’t that great of a cook. So perhaps even with my brown tinged green thumb and one fingered typing…
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Anytime you go anywhere it is good to have a localhost
It makes sense to have a copy of my website on my local computer so I can test stuff out. Wow. Creating a local copy of the WordPress site was, and continues to be, not that simple. Here is my conceptual thought cloud list on how to get your WordPress website in two places. Have…
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A Waste-er is a terrible thing to be
As was introduced previously and will be emphasized continuously, gardeners must compost. To not compost is wasteful and a waste-er is a no good thing to be. I like to think of compost in terms of wet and dry. Wet items come from the kitchen and are gooey and juicy and very attractive to insects…
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pay attention
When you plant seeds it helps to pay attention. You want to be able to know what you planted when. Then, in the middle of summer, you could check which variety you planted for your seed order. You might also be able to track year on year to remember what did well when. Then you…