Independence Days Challenge and My First Update

Sharon has started the Independence Days Challenge on her blog and I've signed up. Food Independence is what we're talking about, and we're supposed to one thing every day or so that helps work toward being self-sufficient food-wise. There are actually ten areas to work on and here they are along with what I've done in the past week (with some help from George, of course)...

Planted: nothing yet, waiting another week here in Minnesota for most things; will plant peas this afternoon though. I promise! :~/ I did divide my one rhubarb plant into three plus a lot of little “bits” (see local food systems section…)

Harvested: things are just coming up; have been “snacking” while weeding, on the sorrel, daylily shoots, chives, and whatever else. The kids love to do this too!

Preserved: nothing yet but bought a pack of canning lids and a magnetic lid lifter in preparation; also bought a mandoline to use for cutting cabbage and other veggies thin for sauerkraut and other preserving recipes; did make a huge pot of chicken broth which for now we’re freezing but hope to get a pressure canner to can this stuff eventually

Stored: bought a second case of refried beans before they went off sale after Cinco de Mayo; ordered a Lehman’s Best Grain Mill with tax rebate money so I can store wheat berries, oat groats, corn, etc. which store much longer in their whole farm than they do as flour

Prepped: finished leveling off a former raised rock garden bed that is now part of my greatly expanded veggie garden; cut out middles of old tires for potato growing; rinsed out the 55 gal. barrels I got from the hospital laundry to make into rain barrels;

Managed reserves: not much here

Cooked: a huge pot of chicken broth from a $4.50 farmer’s market-bought stewing chicken.

Work on local food systems: gave extra rhubarb “bits” to some neighbors after dividing my one rhubarb into three; also shopped at the Farmer's Market last week in the bitter cold and wind.

Reduced waste: moved my black plastic compost bin over a few feet to make room for a second compost pile so we can have two piles going at once. One with mostly food scraps and another with more “brush-y” items and weeds, which will compost more slowly

New skill: shoveling loads of dirt off the raised “berm” to level it for a veggie bed was definitely something I’m not used to doing. I’m a wimp! And need to do this kind of thing more to build up some muscle and endurance.

I'll post some more garden photos soon. This weekend we're picking up a load of compost from the City's site--all for free! We'll plant some peas and potatoes and more beets, and some lettuce and greens too.