farm love

If you think being wooed by a farmer is all muddy pick-ups and hand-holding so rough it exfoliates, you're only half right.  The farmer in this backyard has brought me flowers six times in the last week, and hasn't once had to pay for them (which is likely the real ticket to romancing my frugal, financial counselor's heart), thanks to our neighbor's generosity and Abe's fearlessness in the face of tick-infested fields.  Hydrangeas, gardenias, wildflowers, a small bunch of roses and this beautiful magnolia, which came with a note:

We married in South Carolina, and my aunt and grandmother used magnolias (native to the area) in my bouquet.

Yes, I'm know: I'm the luckiest.

Guerillas in your midst

When we first became interested in producing our own food, we guerilla gardened.  Abe (always the adventurer) discovered a floodplain behind the apartment complex we lived in.  Getting there involved a walk through the woods, a healthy respect for copperheads, and a balancing act across a creek (good practice, maybe?).  But it was land no one was using, and our narrow third floor balcony hardly had enough sunlight to grow a few cherry tomatoes.  We cleared a small patch of ground and dug in.

It wasn't exactly an ideal garden site. The spot was a trek from our apartment.  The land was swampy, and we got itchy red bumps to prove the gardening bug wasn't the only one to bite us. There was the chance of falling in the creek (Sorry, Dad). The area's deer had also discovered this little wilderness and helped themselves to most of what we planted. We may or may not have been voilating the city's flood plain regulations.  Still, we enjoyed a few skinny carrots and our first real taste of vegetable gardening.

Now, two years too late, I'm glad to have come across a land access toolkit by the East Bay Urban Agriculture Alliance.  They provide great advice on negotiating land use for those who might not already have access to a garden site.

Real food & mycology

The baby rabbits  have been eating real food for a little more than a week now. It's so sweet to see how they watch their mama eat new foods before they try them.  They love cabbage and carrots, and sometimes forgo the veggies entirely in favor of their rabbit kibble (made by Purina... who knew?).

And speaking of real food, my camping husband returned from the woods with a handful of foraged mushrooms (mostly oyster).  We ate them with whole wheat gnocchi, charred onion, cherry tomatoes and fresh basil from the garden, brown butter sauce and sauteed kale.  Delicious!

Then the next morning, Abe whipped up a veggie scramble with peppers, fresh eggs, and the last of our mushrooms, including a lone dark brown one whose name I can't for the life of me remember. Grandfather something? Maybe Grandfather Gross, because the whole thing tasted like straight dirt. You know that wonderful musty, dank forest smell?  I don't recommend eating it.