Spring is in the Air!

*breaths in deeply*
Ahhhhhhhh, spring is in the air!  At least here it is! 

With spring comes all sorts of thoughts of what we want to do in our yard.  We bought our house the middle of last summer, but most of our work went into the house, not the yard.  But with the warming of the days comes the itch to get in the dirt and DO SOMETHING!

I have so many plans swirling around my head!

I have very large plans for our garden this year along with things to be more self-reliant.  I'm in the process of cutting out beds on the edges of our yard for garden beds and also making our existing raised beds larger.  I also want to make a patio, move our clothes line back some, make our compost pile better, build some privacy screens around our patio for things to grow on, do some AWESOME paths, build our chicken house, build some rabbit hutches (this might happen next year), and grow a variety of food including:
raspberries

 blueberries

strawberries

grapes

 apple and perhaps peaches

 asparagus

 lettuce

 spinach

 Kale

chard

 onions

artichoke

 carrots

 radishes

 tomatoes

 squash

 pumpkin

watermelon

 peas

 beans

 cucumbers

peppers

potato

mint

oregano

basil

tyme

rosemery

chives

cilantro

And we'll see if i add to the list. 

It's a lot, but i'm so excited.  And i'm excited to be able to do this all on a lot that is only .11 acres and has a 1,200 sqft house on it WITH a car port.  I will have to be creative and really utilize the square foot/intensive gardening technique, but i know i can do it :)

And now some pictures of the awesome things swirling in my head....

This is the best set up for sprouting seeds i've ever seen!  I actually purchased the supplies last night and have mine set up in our living room! SOURCE

Use your old bottles to water your plants down at the ROOTS where they need it most! SOURCE

Build a fence using wood pallets that you can normally find for FREE! SOURCE

a privacy fence that we could grow our grapes on SOURCE

Using ikea storage bins as nesting boxes for your chickens.  Easy to gather eggs and clean! SOURCE

a raised bed made from pallets.  You can find pallets for free all the time!  Just make sure they have HT printed on the side for 'heat treated'.  Others can be treated with chemicals which would leech into your garden.

Patio furniture made from pallets.  Again, could be made for nearly FREE!

Yet another way to use pallets in your garden.  can you tell i love pallets? SOURCE

square foot gardening.  Grow more food in less space! SOURCE

So i think that is it for now, at least for what i can find pictures for.  I'm very excited for the days ahead, it's just going to be a lot of work. 

If anyone has pallets, spare wood or glass bottles they are not using, i will gladly take them off your hands!

What are your plans for this spring/summer in your yard/garden?
Happy digging everyone!

Naturall Healing

So with sticking with the trying to be natural lifestyle if i can help it, i would rather use something natural to heal my body, as well as my family's.

Well for over two weeks now our daughter has been fighting a cold and for the last week we had seen no improvement (for reference point she is 4.5 months old).  We tried a vaporizer in the room with tea tree oil, we tried tea tree oil rubbed on her chest before bed, we tried breastmilk up her nose, we tried saline solution up her nose, i tried MEGA doses of vitamin C but nothing was helping her improve.  All day she was coughing and well into the night as well.  Some nights she would cough for an hour or more yet she could not get the mucus out of her lungs.  I also have needed to suction her nose multiple times during the day and even night.  She also had lost her voice.

So finally i contacted a midwife friend of mine who makes herbal tinctures.  I bought some Mullin tincture and also Silver. (click links to find out about these tinctures) I started giving Rainbow the tinctures saturday night and then all day sunday.  Last night was the first night she has not coughed in over a week!!  I also did not have to suction her nose before bed like i have needed to do for 2 weeks now!  And she was clear all night as well.  She slept well and was easy to put to bed!  I was amazed!!  *I* finally got some sleep as well!

This morning she has started to cough a bit but she sounds so much better!!  It's amazing!!

And so, this is me *highly* recommending these tinctures!  She has many to choose from for anything you can think of.  She also can do custom blends for you!  She has tinctures to improve fertility in woman (and soon men) and even an amazing tincture (or so i have heard) for nausea (or morning sickness).  So go to her site and get some relief for your family!  You won't regret it!

Silver Sage Herbs

(i also have placed a button to her site on the side of my blog, for easy access)

Have you had any experiences with "natural healing" that you would like to share?