Fresh from the garden to the kitchen

Fresh from the garden to the kitchen, originally uploaded by megs threads.

We ate these the other night, and they seemed to taste all the better because they came from our garden. Our middle boy declared that he will only eat broccoli that comes from our garden. Our youngest boy is always stealing the broccoli and cauliflower from everyone's plates. I am now wishing that I planted the whole backyard with broccoli and cauliflower. Next year I will grow more. No bugs and the possums didn't eat it. Maybe the plastic snake hanging on a stake in the garden worked.

Bugs and Keeping your house free of them naturally and organically

Photos Images of Japan: Sugidama (cedar ball) outside Sake brewery, Yunotsu, Shimane, Japan. © Jake Davies


I found a bug. A carpet beetle bug. Now I know that not many people know what this is, so I had to do a lot of research and talking to people on the phone to find out how to deal with this bug because, whilst I love nature, I don't like things that could destroy any fabric or timber in my home. So what I did find out was that I had to go through every single piece of fabric in my house (a very big job for me) and "protect it" (put it in sealed containers, drawers, wardrobes) and wash at 60 degrees, freeze for 2 weeks or chuck anything that had the bug in it.


Fortunately, it seems that I caught it quite early because I didn't find many at all. It really only seems to be able to eat through felt or wool and likes to sit in old cotton and then die. I have wiped every surface with lavender and teatree oil, we have vacuumed over and over, then thrown out the vacuum bag. Now lastly to protect what we do have, I am putting cedar balls in every single cupboard, box, shelf and drawer. Obviously not as big as that ball in the picture, although, if that could protect me, I would.


From here, we will continue our once a week (wet cloth dust, vac, and mop), check the clothes, air out the cushions, pillows, doonas, and soft toys (which we do anyway for dust mite protection & it makes them smell better). Every 6 months I will put more cedar oil in the cedar balls to make sure that they are fresh to keep the moths and beetles away. Better than spraying with insecticide. Hooray!

Make your own Aromatherapy facecream

It really is very simple, and cheap to make your own facecream & your face will be thanking you for it for years to come. This cream is lush and smells simply fantastic. This cream is great for the more, ahem, mature skin, however, any skin will love it.

You will need a paddle pop stick (you can get these from the art shop) & a glass jar (I got mine from the chemist really cheaply)

100 grams plant based cream or aqueous cream (I get a big tub of this from the chemist)

5 drops of vitamin E oil

5 drops of evening primrose oil

5 ml of jojoba oil or wheatgerm oil

20 drops of rosewater

10 drops of frankincense essential oil

25 drops of rose essential oil

5 drops of jasmine essential oil

5 drops of neroli essential oil

Mix these all together with the paddle pop stick & spoon into the glass jar. Massage into your skin twice a day after cleansing your face. Be careful to only use cleanser on your face in the evening as hot water is ample for your skin in the morning.

Make sure that you use essential oils as the fragrant oils do not contain the necessary aromas needed to help your skin. If you find that you do not like particular oils, you can play around with the mix. I have found that this mix is quite good for my skin.

Grow Potatoes in a tyre

We have planted many things in many places in our small block in the inner city of Melbourne, so when my mum rocked up to my place about a month ago with 8 seed potatoes that were excess to her needs, I was a little dumbfounded as to where I could actually use them.

6/5/2012 Please note:: I used this method once (for this year 2009) and have since found out that it is not such a good idea to use tyres for planting (or compost), even though they are so effective.  The reason why you should not use them is because of the possible lead leeching that may happen.

We do have some old tyres that I had picked up for free from the tyre shop that I had previously used for composting (very successfully), but now we have built a big compost bin, we don't need them. So I decided that I could use the tyres and do the old "stack-as-it-grows" method, hopefully giving us a greater yield of potatoes in the end.

I have actually combined a bit of the no dig garden bed theory in here as well with layering a thick wad of newspaper down on the bottom as I did put them straight onto concrete. I then pulled out the compost from the compost heap and combined it with some sheeps manure that had rainwetting agents through it. I filled up just one tyre high. I then place one potato at 12, 3, 6 and 9 o'clock inside the tyre (not right on the edges though). Then I waited, until the week before last.

I was very excited to see some green foliage which is the signal for me to get the next tyre and some hay to layer around the foliage. I have done this and it is all looking really good, in fact, I am now going to have to get another bale of hay as it is already peeking through with all this great rain in the last week.

If you live in a temperate zone in Australia (Melbourne), you could plant potatoes in August for eating in Nov - Dec

We did just eat our first broccoli tonight! It was delicious.

Other vegies to plant now in July in a temperate zone in Australia:

Beetroot (seed) to eat in September - October

Broad beans (seed) to eat in October - January

Cabbage (seedlings) to eat in September - November

Lettuce (seeds or seedlings) to eat in September - October

Mustard greens (seed) to eat in September.

Onion (seedlings) to eat in January - March

Parsnip (seed) to eat in November - December

Peas (seed) to eat in October.

Radish (seed) to eat in September.

Shallots (also Eschalots) (seedlings) to eat in October - November

Snow Peas (also Sugar Peas, Mangetout, Chinese Peas) (seed) to eat in October - November