Beauty recovered
Today’s most is simple.
i am reorganizing my pictures, and having fun enjoying those that I forgot about (it’s so sad that for the most part, my pictures just live on my hard drive, unappreciated and unloved!)
I posted some pictures a while back about Grand Prismatic in Yellowstone National Park (a trip I took 4 years ago) and how I wish I had a wide angle lens when I was taking pictures of it…
well apparently I did have a wider lens then I thought. I just never went back and finished editing all of those pix!
Here are a couple:
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| Grand prismatic, as seen from a nearby hill. |
| Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL XT 24.0-70.0 mm f/16 1/100 |
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| Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL XT 24.0-70.0 mm f/13 1/40 |
Composting: For the world and for the garden
I like to think of myself as an environmentally conscious person. Someone who makes an effort to think about how to live responsibly in the environment around her. That is why as I was preparing for the birth of my daughter (3 years ago), I was doing all sorts of research on cloth and reusable diapers. I was insistent that we would not contribute thousands of diapers (that would pretty much never biodegrade) to the landfill. Six months later we are in the hospital, desperately trying to figure out how you take care of a newborn baby and change those teeny tiny diapers! I was so overwhelmed with the major life changes and the intricacies of caring for my new daughter, that I was too scared to do anything differently than what I learned in the hospital. Two years later…we are still using the same diapers. Ugh. So disappointed in myself =(
I have always been obsessed with recycling –> in college, I bullied my room mates into letting me put 5 different brown paper bags along our kitchen wall for each different type of recycling. In medical school, I used to send visitors home from my apartment with bags of recycling that my building wouldn’t take! On a recent trip to California, I learned that San Francisco actually requires people to compost by law. You should put your little compost bin out with your trash and recycling, and the city takes it to a big huge compost place. How amazng is that?? For most people the rate limiting step in composting is first, the space for the bin and second, the grossness of dealing with the actual compost bin and its many inhabitants.
Last summer when we moved into our house which has quite a bit of land, my desire to reduce waste fortunately overpowered my repulsion towards insects, and I bought a compost tumbler so I could start composting. I couldn’t deal with having to mix the compost manually or visually seeing the insects etc, so I went with a tumbler. It is closed, and sits on a base with wheels to make it easy to rotate. Which is great! Although the sticker on the outside says it can make compost within 2 weeks, it is almost full after 8 months and I can still make out most of the food! I think the cold weather is obviously a compost deterrent…but hopefully it will start “cooking” soon! I actually just bought a second tumbler (this one actually collects the compost tea in the base) so that I could use that for the next year and let the first one “work.” 
I have been basically throwing in anything that was once living – except meat. That includes all old leftovers and things that have gone bad in the fridge. Anyway – although I started the compost to reduce waste (“compost for the world”) with the plan of literally dumping the spoil out back, I am now really excited to use it for my garden! I’m anticipating it wont be ready until next summer, but I’ll probably put it to better use then also. Speaking of compost, half our plot is almost a big natural compost bin for the ridiculous number of leaves that fall every year from the 5 story tall trees all over the place. Luv and I have never owned so much land before this house and thus had NO appreciation for the upkeep needed to care for it with all trees we have everywhere. We both had the ridiculous notion that after having 6 weeks of snow on the ground, the leaves would just kind of “melt away” with it. Umm….NOPE. I think they were just preserved and have been laughing at us all this time. So we have been trying to rake them little by little…I’m afraid it might never be done! You can see in the pictures that you can barely make out the lawn because of all the leaves all over the place!
We have been throwing around the idea of buying a leaf shredder – which would help the compost and could perhaps serve as mulch too! But not sure we can dish out all that money! we’ll see…
- The way this area looked when we moved in =(
this is actually supposed to be a really pretty shaped bed surrounded by grass near the pool
- the leaves at the gate are so thick and packed in, that when you open the gate, the leaves form a threshold
Phew!
I have a new found appreciation for farmers. After raking and gardening today, I’m EXHAUSTED. Can’t even write much. But got my raised bed done along with some herb pots. Will write more about them later. But here are some pix. =)
Now that I am writing on my other blog daily, I might have to change this one to “Post a Week 2011″…we’ll see!
Part 2: Beginnings of a Vegetable Garden
I would like to start off today with a BIG THANKS to everyone who has left comments and sent words of encouragement and advice for our gardening adventures. I had NO IDEA how passionate people are about gardening! Also a big thanks to wordpress.com for the honor of my freshly pressed feature! I would have never received all of this amazing advice and positive energy had it not been for that – so again, thanks!
Yesterday I was gifted with warm weather. I walked out with a coat on to plant my little transplants, and was met with a very welcomed wall of warm air. You don’t have to ask me to take of my jacket twice! Miami girl was very happy. So I took Radha out to help me – and we got through about 9 transplants before I could no longer keep her entertained…I guess that is still pretty good! I finished the rest during her nap (thank goodness for baby monitors!) – you can see the results above.
As you can see above, I revised my plan a bit. Given the number of people who agreed that you can crowd lettuce and cabbage if you are harvesting them continuously, I planted the buttercrunch lettuce, mesclun mix and chinese cabbage 4 to a square foot instead of spreading them out more. So these freed up some space in my cool weather bed! I have highlighted in blue the areas that are currently empty with my potential plans. I am off to some nurseries this afternoon to see what other plants/seeds I can find. I have to get it all in within the next few days because starting Monday I am working for 12 days straight – which means very little time for gardening =(
- My spreadhseet for the details of the garden plan
True to my reputation for Obsessive Compulsive personality, I made a spreadsheet to help plan the garden beds. As you can see, I have only gotten through the cool weather bed plans. I have ideas for the warm weather bed – but need to do more research. Another reader commented that once my lettuce and cabbage are done for the season, it will free up space to plant more warm weather plants there. YAY! Maybe more tomatoes? Or red bell peppers? I can always make more salsa! Anyone ever grown tomatillos? I would love to have some fresh ones.
And now for the beautiful transplants.
Above: Buttercrunch Lettuce
Below: Chinese Cabbage
Below: Mesclun Mix
Below: Arugula (I can NEVER eat enough arugula!) Funny story: first time Luv or I ever ate arugula was in Italy during our honeymoon 8 years ago (yeesh!). We would go to restaurants and other salads, it would say “rocketta” salad. Growing up in Miami, I know a fair amount of Spanish – which helps in Italy – but didn’t really help here. Well we tried it, and LOVED IT! So we asked various waiters – what is this salad? And all of them would say “Rocket salad!” Clueless, we still had no idea what we were eating. We just kept eating it. FINALLY, someone was able to tell us that it was arugula (writing this, I’m getting embarrassed to admit that we didn’t know what it was). Ever since, we have been hooked, and buy it in large quantities. So I’m really looking forward to this part of our garden =)
Our various herbs – plus spinach. The mint is the only plant not yet planted – Luv is going to build a separate, long and thing rectangle planter for us to keep outside the kitchen on the deck for that so it doesn’t take over our entire bed. I will probably have another one there for more cilantro and maybe some basil (hmmm….getting hungry).
I left the cilantro at 1 per square foot because from what I read, you could put 4 in a square foot together, you should wont get as much yield on the plants. Since we love cilantro, I figured I would give it as much room to grow as it needs!
The lettuce and cabbage subjected to crowded city life… ha ha…
I got a “good job mommy!” from Radha!
- My “high five” from Radha for finishing!
Next steps:
1) Buy and plant transplants for my remaining 9 square feet in bed 1
2) plan bed 2 and possibly start seeds indoors so they are ready to plant in a few weeks
3) build planters for mint (and more) to keep on deck outside of the kithen
4) RAKE UP ALL THE TONS OF LEAVES ALL OVER MY LAND!
Playing with processing
The other day I posted some pictures I took through my skylight that looked like reflections in water. Well, I took a few more and decided to have fun and play around.
For each picture, i cropped and often changed white balance or tried random presets (all in Lightroom) to have fun. I also included the original for each picture so you could see the transformation!
- Original for the pictures above
- Original for the three pictures above
- Original for the picture above
The following is a video of what the weather is like today…similar to when I took the pictures above except very windy! I am standing inside looking out of our skylights, and all that noise is the wind and debris falling!
http://www.facebook.com/v/1979667454115
On a happier note, the weather was great yesterday, and I had the opportunity to capture some sights of spring on the trees! I tried to explain to Radha that while the weather was cold, the trees have been sleeping, and they are starting to wake up. I think she understood because every time we saw some leaves, she would say (in hindi) – “trees woke up! trees woke up!”
My new pledge (and blog)
I have a new commitment:
Appreciate one of life’s Simple beauties every day for a year, and
Photography has taught me that you can find beauty in EVERYONE and in pretty much EVERYTHING.
After a particularly challenging day with my 2 year old daughter yesterday, I decided that I needed a little bit of perspective. I try to remember this while I am having a tough day…and it often helps me re-group and cool down.
So I have decided to pledge the following:
Each day, for at least 1 year, I will appreciate one of life’s Simple Beauties.
Whether it be a photograph, a person, a thought, an everyday invention, or a moment with my daughter, husband or family.
I will appreciate it, revel in it, blog about it..and then try to remember it the next time I’m in a “not so positive” mood.
Hopefully my thoughts and experiences will add some perspective and happiness to your days as well!
So please visit: Simple Beauties.
And if you are so inclined…subscribe for email updates or leave a comment!
The Beginnings of a Vegetable Garden
If you would have talked to me a month ago about making and keeping a garden this year, I probably would have laughed and said “yeah right.” The most “gardening” I have ever done is a basil plant that I kept alive for about 6 months. You see, I am from Miami. Where one city blends into the next. In fact, the first time I ever saw a farm was when I went to my (at the time) boyfriend’s (now hubby) house in Westminster, Maryland. This is a story he likes to retell many times because as we were driving past the many fields of corn, I said “what are those tall cylindrical buildings?” Really. He looked at me as if I were making a really funny joke. And then…”really?” Yup – that was my extent of farm knowledge. Fast forward to today: still no new knowledge about farming (except what I have been reading in Omnivore’s Dilemma).
As I mentioned in a previous post, we have a friend/couple that has inspired us to eat better and be more conscious about various sustainability issues, and they have passed the gardening bug onto us. We have been contemplating it for a couple of weeks now…I have been reading online and often getting overwhelmed by the different options and facets of gardening…and finally took the plunge this weekend.
We have decided to go with two raised beds, each one 3×11 feet, dedicated solely to vegetables and herbs. Part of the motivation and excitement for us to be able to raise our own food that we can then harvest and eat! Talk about green, organic and “natural” food!
Although we have a fair amount of land, there is not really much accessible, flat land that gets unobstructed sun. And unfortunately most of that obstruction comes from the neighbor’s trees…i.e. not ones that we could prune.Although we have a fair amount of land, there is not really much accessible, flat land that gets unobstructed sun. And unfortunately most of that obstruction comes from the neighbor’s trees…i.e. not ones that we could prune.
However we are keeping a positive attitude and hoping this will work! So these are our pictures from the weekend – these first ones are of us creating the raised beds. We bought untreated cedar and made a simple set up following the instructions from a Lowe’s video on YouTube.
Below you can see the first raised bed area where I started to remove the sod where the bed will sit. It is not easy work! I definitely have a new appreciation for the hard labor that goes into farming! I have a particularly weak core (i.e. my core muscles) and was SO FATIGUED after doing this work. I felt like I couldn’t hold myself up adequately. It was pretty pathetic.
Below you can see one bed finished and ready to plant. Luv (my husband) finished the second bed as well – so they are now both ready to plant! Yay!
I am especially excited about the fact that we were able to buy all of our soil and compost from Meadowbrook Farm, which is a farm literally at the end of our block! It makes me so happy to be able to support a small, local business/farm. Not to mention that it was extremely handy when at 4:45pm on saturday, 15 minutes before they closed, we were able to run over there when we realized we were 17 bags short of soil! And 15 minutes later we had the soil paid for and delivered at our house. It was AWESOME. I’ll write about Phase Two: Transplanting our Seedlings soon!
In the meanwhile, here is my garden plan:
Note: Most of the reading I did said that most lettuce and cabbage need about 10 inches between the plants. However I found a couple of sites that said this is the amount of space you need if you are going to let the plant reach full maturity and then harvest the entire thing. On the other hand, if you are planning on harvesting the outer leaves at regular intervals, it is ok to make them a little crowded since you are never really letting them get to full maturity.
Lastly, here are some pictures of our little helper!
Baby Daffodils
The daffodils are making their way out of their little buds. I’m so excited to see what this new land will bring with the spring!
Reflections
I am in the process of completely revamping my “prints for sale” page on my photography website, and have thus been going through many of my old pictures to decide which ones to include. One cool thing about this process is that I have realized that I have definitely become better at post-processing – both in terms of making a picture look better, but also in the different creative things you can do with a picture. I found the above image, which I almost through out – because the original is very dark, and much larger, with no clear point of focus. However I decided to play around with it a bit, and came up with what you see here. I was surprised to see that many of the berries were actually in focus – despite looking like they were are terribly underexposed in the original format of the picture, and I was even more surprised to see that you could see my reflection taking the picture in almost every one of them! Kind of reminds me of a fly’s eye =)
Hello Sun!!
I MISSED YOU!
The day always seems more cheery and exciting when I wake up to bright sunlight streaming in from the skylights.
It always puts me in a GREAT mood!
Have a great Saturday everyone!
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