Grit Post

I wish this was my fence. In Montana, 2011

The new post has been submitted to GRIT and should be live later today, so stay tuned!

Today's topic is the Toby Hemenway presentation from the fair. Specifically, how the concepts of Permaculture can be applied to daily food choices - and how it's not just a gardening plan, necessarily.

I'll bump it out via Facebook once I see that it's up. Until then- here's a bit of Montana, from one of our trips a few years ago, for you to enjoy.

Friday Photo Tour

Hi Friends- Happy Friday! I hope you had a great week. I did; it had its ups and downs, for sure, but it all evens out in the end. Here's what it looked like, from my perspective:

This little guy fluffed up all of his feathers just so I could take his picture.

Happy!

I think this is an Angora Goat. Anyone know for sure?

I love our big trees... Alex is a good 9 feet off the ground, in this photo.
 It's time for a trim, though!

... and all of that cleanup work gives us a head start on next year's firewood. Satisfying!

The last of the robins, getting ready to leave.
All of them have flown the nest, now.

The garden is taking off.

This year's potato bins are growing fast too... much better than last year!

Peas - take two.

Foo Dog - Guardian of the Garden

Fiery red-orange Oriental Poppy

One of my favorite roses - a gift from a friend's garden.

That's it for now! Don't forget to stop by the Facebook page and leave a comment on the giveaway post to be entered to win a package of reusable produce bags from Natural Home. The contest closes Saturday night at 11:59 p.m., and the winner will be announced on Monday! 

Have a great weekend everyone! :)

MENF and Other News

Hey, everyone! I hope you had a great weekend. I surely did!! This is what it looked like:

2014 Mother Earth News Fair. Puyallup, WA.

The Mother Earth News Fair (MENF) was AMAZING. I have many (many!) pages of notes from the presentations I attended, that I'll be basing upcoming posts on. All of the speakers I listened to were great, but I have to say that the two standouts were Toby Hemenway and Joel Salatin. Between the two of them, my head is still spinning with ideas!

There were so many great vendors and exhibitors, too! The poultry show hall was packed full of hundreds of beautiful birds, from chickens and roosters to ducks, geese, turkeys and guinea hens with their gorgeous feathers and not-so-pretty faces. There was even a show pigeon area, but I didn't have time to wander through there, unfortunately.

I sent a few tweets and instapics while I was there, but mostly I was rushing between presentations and trying to cover as much ground as possible. Next year, I'm definitely going to get a hotel room down there so I can attend both days. There's just too much good stuff to be seen, and I'd like to do it at a more leisurely pace. The day positively flew past and I had a wonderful time. There are 2 more fairs this year, in September (PA) and October (KS). I *highly* recommend checking them out, if you're in the area.

On to more news: I've been working hard at monetizing the blog; in order for this to be my new career, I have to find a way to bring in some money to support the work that I do. I didn't want to overload people with random ads, so with the exception of the ad feed from Google, I've been hand-picking affiliate programs to join. Affiliate programs (like the Amazon link, for example) pay small commissions on sales that generate from a given website. I list books and things that are of interest to me, but it's not limited to those items- all you have to do is start out here at the blog, then click on an affiliate link to shop at your merchant of choice. Then, they give me credit for the traffic when you make a purchase, at no extra cost to you. So please, check out the affiliates when you're looking to make purchases, and help me keep this going.

One of the affiliate partners that I'm excited to team up with is Craftsy. As a thank you for joining their affiliate program, I get to take one of their classes for free so I can do a post about it. I purchased a few classes over the winter, and I've been singing their praises ever since- so if you haven't checked them out yet, please do! This week, over on the FB page, I'll put up my three top choices and let you guys decide which class I take and then I'll do a post (or series of posts, more likely!) to share my experiences with you.

I also have a couple of giveaways coming up! I know I've mentioned them before, but I'm a huge fan of the Baker Creek Heirloom Seed company. I reached out to them last week about partnership opportunities, and they've graciously agreed to provide a copy of their hardcover book "The Heirloom Life Gardener: The Baker Creek Way of Growing Your Own Food Easily and Naturally", written by the owners, to be used as a giveaway prize! I'll review the book before the giveaway, so keep an eye out for that in the next couple of weeks. The other giveaway will happen this week on FB as well- it's a package of reusable produce bags that I got at the Fair yesterday... stay tuned!

What did your weekend look like?

Thursday Links

Hey everyone! Here's a collection of things that caught my eye this week:

• This new-to-me website for canning supplies! Pantry Paratus has a bunch of interesting and useful kitchen supplies. I like it so much, in fact, that I've signed up to be an affiliate. Check out their ad in the sidebar to the right- if you click through and buy something, I'll get a small commission from them. (It's just like that little Amazon box down below... if you buy anything from Amazon through that widget -whether it's something I've listed or not- then I get a little money as well. It all adds up, so keep an eye out for some new advertisers, coming soon!)

• I enjoyed reading this article in Mother Earth News about urban homesteading. It reminded me of when we lived in the city, and how it's possible to live simply and be sustainable, even if you don't have a lot of property to work with. 

• The drought in California is scary stuff, considering how much of our country's food is grown there. Just one more reason to plant your own!

• Another new-to-me blog that I'm loving is Edible Perspective. The author, Ashley McLaughlin, has a great writing style and I am really impressed with her photography. Check out her Photography 101 collection for some great tips on how to take better photos.

• Speaking of photography, here are some more fantastic photos. I love visiting National Parks!!

• I want to make these bread and butter pickles. I have a couple of months to wait, though, I think. Patience, grasshopper. 

• I'm really excited to go here this weekend. If you happen to be in the area, you should go too! If you're not, follow me on Twitter (@acornandthistle) and Instagram (acornandthistle) for updates as I wander around. 

• This article about rabbit recipes in my local newspaper has me thinking about dinner already. Hmm, which one to choose?!?! 

What have you been reading about this week? 

Grit Post

There's a new post over on Grit; click here to check it out!

While you're here, this is exciting news too: Grit has given me a pair of tickets to go to the Mother Earth News Fair down in Puyallup, WA at the end of this month! Click here for the Fair's official website. There's a fantastic lineup of speakers (I'm really jazzed about finally getting to see Joel Salatin!) and workshops of all sorts. You can bet I'll be taking lots of pictures and notes to share with you! If there are any particular topics that interest you- at the Fair or otherwise- please drop me a note in the comments or on Facebook so I know what you want to read more about.

More to come!