#EpicGardening – ~Our Holistic Homestead~

Still partially concealed beneath a parasol of frost-white lace, the mountain is donning her spring bonnet. Shy as Miss Spring is to rise up and dust off her green frock, she must have whispered her secret to the birds. Daily now they bob along the ground and dart among the trees, spreading their tittle-tattle as they go. Their gossip must have reached Madame Winter as well, for her bitter tears flow down, scarring the sage-trimmed mountainside with the lament over her final days in the sun.

Welp! Hibernation is over up here in mountainous Montana! I was relieved when winter first arrived, but now as our mountain fades into spring, I find myself torn between two feelings: invigoration and intimidation. Isn’t it thus with most every turn of the season? Our emotions are often as mixed up as the weather outside our front doors, and neither of us can ever seem to make up our minds what it is we want day to day! But want it or not, need it or not, ready or not, our workload has definitely been ramping up even without our consent. With every patch of melted snow, our slow, gentle winter projects melt also into the fast and furious ones of spring.

But before we go fully WILD up here, come along with us as we take a little look back at our “hibernation” months on the homestead . . . HA!

EVERYTHING WE DID OUR SECOND WINTER ON THE HOMESTEAD:

Finally got that barn raised!

Hats off to anyone reading this who is building a home! This was more than enough construction fun for us! It took months longer (not to mention thousands and then some more) than we’d budgeted, but it is nearly finished. And what a relief! You’re absolutely right, by the way, this structure isn’t really a barn at all. It’s definitely a giant garage. But for some reason we started out calling it a barn and I don’t think we’ll ever shake it.

The “barn” is 27’x40′ with a 23′ tall peak; just enough room all around to accommodate our two trucks, the side-by-side, and our Kubota with plow bucket attached. The structure is comprised of a cement slab, wooden beams and trusses, a metal roof, and metal siding. We went for dark forest green siding in hopeful courtesy to our neighbors who live on the mountainside opposite of us and whose view of mountain majesty is only marred by . . . ummm . . . us. When we visited their neck of the woods last year, we were kind of appalled how much our new homestead tore into the mountainside from their perch. We’ve been planting many trees and growing as much as we can to restore the mountain back to green again. But this barn had to be built. Our cars and tractor are suffering from our winters up on the mountain and need shelter badly. So, we did our best to camouflage our admittedly massive structure.

What we still have to go on the barn:

last garage door
insulation
wood stove install
finishing the interior
rafter storage

Grew new varieties of mushrooms!

We just love growing gourmet mushrooms! They are such a great addition to our grow list on the homestead and a joy to grow through the winter when you’re aching for something to bloom!

Shrooms we grew this year:

more standard oysters
blue oysters
pink oysters
lion’s mane

Check out our previous post 🍄March of the mushROOM🍄 for all that we did to get growing!

Processed 70 pounds of potatoes!

We did everything we read to do for storing potatoes through the winter, eating as many as we could along the way, but by Valentines Day half the lot were sprouting. So, we rolled up our sleeves (well, I did anyway) and got to cutting, shredding, blanching, drying, bagging, and freezing. Whew! It was quite a chore.

For my efforts, I got:

8 freeze dried bags of hashbrowns (thank you to my friend with a freeze dryer!)
8, three-pound bags of frozen country potatoes
6, three-pound bags of frozen fries

Cared for feathered friends!

The bird population on our homestead has decupled since our first year. We believe the main reason for this incredible increase is mainly due to the fact that we put an end to the chemical warfare that was going on up here before (both on the road and lawns). In addition, we have made many efforts toward our feathered friends! As pictured above, the Captain is building an adorable “Robin’s Retreat” with Papa for a birdhouse competition later in May (stay tuned for the finished product). After it’s over, we will put it somewhere high up in front of the house. We also put up our first bird feeders this winter, with two on our back deck. The addition of colorful visitors outside our frosty windows made such a splash when we needed it most!

Sterilized seed trays and cups until we wanted to throw them all away!

This was a chore plus ten! Oh my word, I can’t believe veteran gardeners do this annually!

What we did:

loaded all the cups and trays into our largest bathtub
ran the shower on warm water
scrubbed out the lot as best we possibly could
sprayed down each cup and tray liberally with hydrogen peroxide
rinsed every, last, stinking cup and tray
layed out every, last, stinking cup and tray to dry on the kitchen counters

So, is all this actually necessary? I have no idea. All I know is that all the gardening gurus do it and say that sterilizing your seed starting cups and trays is a mandatory precaution against bacteria, fungus, and disease. This is the first I have ever done this and haven’t had issues in the past that I’m aware of, but I figured better safe than lose a ton of my precious plants!

Started way too many seeds!

I’m not sure why, but my seed starting has gotten entirely out of control this year. My hubby says I overcompensated when I realized it was the first of February and suddenly felt behind. Whoops. I’m not sure who I was thinking was going to plant out a thousand yarrow plants, 500 pansies, or 300 lavender. Oh well, I’m sure my friends will happily agree to take overflow plantings off my hands. Seeds we started really early (in January and February): herbs, alliums, asparagus, and pansies. Seeds we started in March (so far): 2nd round of herbs, 2nd round of alliums, and brassicas.

Ordered green!

A few things we ordered ahead:

veggie and herb seeds
flower seeds galore (lupines, poppies, milkweed, borage, zinnia, sweet peas, stocks, snapdragons, hollyhocks, sunflower, and more!)
cover-crop seeds (red and white buckwheat, red and white clover)
seed starter mix
yet another Raised Birdies Bed (which will bring our total up to 18 beds!)

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Composted the lazy way(s)!

In the winter, we don’t bother with complicated composting, To be even more truthful, we barely bother in summer either! We are big fans of simple, lazy composting such as “the drop method” and our favorite: put it in a heap and let nature do the rest.

Here are the lazy ways we “compost” through winter:

1.) Feed it to the chickens (duh!) then pile up the poop and bedding (we use rose chips) or put into covered containers to age and decompose at its natural pace. We try to clean our coop on a monthly basis, preferably not during a blizzard.

3.) Feed the worms! Check out our super easy worm compost system here, two years old and going better than ever! We have three worm bins now in our basement and tending them is genuinely one of my favorite activities on the homestead.

4.) Just dump it. Anything we can’t feed to the chickens or worms, we heap in a pile that disappears every few days under a lovely, clean layer of snow! Then we mix it all up in the spring.