July 27th, 2011 | Hella Delightful, Shows, BC, boulevard, city, diakon, garden, harvest, kids, urban, Vancouver
Little Mikko and Amaia come for a visit and help me pick the diakons from my boulevard garden. According to Masanobu Fukuoka who wrote One Straw Revolution, diakons are a good plant to help you dig up hard, stony soil.
I dug up the area outside our apartment this year and decided to try an experiment with seedballs made following Masanobu Fukuoka’s technique of natural farming. My middle plot is full of crimson clover and diakons. I also planted diakons in my other flower-beds to help loosed up the hard-packed ground a little. It seems to have really helped!
Diakon leaves have little prickly hairs on the edges of them, so be aware of this if you try it at home 
May 22nd, 2011
It's that time of year to seed bomb the city! I found this basic recipe for seed balls on Heavy Petal, last year and it works great:
5 parts dry red clay*
3 parts dry organic compost
1 part seed**
1 – 2 parts water
We used a 16oz. plastic cup as a measure, which made enough for approx ...
May 13th, 2011
I recently came across this delicious and healing recipe for dandelion syrup. I have made dandelion wine before so I know how many dandelions you need to pick for such a recipe. It is best to have a lovely field with no dogs or pesticides anywhere near it. It is a lovely way to spend a spring day, p ...
April 24th, 2011
Please join us May 1st at noon for the third annual Cedar Cottage Garden Spring Fling in Vancouver, BC! I am very excited and a little nervous because I am signed up to be a vendor for this event and will be selling my handmade aprons, to die for hazelnut truffles, homemade salves, soapnut laundry p ...
March 18th, 2011
We finally had our first underground market meeting here in Vancouver. It went really well, we met in a lovely old house in a nice central location. I even--just barely--remembered to get a photo to document the event--too bad my camera sucks at indoor photos-this was the best I could do. We decided ...
March 14th, 2011
I have finally gotten the first draft of my Urban Dweller's DIY finally up. Please check it out! Bear in mind that this is a work in progress. What I am especially interested in is bringing together all kinds of ways people are working towards living a more sustainable life. I am eager for suggestio ...
February 7th, 2011
The world is too much with us;
Late and soon,
Getting and spending,
We lay waste our powers. - Wordsworth
This is a great little video from a practical fellow who seems to be one of the ole' sourdoughs from the gold-rush days, returned to tell us how to live more practically. We really don't n ...
January 12th, 2011
These are some of my most helpful friends in the kitchen. I tend to like to do things as manually as possible, I think this is just habit from growing up in a place without much electricity. I also find that doing things this way gives me a good workout. I have often thought of putting together a cu ...
December 30th, 2010
This is a recipe I was meaning to post a couple months ago, and am now doing so I can add it to www.amoderatelife.com's Tenth day of Bloggi-mas that I have been doing my best to be a part of this year. Today is casserole day. I made this for our Canadian Thanksgiving this year and it was a hit. It i ...
December 23rd, 2010
Have you ever seen that documentary about the hugest urban community garden in the world that was bulldozed by the city of Los Angeles? It is a real tear-jerker. A truly disturbing film. Guess what? LA is at it again. They are planning to increase the cost per plot for community gardens from $25 to ...
