End of 2013

Well, it's the end of the year....

Of course the obvious high of the year was our wedding. I'm still grateful and amazed at how wonderful that was and the generosity of everyone involved. Especially Mama N for taking a long forcasted horrid winter weather weekend and giving us an impeccable warm and beautiful spring weekend. It was truly a party amongst loved ones and was perfect.

Scored some points in the yard, getting the luffas to work, the bumper crop of beans, putting in our first raised bed, cleaning up the solarium beds... Also lost some points in the not taking care of the orchard again, and not getting the flowers in the sanctuary to work, and having such problems with all the container growing.

To date, and there is still a chance of more seeds coming in the mail today...
Growbox Hill now has a breeding base of 360 seeds. We donated 220 packets of seed to new gardeners in 2013. Scrambled the whole trade list, but I know we traded in and out dozens of packets of seed. Currently under 200 seeds on my wishlist, lol- I'm sure that will change once I get my bean and tomato seed swaps in and look through the new seed catalogs.

Had some fine culinary accomplishments this year. Canning has turned out to be a wonderful experience, though I'm particularly pleased with the wild gathering and making of blackberry jelly and the salsa I gathered ingredients from several produce sellers to make. Discovered the joy of making homemade horseradish and tahini. Figured out making my own dinner kits.

Tikki came into our home this year, and boy what a difference from when we first rescued her to today! She is a right plump little thing now, sweet as she wants to be. Still not getting along great with the other kitties, but slowly things are looking like they will be fine.

2013 was a good year. A good setup year, a good learning year.

Looking forward to 2014 though. I don't really have resolutions, but I do have things I want to accomplish.
I want to try wintersowing this year. I've been wanting to do this before, but 2014 will be the first time I really have the resources and seeds for doing it. Primary target this year will be flowers.
Want to get some progress done in the sanctuary- get flowers established.
Want to get 2 raised beds set up this year. Now that I filled the first box with garlic, I realize I will probably always have a garlic box. Maybe we can squeeze 3 beds.
I want to finally, really get the orchard cleaned up. It's been way overdue for way too long. I want good, edible, useable fruit in 2014!
Want to build/obtain a cider press.
Want to paint the interior of the house.
Want to get the garage fixed or shored up, and the solarium skylight repaired.
Want to make the top gate for the basement door and set up the salt teat system.
Want to get the beehive setup accomplished this year so we can put in a nuc in 2015! By this I mean the bee patio finished, including the beehive and accoutrements. I'm thinking of doing a traditional Langstroth hive and a Mason Jar Observation hive, which is pretty much a Langstroth with a bunch of mason jars on top. Pretty darn neat.
Want to get one alternative energy project set up. Don't care what it is, but I do think we should apply it to the power source for our well. We can progress from there :)


Will likely slow down on the seed collecting in 2014. I do ultimately have goals of storing more kinds of seed, but considering I have over 100 more kinds of seed than my initial goals in January of this year.. Whew, I need to do some sorting and growing out of a lot of stuff to catch up!
Will likely get a handle on the raspberry patch- or at least sweat and swear a lot over it. Considering how much better the raspberry patch is down at the corner, I'm seriously thinking about just grooming in that chunk and doing something else entirely with the current patch. What, I don't know.


So now it's afternoon on New Years Eve. I'm not sorry to see 2013 go, but I'm not thanking heavens it's over, hahahaha. I'm grateful I've had a year full of love and good things, friends and family, experiencing cool things.

Hope everyone has a safe and wonderful evening... We will see you in 2014! Cheers!!