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The Gardening Gals

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The Gardening Gals

Check out Susan & Christel's four-season suburban Permaculture garden and see how the garden weaves into a rich tapestry of life!  We'll be talking about the usual (or unusual) activities related to our garden, what's cooking in the kitchen, and how we're engaged in the larger community.  Tune in for all sorts of adventures related to distributing food and garden-related abundance which occur with regularity between the regular cycles of prepping, sowing, planting, and reaping a garden.  Typical adventures include neighborhood leaf liberation, apple distribution, bare-root strawberry abundance, work-parties, and CSA box give-aways.

Recent articles

  Fun with Fermentation: Making Sauerkraut
Feb 25, 2010
cabbageFermented food is fun to make, healthy to eat, and preserves the harvest. Making sauerkraut is a really easy hands-on way to learn about live fermentation  and only takes about 15 minutes to make.
  Building the Soil with Cover Crops
Jan 25, 2010
Crop CropsCover Crops - What are they?  Compost Crops - Are those the same thing?   And, why would someone plant a crop which is not going to be eaten?
Read on to find out the answers to the above questions, and along the way, learn that cover crops improve soil texture, improve soil biology, build the soil, increase the water holding capacity of soil, and reduce water and wind erosion problems.
  Seasonal Holiday Recipes
Nov 18, 2009

We hope that you enjoy the recipes that the Conexions' Green Fork project has collected over the years of our 100-Mile Thanksgiving Celebrations and are inspired to create similar dishes for your Thanksgiving Feasts and other holiday meals. All of the recipes use local (to Palo Alto, CA) ingredients with the exception of the spices. All but a small number of the ingredients are also organic.
  Healthy Food, Healthy Holidays
Nov 18, 2009

CHOICES – Every day we make thousands of them. They range from “what time am I going to wake up” to “what am I going to eat for dinner.”

ADVENTURE – Every day in the kitchen can be one of those. As I peer into the cabinets and the refrigerator, I’m on the lookout for what is going to pop up and say “Choose Me! Choose Me!” Sometimes it hard to distinguish if the vegetable is calling or it’s my stomach – but really, either one works. I especially enjoy using this technique while perusing the stalls at the Farmers’ Market.
  Anatomy of a Work Party
Apr 12, 2009
The title for this post was a toss up, the other choice was 1 + 1 + 1 = 5. It’s not about some new kind of math. It's really about the power of bringing people together to work on a project.
  Lessons from the Farm
Mar 9, 2009
Hoop HouseOur friend Jim has a farm outside of Sacramento that has been in the family since the late 1800's.   His parents grow walnuts, and he's growing organic fruits and veggies for a CSA (Community-Supported Agriculture) and a few local farmers' markets.  I was excited to learn that the family is leasing out some land to someone who is growing grains and beans for a grain CSA.  It's too bad that we don't live close enough to participate in the grain CSA.
  When is an Annual Really a Perennial?
Feb 8, 2009
Annuals = fabulous in short amount of time + lots of work
Perennials= fabulous in long amount of time + less work than most annuals

What if we planted annuals that acted like perennials?  What would that look like?  Well, in my mind, it would be more food with less work.
  Serious Green Salad
Jan 12, 2009
One of the best things about having a garden is that it's difficult to go hungry. If you plan things well, there's typically always something to eat.