Avocado Update: Slow Growth

This week is shaping up to be a week of indoor gardening projects! We had a few requests for an update on the progress of our avocado plants. It's been 4 full weeks since our last update and I'm happy to say the plants are still growing, but sad to say not very much...

How To: Regrowing Bok Choy

Tim was cooking in the kitchen as he usually does and sliced the bottom of a Bok Choy off and asked, "Can we grow Bok Choy like we did celery?" Of course after surprisingly being able to regenerate onions and celery from their cut bases, I said, "why not, let's try it!"

Weekend Planting: Outdoor Containers

While accomplishing many things this weekend, our focus centered around outdoor container planting. We've been starting many seeds indoors and are just about getting to a temperate point here in Richmond where we can safely plant outdoors.

How To: Make Sweet Potato Dog Chew Treats

After making and sharing two variations of natural dog treats for Basil (apple treat recipe here and carrot & banana treat recipe here), we had a few requests for some gluten and grain free natural variations. We've pined here on the blog before over our love for Sam's Yams natural sweet potato dog treat chews, and this past weekend we tried our hand at making our own version.

Growing Celery Indoors: Never Buy Celery Again

Remember when we tested and shared how to grow onions indefinitely last week? Well, at the same time, we've been testing out another little indoor gardening project first gleaned from Pinterest that we're excited to share the successes of today — regrowing celery from the base.

Free Urban Gardening Classes in Richmond, Virginia

Last week we received a note from our neighborhood email list alerting us to an upcoming urban organic vegetable gardening class series. Being right up our alley, we made plans to attend the first session over the weekend to find out what it was all about.

Weekend Basics

1: We attended the first class in a series of 6 free urban gardening courses, open to the public at the North Avenue Richmond Library. One of the speakers brought along her backyard hen named George — we're looking forward to taking more of the classes and sharing more details from the first tomorrow.

Bright Ideas

Have I ever told you guys that Tim actually used to be an electrician by trade waaaay back when? Well, it definitely comes in handy all the time. This also means I get to see him up on a ladder and/or sporting a tool belt every so often; which I never complain about.

How to Grow Green Onions Indefinitely

I'm officially dubbing this the week of Scallions and Pinterest. Mary and I separately came across 2 trending ideas for using and growing green onions on the highly addictive bookmarking site, Pinterest, last week — we couldn't wait to try them.

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day! XO, Etsy from Etsy on Vimeo.

Weekend Snow

We had our first snow of the season here in RVA for about 20 minutes on Saturday. It came down heavy and fast and was a bit magical while it lasted — then poof, the snow was gone as quickly as it had rolled in. We're hoping to get at least one storm this season that sticks around for a day or two and then heads on out with the rest of this cold weather.

DIY Treat Packaging Tutorial

We had such a great response to the last batch of homemade dog treats we made, with inquiries on the wrappings — I thought I'd share a quick tutorial on how I packaged them up. It's really simpler than it looks and could work for a multitude of different baked goods other than dog cookies.

The Aerobin 400: Our New Composting System

We've got a new composting system! Some of you may remember our previous DIY compost bin we made right around a year ago at our old house. It consisted of drilling holes throughout a metal trash bin, setting it up atop of some planks and adding/mixing organic matter over time. This was a great bin for getting us started with composting; for anyone interested in the fuller details of how we made it, see here.

Weekend Basics

1. We've got broccoli sprouts! Probably the most exciting news (geeky I know) we have to share this week is how quickly and well our broccoli seeds sprouted from planting them in eggshells last weekend. No later than Tuesday mid-morning did we notice the first small sprouts peeking through, followed up by rapid growth ever since. Be it a combination of sunnier windows in our new place paired with the natural planters or just dumb luck, we couldn't be happier.

Super Bowl Recipe Roundup

Who's ready for gameday? For those of you still looking for recipes to make for your Super Bowl party or take to another — you're in luck. I've been working on a special series just for gameday (well, you could really make these for any occasion), that rounds up go-to recipes full of flavor you can make with fresh ingredients.

How To: Carrot & Banana Natural Dog Treat Recipe

We decided it was high time to make another bulk batch of homemade natural dog treats for Basil. Our last batch of fresh apple treats ran out fairly quickly and we've been wanting to try something new. Not only can the recipe base we use allow for all sorts of natural ingredient combinations, it really helps us cut down on the amount we spend on natural treat varieties from the store (plus, we can't help but think they are a tiny bit healthier knowing exactly what goes into them).

Avocado Update: We're Sprouting Stems

Last time we checked in here on the blog with an avocado plant update, our little pits had just began to sprout roots. In 3 weeks time, the roots on both pits have grown so long they're beginning to curl under and more importantly, they're finally beginning to sprout stems through the tops of the pits!