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My grandparents always had a garden when I was growing up and I remember spending summers with them working in the garden, watering all the plants, and eating lots of yummy things. I remember running up and down through the rows of corn playing tag and hide n’ seek with my cousins. It was always the best part of summer.

So for several years now, I’ve wanted to replicate that in my own yard to not only give my kids some fun memories and teach them about sustainable living, but also simply for the benefits it brings – like natural, organic food, fresh vegetables, fruits and berries for canning for the winter months, and of course, to cut down on our grocery bills (which really seem to be rising quite dramatically lately).

I always wondered how in the world I could actually successfully grow that much produce in a relatively small and manageable area. From time to time, I go searching around the web looking for info and always seem to come up short of what I’m looking for. But one day this week, I was reading one of the family oriented blogs I read regularly where I happened upon some information called the Mittleider Method. And now I’m so excited because I think this method will actually work the way I want to.

If you’re not familiar with it, here a brief description from the Food For Everyone Foundation website -

What is the Mittleider Method?

The Mittleider Method combines the best features of soil-based gardening and hydroponic gardening, but without hydroponic expense! It’s a complete, easy-to-follow plan that eliminates guesswork and ensures success anywhere: an apartment patio, a city yard, a country lot, or a farm.

The method is based on maximum utilization of space, time, and resources. Crops are large because plants are close together, nourished by supplemental feedings of natural mineral nutrients (as in hydroponics), but with no special equipment.

Also, unlike hydroponics, the Mittleider Method gives plants access to the natural soil for nutrients as yet unknown or that, while not essential to plant growth, are useful in human nutrition. You can use the Mittleider Method by raising crops in either soil-beds or grow-boxes.

And to me it sounds like container gardening on steroids! Which is actually what I want – containers that maximize growth and are easy on my back.

Now my plan for the next week is gather materials and have my husband begin building the boxes and greenhouse. Hopefully the weather holds out long enough to get it all ready and set up before it’s too late. Although, I think if we do it right, it won’t matter much. I’m thinking our summer is going to be a decent one this year and having a greenhouse will allow us to extend the growing season long enough to compensate.

I’ll keep you posted how things go and if you’ve used this method or any other container gardening style with good success, let me know.

I hope you’re enjoying this beautiful beginning to the summer season. Have a safe and fun weekend!

In the arena,

God made rainy days so gardeners could get the housework done. ~Author Unknown

Annie Anderson is a freelance copywriter and graphic designer specializing in the small business and real estate markets. Her tagline “Making your business, my business” means that she’ll take the utmost care when creating words and images for your business – just as if it were her own.

I was beginning to think Mother Nature had forgotten what “Spring” meant. But it appears she has finally remembered. And I’m excited about that because snow and rain and cold, icky weather was just getting old and tiring. I can finally see why senior citizens and other retired folks go to Arizona and such for the winter months.

For the past few days here in NW Washington, we’ve had sunny skies in the 60’s. Great weather for this time of year! And it’s what makes me love spring in the first place. Nice, cool (but not cold) mornings and warm afternoons.

Beautiful.

The kids are funny, though. They insist on wearing their winter jackets to school.

Gman – “But mom, what if it gets cold? Or what if it rains?”

Little Girl – “Yeah, mom. He’s right. We should wear them just in case.”

Short Dude – “No, mom. I really want to wear my warm jacket.”

Me – “Ok, fine but trust me, you won’t need it.”

And then when they get home from school,

All of them – “Geez, mom. It’s H-O-T out here!”

Um, yeah, guys. Tried to warn ya.

The bummer of the whole thing, though, is that LAST week – when it was still cold and rainy – was SPRING BREAK. Go figure. So, the kids were cooped up in the house all week with not much to do because it was too nasty outside to do anything or go anywhere. And we all were definitely ready for school to resume this week!

Can’t wait to get outside and ride bikes! Biking is one my favorite pastimes. Another good thing about Spring. I know – there are people out there who ride year-round no matter the weather. But not me. Sorry. Rain, I can deal with – but freezing temps are another thing. And as that’s about all we’ve had since last November, I haven’t ridden in a while.

Not that I have a bike to ride at the moment anyway. I’m looking into getting a new bike as I gave mine to The Teenager because she outgrew her old one. So, I’ve been researching new bikes and drooling over them.

Due to my back and arm issues, the doctor and physical therapist have all recommended I ride a recumbent bike anyway so giving my bike to The Teenager made sense. It’s really a nice bike – 24 speed mountain bike with some extras including a nice seat, top of the line shifters and brakes that were easy on my arm. It’s a smaller frame so it fits people in the 4′8 – 5′4 range quite nicely. If she continues to take care of it as I have, she should have it for many more years.

I am looking forward to getting a recumbent so I’ve whittled my list down to a couple of 3-wheel (trike) versions that I think would really work well for me. Now it’s just a matter of making a final choice and biting the bullet. (Recumbents are typically quite expensive. In fact, some of them are even more expensive than what my CAR is worth! LOL) Too funny.

The models I’m looking at are:

1. TerraTrike Path 8
2. Catrike Pocket
3. Greenspeed GT3
4. Sun EZ Tad

I really like the looks and everything of the TerraTrike, but I’m leaning towards either Catrike or the Sun. They all seem fairly comparable to me though the Catrike Pocket comes in a smaller size to fit shorter folks. Actually, so do the TerraTrike and Sun models. I really like the look and reviews of the Catrike and Sun and I know of 2 of each of those models for sale for a little less than the retail prices.

If you’ve ridden a recumbent – and specifically, one of the models I’ve listed here – let me know what you think and why you like (or don’t like) that model. I’d appreciate any input I can get. Hopefully, I will make a choice and be able to purchase one by the end of the month.

Aside from my back and arm issues, the other reason I want to start riding again is part of my exercise plan for weight loss. I used to ride everywhere as a kid – all over the place, really – and if I wasn’t at home reading, my friends and I were hanging out and riding bikes. I even built my own bikes when I was a pre-teen & teenager because I couldn’t find one exactly like I wanted.

Funny enough – the bike I was riding when I trashed my arm was one I had *just* finished building. It wasn’t even 24 hours old when I had the accident. (No, the accident had nothing to do with the bike – just stupid teenage error on my part; i.e. – riding down a really steep hill going very fast.)

Bike riding has always been one my favorite outdoor activities and I always miss it during the cold winter months. With that and my arm/back injuries, I don’t ride as often as I’d really like to so I think getting a recumbent is the answer I’ve been looking for. Maybe I will even want to venture out when the weather isn’t so cooperative.

Luckily, my kids and my husband also enjoy riding. In fact, that’s we did after our wedding – we packed everything up and went bike riding for the afternoon!

Yes, I’m a funny girl. My kids think I’m downright weird.

But it’s okay . . . it runs in the family. I’m pretty sure I’ll get to laugh at them when they’re my age as much as they laugh at me now.

When I started this post, I had intended to write something about my weight loss achievements over the past few weeks but I think I’ll end here and save that for tomorrow.

Hope you’re enjoying your week!

In the arena,

The reason most people never reach their goals is that they don’t define them, or ever seriously consider them as believable or achievable. Winners can tell you where they are going, what they plan to do along the way, and who will be sharing the adventure with them.
~ Denis Watley

Annie Anderson is a freelance copywriter and graphic designer specializing in the small business and real estate markets. Her tagline “Making your business, my business” means that she’ll take the utmost care when creating words and images for your business – just as if it were her own.

Thank. God. It’s. Friday.

I’m so excited it’s Friday! I always like Fridays as it means the weekend is arriving and my husband will be home. It means he gets to spend time with the kids. During the summer, it also means no worries about kids getting up late for school and it doesn’t matter so much if they can’t find a their shoes or whatever. Of course, it also means *I* don’t have to get up so freakin’ early.

But this weekend is extra cool because my mom and I are going to the Smooth Jazz Festival in Woodinville at Chateau Ste Michelle Winery. My mom usually goes every year and usually her friend goes with her but this year, he can’t make it so she invited me. A day without kids! I am so excited! (I’m sure you totally couldn’t tell, right?)

We are going to see Marion Meadows, Waymon Tisdale, Nils and the Crusaders. I don’t especially like the Crusaders, but everyone else is pretty cool. The lineup for Sunday includes some equally cool musicians like Chris Botti, Boney James, Blake Aaron and Janita. Unfortunately, we’re only going to Saturday’s show which kinda sucks because I really like Chris Botti. Wish we could go to both.

You can bet that I will be posting all about the festival, probably sometime Sunday. I plan to take my camera as well so hopefully I’ll actually remember to use it and take some pictures! Although it’s not supposed to be extremely warm, it should be pleasant weather and with any luck we’ll get some good shots as we’re supposed to be in the VIP seating area. Not sure exactly what that means, but I’m sure it means something really cool. Like maybe front row or something.

Seafair Weekend

I also wanted to share with anyone who happens to be local to the Seattle area, that this weekend is Seafair and I’ve written a listing of Seafair activities going on around the sound over at Beyond Real Estate. Please feel free to check it out. If you know of anything I missed, please do post something about it in the comments there.

Wherever you are and whatever you’re doing this weekend, I hope you have a great weekend! I wish you lots of fun times and safe adventures!

In the arena,

PS – Anyone having a big time delay between when they publish a post and when it shows up in the RSS? Usually it’s pretty fast – I can publish a post here and it’ll post to the RSS feed within just minutes. But lately, unless I schedule the post ahead of time, it takes 2-3 hours before it shows up in the feed. I’d appreciate any clues anyone might have. Thanks!

PPS – I can’t get the formatting on the post to allow the picture to be aligned left with the text wrapping around it. If anyone knows a fix for that, I’d appreciate any tips on that too. Thanks again!

Make $10k in a weekend – “Too good to be true.” That’s the first thing I said when
I heard of http://tinyurl.com/5lq2g4. You can’t REALLY make $10K in a weekend. But I quickly bit my tongue once I saw the content. . .

Annie Anderson is a freelance copywriter and graphic designer specializing in the small business and real estate markets. Her tagline “Making your business, my business” means that she’ll take the utmost care when creating words and images for your business – just as if it were her own.

I enjoy cooking – for the most part. Well, no, I love to *cook*. The part I don’t like? My kitchen sucks. It’s old, out of date, not near enough counter space and the poor oven has been better days. We keep thinking we’ll go ahead and get new appliances . . . but then something else happens. Like, the kids need new clothes. Or the plumbing goes berserk. You know, “fun stuff.”

So I have a kitchen I really dislike but I like to cook so when I can clear enough counter space to make it happen, I like to bake bread, cookies, muffins, and other good stuff. We’ve had some really great meals lately – crockpot chicken that the kids loved!, a noodle casserole they all gobbled up and apple muffins among other things. I still have some recipes to try and I’ll try to post the crockpot chicken recipe and the others either here or over at The Weight Loss Papers sometime this weekend.

Right now, there is 10 grain bread (the recipe is at The Weight Loss Papers) rising in the pan on the counter. About 10 more minutes until it goes in the oven. There is also a basic sandwich bread in the bread machine. It’s got about two hours until it’s ready to put in the pans to rise before cooking in the oven.

I know – it’s summer. What am I doing using the oven?? Well, I live in Seattle (that alone should explain it) and it’s only 70 today. Just right for baking bread.

Maybe if I can find the SD card for the camera, I’ll take some pictures when everything is baked and post them.

Do you bake bread? If so, what are your favorite bread recipes?

In the arena,

By the way – if this is your first time here, or you haven’t done so yet, please consider subscribing to my RSS feed. You can use any feed reader you wish.

Annie Anderson is a freelance copywriter and graphic designer specializing in the small business and real estate markets. Her tagline “Making your business, my business” means that she’ll take the utmost care when creating words and images for your business – just as if it were her own.

On the bookshelf this week -

• A New Earth by Eckhart Tolle
• Life’s Golden Ticket by Brendon Burchard
• 2008 Songwriter’s Market by Writer’s Digest Books
• The Grown Ups Guide to Running Away From Home by Rosanne Knorr
• The Key by Joe Vitale
• Think Two Products Ahead by Ben Mack (previously read)

Do you ever re-read books? If so, what are your favorites?

~ Annie

On the bookshelf this week -

• The Anti 9-5 Guide by Michelle Goodman
• The War of Art by Steven Pressfield
• Wealth Cycle Investing by Loral Langemeier
• The 5 Rules of Thought by Mary T. Brown
• Big Book of Apple Hacks by Chris Seibold
• You The Owners Manual by Michael F. Roizen

I’ve heard good things about The War of Art and can’t wait to get started on it. If you’ve read this one, let me know your thoughts.

See you again soon!

~ Annie

On the Reading List this week:

• The Ultimate Marketing Plan by Dan S. Kennedy
• Book Yourself Solid by Michael Port
• Allergies: Fight Them With the Blood Type Diet by Peter D’Adamo
• The Irresistible Offer by Mark Joyner
• The Sinus Cure by Debra Fulghum Bruce

And that’s it for now. If you’ve read any of these, let me know what you thought. Feel free to post a comment or email me.

~ Annie