Ashley is fast becoming a backyard gardener-extraordinnaire. Not only is she gardening, but she’s composting, too. Just look at this fancy compost bin!
Nice, isn’t it? It’s fabulous. However, composting 101 requires more than mere kitchen scraps. Remember your ratio: 30:1 — Carbon:Nitrogen — Browns:Greens
Your “browns” are things like dead leaves, hay, pine needles, wood shavings, etc. Your “greens” are things like food leftovers, grass clippings, freshly discarded plants, etc.
Translated, this means you must include more than leftovers in your pile. Now I do “fudge” this number somewhat as composting is not an exact science at my house, but if you simply place your food items in the bin and leave it be, you can expect a host of flies to invade your bin (those light specks in the photo), much like they do your outside garbage. Very bad. Stinky. Not a likely scenario for long-term composting behavior.
Now for the good news! Ashley has placed her bin outside beneath the oak trees which gives her an unlimited supply of dead leaves (browns!). All she has to do is to instruct her boys to cover each kitchen deposit with a few hand-fulls of leaves. Voila! Problem solved!
Perfect. Speaking of problems solved, Julie is finding all sorts of ways to be creative and recycle, thus eliminating the need for things like disposing of unused toys. Rather than carting this old baby pool to the garbage dump, she plans to turn it into a herb garden! Clever, isn’t she?
Then, her husband surprised her with an unexpected contribution! What a nice guy. (I’m sure it had nothing to do with any guilt over watching his wife rake and dig, till and toil all by herself.) It was simply a gesture from the center of his heart.
“What’s that? Ego, you say? Not wanting to be outdone by Ashley’s husband?”
Oh, c’mon. You’re being too cynical. I mean, he bought her dirt, too! I love husbands. They’re simply indispensable.
And they will receive their just reward. Why, look at all these potato plants bursting forth in Ashley’s garden!
They’ll certainly make for some delicious potato salad, mashed potatoes, baked potatoes, potato au gratin…
Yum. Not only helpful, husbands are smart, too!
Great ideas, thanks for sharing!
I love this post – I’m an avid gardener – have been for years. Thanks for the composting tips – I needed them. 🙂
Great article. Easy directions to follow.
This is my first time to your site…WOW….I only WISH I could grow the things you have pictured. I always say I was blessed with a “brown thumb” there’s not a plant out there that I can’t kill. I’m bound and determined this summer I’m going to plant a little garden with my kids so I’m going to start following your blog for tips along the way. Who knows, maybe we’ll be swimming in green beans in a few months. There’s a first for everything, right? 🙂
Great ideas especially with recycling old toys.
Rani Chopra
Very interesting.
I have a compost bucket in the shape of a pig. I feed him through the mouth and roll him over every couple of weeks. It’s really good.
Enjoyed the read – thanks