My Favorite Things...

I wanted to make a list of my favorite things for Garden Anywhere Box.  This list will be ongoing. As I find new favorites, I will add and share.

 1. Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds

www,rareseeds.com

I use heirloom seeds in my garden. Heirloom seeds are "seeds with a story."   Some seeds date back to the days of Thomas Jefferson. There are seeds that have been handed down through families. The people at Baker Creek travel the world to find rare and unique seeds.
Here is a link to read more about the Gettle family and their mission in life. 

http://www.rareseeds.com/about/

My favorite seeds: American Beauty sunflower, Cosmic Purple carrot, Boston Pickling cucumber, Golden squash, White Scallop squash, Cocozella di Napoli squash, Black Beauty squash, Strawberry (pop) corn...

2. Sea Agri

www.seaagri.com

I first learned of Sea Agri years ago, but the shipping cost was pretty high. Now you can find it in most states and can get it easier. You do not have to have this to grow food in a GAB, but adding extra minerals from the sea to your food couldn't hurt. Go to their website to read more about Sea Agri and its benefits to your garden and lawn and livestock.

3. Eckroat Seed - Dolomite

http://www.eckroatseed.com/

Eckroat Seed is a local company in OKC. They sell a 50# bag of dolomite for less than $10. We include a 2 cup bag of dolomite and fertilizer in each GAB. These two things plus black plastic is all that you need to redress your GABs each season. A 50# bag of dolomite will last a long time. Check with different seed/feed stores where you live to see what you can find.


4. Mason Bees

http://davesbees.com/masonbees.html

If you are lucky enough to have bees in your garden, you are very lucky. If you are not

seeing bees in your garden, consider making a Mason bee house. 

Mason bees don't make honey, but they are great pollinators. I provided a link to show you how to make your own Mason bee house. It is not hard and will reward you with hard-working bees all summer.



5. Willow Water

http://www.bluestem.ca/willow-article1.htm

i just learned about Willow Water. Gather some new growth small willow branches. Cut them into 1 inch pieces. Boil water and pour over the twigs. Let steep 24 hours. Discard the twigs and use the water as a rooting hormone for your plants. We pruned back a couple of tomato plants that had gotten spindly. The stalks did not look that great, but they were putting off new growth on the ends. We trimmed the ends and stuck them into potting mix. Now we have lots of new tomato plants. We will use the willow water rooting hormone to help stimulate root growth. 

Everybody has a Story...This is a Continuation of Ours.

Dear GAB friends,

I wanted to share our progress with you. One of my first blog posts was Humble Beginnings, and how we got started gardening in boxes. I posted Things I Learned Last Summer in 2012 updating on our progress and a post in September of last year about the birth of Garden Anywhere Box. There have been other posts along the way updating our GAB journey. 

It's time for another update. Every business has a story. This is the continuation of ours.
Some of you know that Larry has developed macular degeneration. It had been advancing slowly, but at the end of last year, it worsened. He could no longer drive or see the regular print on the computer to do his telecom job. He has been without a "regular job" since January. Thank heavens for Garden Anywhere Box. This is something that he can still do. We have been (mostly) able to live on GAB sales from The Home and Garden shows and farmers markets...but just barely. Pay bills...buy box supplies, both, neither...

If Larry was able to do his telecom work, we would be fine, but apparently there was another plan. We were not ready to jump feet first into the deep end of our business just yet, but...here we are. Sink or swim. 

Some months have been really tough, especially as the summer gardening season came to an end. If it were not for the generosity of family, friends and our church, we don't know how we would have survived this year. We think of those that have helped us as silent investors. Your investment WILL pay off!

We have had a booth at the Home and Garden Show for the 

past two years.

The first year, 2013, we didn't even have any boxes to sell. We didn't know if anyone would want them. We paid for a booth space and handed out flyers to anyone that would take one. From that humble beginning we found out that, yes, people were interested in Garden Anywhere Box. Yay!









The second Home show, 2014, was a lot better than the first. We'd learned some things along the way. 


This is a picture of one of our last customers of the weekend.  She had heard about us on the radio from Larry's "minute of fame" the day before. All she could remember was "garden box". This lady went through five buildings to find us. She has a condition that does not allow her to have a garden. She grew up with a big garden and misses not being able to have one. She literally was in pain by the time she found us. Larry was talking to someone, so we offered her a chair in our booth to sit and rest. 

We were so humbled that she would seek us out so diligently. I wish I could know how her garden did this year. When people buy GABs, they get us. We care and want to hear about successes and failures. We want everyone to be successful and if you aren't, we want to help.

This picture is of William Moss, a Master Gardener who lives in Chicago and gardens in containers. http://www.wemoss.org/

He was at the Home and Garden show this year. Larry met him while waiting to be on the radio. He invited Mr. Moss to come by our booth to see our container garden set-up. He said that he would stop by. His handler did not want to let him come because he was on a tight schedule, but he came anyway. Larry offered to send a Starter Kit to Chicago for him to try. He said that he would really like that. We emailed and tried to establish contact, but I guess he never got the email. Oh, well...it was still a pretty exciting meeting. 

This is a picture of Larry being interviewed by our local gardening show hosts. Notice the eye patch...perfect for radio...last year, he developed Bell's Palsy. When you have Bell's Palsy, sometimes your eyelid will not close without much struggle. This causes your eye to become irritated and dry. We got an eye patch, but our oldest (hipper) son was not satisfied. He got his dad a Steam Punk monocle to wear. Now, his dad could protect his eye and be cool. Plus, the monocle allowed him to see out instead of using the patch which blocked vision.

Larry had to wear eye protection for a while and tape his eye shut at night. The Bells' Palsy lingered longer than we hoped. After almost a year, his Bell's Palsy was getting less noticeable. He started using frankincense essential oil around his eyes for a little while. One day I noticed that his eye was closing on its own and the Bell's Palsy was nearly gone. YAY! Yay for oils.
This year has been a roller-coaster of a ride and January, 2015 is fast approaching.

We did not even know if we could afford a booth at the Home and Garden Show this next year. We were planning to borrow the $1000 (yes, it costs that much) to pay for a 7x10 ft. space just to be there. I'd been emailing back and forth with the managers of the event to let them know our situation and that we really did want to be there. They were more than understanding and said that our product was perfect for the Home show and that they would wait for us. (Thank you!) 

Well...Larry got a call on Monday from one of the event managers. She asked him if he would consider a proposition. Okay...Intrigued.

She asked what we would think abut having Garden Anywhere Box as one of their featured booths. We would get a 20x20 space (huge) for $500. (No kidding!) We would have to do demonstrations all throughout the weekend and be available for interviews. (Ummm...YES!) We were beyond excited to receive this invitation. We do demonstrations all the time. GAB is not self-explanatory so we always take the time to show how the boxes work and what we are growing.

We are so grateful to the managers of the Home Show for allowing us this opportunity. Add this to the list of silent investors. :)

So, if you live in the OKC area and want to come by our booth, we'd love to see you. We will be getting some free tickets and just like last year, we will be having drawings to give away free ticket to the Home and Garden Show coming January 16-18 to the OK State Fairgrounds. It looks like we'll be in the same spot that we had at the fair. :)

In the Kitchen...

Busy day in the kitchen. Getting ready for our church Thanksgiving dinner tonight. 

Our Primary group made cute little Pilgrim hat crayon holders and turkey posters saying what they are thankful for. I've been in charge of activities at my church before. One thing that I like to do for the Thanksgiving dinner is to cover the tables with butcher paper and set crayons out. This gives the kids (and some adults) something to do once they've eaten dinner.

I signed up to bring my mom's recipe for sweet potato casserole, Chunky Cranberry Applesauce, Mexican Fruitcake and a green salad with home-grown tomatoes from the greenhouse.

 Here is a pretty close recipe for sweet potato casserole.

I use three eggs and my recipe does not call for buttermilk, but I found a recipe on Pinterest and decided to post it. My mom made Sweet Potato Casserole every year for special occasions. My husband would not touch a sweet potato until he tried my mom's casserole recipe. 

  Chunky Cranberry Applesauce

This is a favorite recipe that I found in an issue of Southern Living a few years ago. I grew up with cranberry sauce from a can. I was fine with that...until I discovered this recipe. It is just so good. Worth the time to make to add it to the holiday table. 

Mexican Fruitcake,

This is one of my very old and very favorite cakes. I got the recipe years ago when I worked in an office. People were always bringing goodies. A salesman's wife brought this cake. She called it, "Mexican Fruitcake." I'm not sure why since the only fruit in it is crushed pineapple. It was so good. I had to have the recipe. This cake is super easy to make.

Beat two eggs in a large bowl. Add sugar, crushed pineapple, vanilla, flour, baking soda (my recipe does not call for baking powder) and chopped pecans. Mix with a fork and pour into an ungreased jelly roll pan. No mixer, just a fork and an ungreased pan. What could be easier?

Bake until done, cool, and ice with cream cheese icing.

If you haven't made any of these recipes, you should give them a try. 

Snow

Here are a few pics from winters past.


The pic of my family is a few years old. Our oldest son was out of the house at the time.  The rest of the family could not resist playing in the snow and I couldn't resist taking pictures. Btw, I had to cut this picture in half to make it fit in one of those collage picture frames. 













This is a picture from last year. The snow on our little pine tree looked so pretty. The leaf looks like a heart. 

This picture is from two years ago. These are some pine trees in the front yard. I found a quote by Lady Bird Johnson that expresses how I feel about snow.

              Here's a picture out our kitchen window of Garden Anywhere Box in snow. 

This is a picture of our pond last winter. The water level is a bit low, but the geese don't seem to mind. 

The last pictures are of our pond a few winters ago. 

The pond was not here when we bought our property. It was a boggy spot where blackberries grew and snakes gathered. Yikes! We decided to see if we could turn it into a pond. There were some willow trees in the middle of the field. I asked if we could turn it into an island...and we could. Yay! So, now we have "Willow Island" ...because I like to name things...lol. 

This is a picture from when the pond used to have a constant flow of water and the creek was always full. 

When we dug the pond, we discovered that there was a spot of quicksand over by the woods. That was pretty cool. Our kids had so much fun playing in the red dirt that was excavated to make the pond. We stocked our pond with fish and got to observe the fish building their nests along the bank. Pretty cool for a homeschooling family to get to watch.

If you look closely at the top pic,  you can see geese on the pond. We have a family of Canada geese that come yearly to have babies on the island. Over the years, the family has grown to include many generations of geese. It's pretty cool.

We have had years of fun on our pond. From the year that it froze SOLID and allowed the kids the opportunity to sled across it, to Scout camp outs, fishing and swimming parties, to group gathering for cookouts, to canoe and paddle boat races. We are truly blessed to live here and we know it. You are welcome to come fishing anytime. The catfish are usually biting.

Taking Pictures

When you see my pics, does it help you to see planting and harvesting in a different way?  Planting, not just to harvest, but to include color, texture and shape in your decision about what to plant. I  hope that when you see my daily pics, it will inspire you to take pictures of your own harvests and share the beauty of nature with others. 

June 16, 2013

I did not always take pictures of my harvests. For one thing, there was not much to harvest...lol. Another reason was that when I went out into the garden, I was there to work, to weed and hoe. I didn't even really think about taking pictures. 

One Day's Harvest

These two pictures are examples of harvests before using a basket. The one to the right was from a few years ago It was one day's harvest.  The picture above was my first harvest picture from 2013. Five zucchinis. The basket would follow three days later. 

A tomato harvest - 2012

The pictures that you see today, evolved over time. I didn't have a basket.  When I actually had something to harvest,  I would grab a bowl or pail and head out to the garden to harvest tomatoes. 

One day I was at Hobby Lobby and saw a basket that I thought would be perfect for my daily harvests. I love baskets and especially this one because it is not deep like my other baskets. 

Now that we garden in GABs, I have lots to harvest.  Below are pictures of harvest pictures from my 2014 garden.

In this first picture, I show the sizes of my baskets. The one on the right is my original basket. It's about 10 inches across. It's holds a good amount of food. I saw the same basket, just a little bigger at Hobby Lobby one day and decided to get it for days that the garden was really producing. It's about 16 inches across. The basket in the middle is one of my regular baskets that I have on top of a bookshelf in my library. This day, I needed the BIG baskets for my harvest. 

The picture on the right is of a three day harvest. Lots of work ahead of me in the kitchen! 

This year I decided to look for another  basket as a spare, but discovered that Hobby Lobby no longer carries "my" basket.

I did find a wire mesh basket that I thought looked interesting. Now you can see all the way inside. 

The next picture is a weeks worth of tomatoes. Between harvesting, farmers markets and other errands, I found myself behind in the kitchen. Yikes! 

I like to combine different colors, shapes and varieties, not only to have diversity in my baskets, but to have diversity in my kitchen. This basket combines the beauty of sunflowers with the harvest of zucchini, squash, tomatoes, cucumbers and assorted herbs.

If you had told me a few years ago, that I could be a successful gardener without working so hard to till the ground and weed my traditional garden, I'm not sure that I would have believed you. A traditional garden was how we did it. I had tried raised beds, but not with much success. I thought that there was no easy way to garden and no easy way to grow my own produce.  Garden Anywhere Box has changed my perspective.

Garden Anywhere Box makes it easier to be a successful gardener. I can attest to that. I WAS that gardener who worked in the garden with little to show for it. I was convinced that I had "brown thumbs" and would kill anything that I tried to grow. After gardening with GAB, I finally consider myself a successful gardener. I love going out to the garden, I Phone in hand, to see who is in the garden and what is ready to harvest.  I only use natural light from the sun. No filters or special apps to alter my daily harvest pics. I do sometimes play with my pictures after posting my daily harvest pic, but what you see is what you get on the original.

I know that if GAB can help me be successful, this method of gardening can help anyone. I'm excited now about gardening. I can't wait to see what is ready to harvest. 

Once you realize that you can be a successful gardener, the sky is the limit on what you can grow.  

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Most people have a traditional garden. 

I've seen different methods of gardening...(traditional, raised beds, aquaponics, hydroponics, Mittleider, Back to Eden, lasagne, straw bales...the list goes on . 

I've even tried several of them. Most of these methods involve tilling and weeding (yuck). Some involve $$$ and time to implement (yikes!). 

Some methods involve an amount of DIY know-how (um...so not me).

I'm not knocking anyone's preferred method of gardening. I'm just saying that it's not me. I don't like to weed and I don't like the heat . That's why I love Garden Anywhere Box. 

Some people prefer a raised bed garden.

Garden Anywhere Box is simple. No tilling or weeding (yay!). Not very expensive and lasts for years (double yay!) With Garden Anywhere Box, we've done the work for you (triple yay!).

Plus, our boxes use up to 70% less water than a traditional garden and they are portable. No more spending time and money on a garden that you will have to leave behind if you move. With Garden Anywhere Box, you can take your garden with you. 


Garden Anywhere Box is a container garden...on steroids! We modify 18 gallon totes and turn them into gardening machines. Our exclusive (patent pending) watering system allows your garden to be watered for you. No weeding AND Self-watering!

This is how we garden. No weeding. Self-watering. Portable. No tilling. No mucking in the mud.
You can garden in a box You can garden in your socks. You can garden here or there. You can Garden Anywhere.
This garden was planted on June 1, 2014. This picture was taken three weeks later. 

Because GAB is portable, you can also garden year 'round. When it gets cold bring your garden inside or into a greenhouse. Garden through the winter and move your garden back outside in the spring. 

Larry made a greenhouse out of pvc pipe and greenhouse plastic.
The cats like the heater. 

You don't need a lot of tools or space to start gardening in a Garden Anywhere Box.  All you need is a GAB kit, potting mix and plants or seeds. That's it.

Visit our website and order a Garden Anywhere Box today. 

www.gardenanywherebox.com

Garden Anywhere Box makes a great gift. No one will expect this present under the tree. Give the gift that keeps on giving year 'round. Garden Anywhere Box is truly an easier and successful way to garden.

The Color Purple

I harvested purple carrots this morning! Cosmic Purple from Baker Creek Heirloom Seed. 

Seriously! Color me happy. I discovered an actual carrot had formed and not the just carrot thinnings that I've been doing for a couple of weeks. I could have let it get bigger, but I was too excited.

I decided to write a blog post about the color purple in my garden this year. 

Last year, I had shades of mostly yellow, red and green in my basket. This year I added purple.

It started with eggplant. I saw some plants at Lowe's. I'd never grown eggplant before, but decided to give it a try.I grew the long slender eggplant and the Black Beauty eggplant.

We did a presentation at the Sierra Club of OKC earlier this year. A couple bought some boxes from us because the man wanted to grow eggplant. I never did hear from them again. I hope he was successful. I know I was. Update: January, 2016...They stopped by our booth at the Home Show. They did grow eggplant and loved their GAB garden.

What surprised me was how fast the plant grew. About six inches in just three days. Another thing that surprised me was how prolific the plant was. I had so many eggplants this summer that I didn't know what to do. That's when I learned about "eggplant" bacon.   I love the internet. There is a wealth of knowledge at my fingertips. Who ever would have thought of making bacon out of eggplant, but someone did.

Here is another eggplant bacon recipe for comparison. It recommends salting your eggplant strips for a couple of hours to release excess water and then rinsing your eggplant before you marinate. That is what I did and my bacon was crispy

                                                                                                Eggplant bacon was one of my cool discoveries this summer. It is very easy to make. You can marinate it using whatever seasonings you are in the mood for. Spicy or sweet or both. Put it in the dehydrator to dry. When it's finished, it's crispy just like bacon. Make an "ELT" instead of a BLT. Yum! 

A fun discovery for me this year has been purple basil. I grew Genovese basil last year and made pesto. Toasted Walnut Basil Pesto to be exact. It was yummy. When I saw a purple basil plant, I wanted to add that to my garden.


Another purple addition has been Burgundy okra. It's not really purple, more of a red-violet. It's made a pretty addition to my basket, too. I have to say, though that I don't know if I'll grow it next year. It has not been as prolific as my green okra. I'll have to think about that and see if I want to give it another try. 

I recently planted Red Leaved Hyacinth Bean, It has lovely little purple flowers and purple seed pods. This is my first time growing this bean. We'll see how it does. 







I also have to mention Cherokee Purple , Black Cherry  and Indigo Rose tomatoes. I had good luck with them this year and look forward to growing more next year. I will also be adding Black Krim and Purple Calabash to the garden. If you look closely at the picture, you can also see some burgundy okra and a couple of eggplants to add to our purple theme.




I almost forgot to mention Kohlrabi. I only had one plant this year, but it did great. I am definitely going to grow more next year. 

So, here is my Magical Mystery Tour of purple in my garden this year. Hopefully, this will inspire you to add the color purple to your garden next year.

Still Learning

A dog at the farmers market trying
out our Per-PET-ual Pet dish

Let me just say again...I am NOT a Master Gardener. I've tried to garden for years, with limited success. It was not until we started gardening in boxes...specifically Garden Anywhere Box, that I could admit to myself that I might actually be a gardener. That is why I am so passionate about GAB. If I can be a successful gardener, anyone can. 

That being said, I am still learning. This year we experimented with putting clay pots in our Per-Pet-ual Pet Dish. Just like with the boxes, water would come up from the bottom. Since the dishes are hooked into our watering system, there will always be fresh water going to the pots. But, there would not be plastic on the top like with GABs. 

This method has worked brilliantly this summer. I've been able to harvest greens for smoothies and grow some of the tinier seeds like carrots, radishes and beets. Don't get me wrong. These seeds will still grow in a GAB, but the clay pots make it easier to broadcast the seeds. 

Peas

Beets

Carrots

Well...I learned something new...

I was worried about the pots getting the nutrients that they needed. I decided to try adding fish emulsion to my watering can to add to the pots. Big Mistake and a DUH moment. 

Red Romaine lettuce and radishes

Larry went out to check the garden this morning and discovered two of my pots had been dug up. I'd planted a pot with Romaine lettuce and radishes last week.  The little leaves were just sprouting. I planted another pot yesterday with some carrot and beet seeds. I could not imagine what happened. I suspected raccoons, but they do not ever bother the boxes. Then I figured it out. 

Fish emulsion + CATS= Digging in the Pots. I even found my watering can overturned and drained dry.

I replanted this morning and will keep an eye on my plants...and the cats.  So, lesson learned. I will still try fish emulsion, but only through the watering tube, so that the cats can't get to it. I'll just have to use something else to fertilize my little pots although, they've been growing just fine on their own. 

Vision and Perseverance

As you follow my blog and my Facebook page, I hope to share with you our adventures along the way with Garden Anywhere Box.

Today we were invited to a luncheon with members of the Oklahoma Venture Forum. For those of you who have been with GAB this year, we were invited to be guests at  the OVF meeting at the Governor's mansion in April. We entered a contest for new small businesses. We did not win because our business was "too" small, but we were invited as honorary guests to be recognized. We were very humbled and excited. We got to listen to keynote speaker, Tom Love, owner of Love's Country Stores, see the mansion grounds and meet the governor.

Flash forward to today...We again met with member of the OVF for a luncheon at the Oklahoma Boathouse. We were hoping to find investors for our business. Because of Larry's macular degeneration, he has not been able to work at his job in the telecom business. We have relied only on the income from the boxes that we sell in order to live, pay bills and try to buy more supplies for our company. We counted on Larry's job and income from his telecom business to help us get established with GAB. Without that income, we have been thrown into the deep end of the business and are treading water.

This is no different than many other small businesses, but we have come to a point where we need help to get to the next step of building our business. We are hoping to find investors who can see our vision for the future of Garden Anywhere Box. We believe it is a bright one, and one that will allow everyone to be a successful gardener and grow at least some of their own food.

We met some people today that we hope will be able to help us advance our business. This will include our DIY GAB kit and get us in a position to be able to distribute GAB throughout the country on a larger scale than what we are doing now.

One of the speakers at the luncheon was Michael Knopp. He is the Executive Director of the OKC Devon Boathouse. He shared with us how the boathouse district came to be. It has been ten years in the making and is recognized world-wide as a state of the art facility. Someone asked him how he kept his dream alive during the tough times. He said "Perseverance." I think that is key to any small business with a dream. There will always be set-backs. If you have a dream and a vision, you can overcome the hard times.

After the luncheon, he took us on a tour of the OKC Boathouse District.  We got to see the workout room where the rowers train. There is also a room for high altitudes. Mr. Knopp told us about how a couple came to the high altitude room to train for two months before their trip to climb Mt. Kilamanjaro.  This room is specially designed to draw oxygen out of the room to simulate a change in altitude. Very cool! 

The Oklahoma River is an Olympic-class training ground for Olympic competitors. Athlete's from around the world come to the Oklahoma River to train. Something unique to Oklahoma are statues of painted buffalo around the state. The boathouse is no exception.  This buffalo has signatures from the many athletes from around the world who have come to train at the boathouse.

We also got to see where the athletes train for their races. 

This glass room is where people can gather to watch the boat races. It is also where the auditions for American Idol were held. 

This will be the future home of the new Whitewater Park.  There is also a video of what went into designing the park. 

These are some of the boats at the boathouse. There are different colors for different schools. The blue one just happens to represent Oklahoma City University, my alma mater.

One of the things that Mr, Knopp mentioned was that the boathouse is for all ages and degrees of ability. Eight year old's train in the same area as Olympic-class athletes. There are no barriers. The younger children get to mingle with and learn from their elders. I think that is a great thing.

I hope that you've enjoyed this little tour of the Oklahoma Boat District. The area has come a long way from the boggy ditch that it used to be. It took vision and perseverance to turn it into something that the whole community and really the world can enjoy. If you ever make a trip to Oklahoma, take a cruise along the Oklahoma River, check out Bricktown, watch a Thunder basketball game and ,,,visit Garden Anywhere Box. We'd be happy to show you around.