Well, the 2012 Urban Farm Tour was a success and after a real long day of talking to people and showing off our yard on Saturday, both Eliza and I are beat, but pleased with our hard work. Throughout the day about 400 people visited our yard and looked at all we have done. Supposedly the Urban Farm Tour sold about 500 tickets this year, which is a bit less than last year but still impressive.
Besides just enjoying talking about topics we have a lot of passion and interest in, we were pleased with the days success in selling seedlings. We made some extra cash that we’ll be able to apply towards more garden work or a trip up to Vermont in the next several months. Part of the day’s enjoyment came from seeing all the different people who come out to the event. It is encouraging to know that some many people are interested in urban gardening and sustainable and organic practices.
The work in our garden is still far from done. Besides having more stuff that needs to be planted, we are preparing to plan and order our drip irrigation system (which will hopefully make our water needs easier and more economical in the long run), we need to get more mulching done, and we have goals of improving some of our raised beds. On the raised beds note, the word of the weekend for me was “hügelkultur” which is the practice of burying logs beneath raised beds and letting them decay. The decaying logs act as a sponge and can very significantly reduce the need for watering. Additionally as they decay the provide a heat source and more nutrients in the soil. You can read a real good bit about hügelkultur here. We are hoping to put some hügelkultur into effect ourselves.
So all in all, the second annual Urban Farm Tour was a good time. We were glad to do it and now we are glad that it is done and we can relax a bit more (while there still is garden work, we are not as worried about making the place as presentable). We are looking forward to devoting some more time to some of our other hobbies for a while. Yesterday we already went for a hike and looked for some mushrooms (we didn’t find anything besides some amanitas, and seeing as they were probably poisonous, they were not all that exciting). I am looking forward to brewing some new beer, making some new pickles, and devoting more time to drawing and writing. I know Eliza’s got a list of things she’s wanting to do too.
Until next time, take it easy.
