One Hundred Dollars a Month - Page 1473 of 2143 - I am your typical housewife living in high maintenance suburbia. I have a handsome husband, 2 kids and a flock of pet chickens. I try and feed my family with $100 a month. With the help of coupons, gardening and bartering I am able to squeeze the most out of our grocery budget and still manage to have a little fun along the way.

How to Grow Your Own Food – 9/4/2013 Garden Tally

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 4, 2013 · 10 Comments

This year I’m on a mission to grow 4,000 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables in my suburban backyard. In 2012 I was able to grow 2,028 pounds, and in 2013 I’m going double or nothing. I have absolutely no idea if I’ll be able to achieve my goal. But, as with any adventure, half the fun is getting there. ~Mavis

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This past week we harvested just a little over 200 pounds of fresh fruits and vegetables from our backyard garden. Wowie zowie that is a lot of food. I held a mini farmer’s market at the end of my driveway over the weekend, and we’ve been busy making batches of heirloom tomato sauce like crazy and thinking up ways to use the plethora of tomatoes that are still sitting on my kitchen counter.

I love this time of year!

~Mavis

Here is what I have harvested so far this year:

Basil – 1 pound 3 ounces

I LOVE making fresh pesto and strawberry basil jam.

Beets – 86 pounds 4 ounces

We still have plenty more beets to pull up but I’m waiting for them to get a little bigger first. Also, the beets we planted for this years Thanksgiving feast are doing well and look to be right on schedule.

Bok Choy – 4 oz

We have more Boy Choy growing in the pallet garden. I’ll try and get some pictures posted tomorrow to show you.

Broccoli – 13 ounces

The fall broccoli we planted is looking healthy. The slugs have not discovered it yet {fingers crossed} so I am hopeful.

Cabbage – 40 pounds 14 ounce

We are patiently waiting to harvest our purple cabbage!

Carrots – 5 pounds 6 ounces

We thinned our carrots the other day and brought a few large ones inside to snack on. Yum!

Chives – 1 pound 12 ounces

We thinned the chives and replanted our herb bed the other day. It always amazes me how we can have fresh chives year round.

Cucumbers 5 pound 2 ounces

We picked a few cukes over the weekend and have been making simple cucumber tomato salads with them.

Egg Count – 1,885

We collected 51 eggs this past week. The Hillbilly’s stopped by for fresh eggs on Saturday and I forgot to get a count of how many they took. Oops!

Garlic 9 pounds 2 ounces

Our garlic has been harvested for this year and I am using it in practically every dish now. 🙂

Garlic Scapes 11 ounces

We used these to make Garlic Scape Pesto. Yumm!

Green Beans 11 pounds 9 ounces

I noticed the beans on the tepee poles are about ready to be harvested. Hopefully this week.

Kale – 20 pounds 14 ounces

Note to self: The neighbors LOVE kale.

Kohlrabi 5 pounds 10 ounces

Lettuce – 36 pounds 9 ounces

We should be harvesting lettuce in about another week. Weeee!

M icrogreens 5 ounces

My favorite way to eat microgreens is with egg salad sandwiches.

Mint 12 oz

I made some blueberry mint jam and also harvested some mint for tea.

Oregano – 1 pound 5 ounces

I used a bunch this past week for my heirloom tomato sauce.

Onion – 17 pounds 6 ounces

All the cool people are storing onions in their pantyhose these days. 😉

Pears 47 pounds 7 ounces

We had a bumper crop this year.

Peas – 42 pounds 9 ounces

Aren’t they beautiful? I think they’ll be ready to harvest in early October.

Potatoes – 210 pounds 1 ounces

Lucy LOVES raw potatoes. What a nut!

Radish – 22 pounds 2 ounces

Radishes have been planted for fall.

Raspberries – 21 pounds 7 ounces

Raspberry season is officially over in our backyard. 🙁

Rhubarb – 39 pounds 9 ounces

I harvested rhubarb 2 twice last week for my mini farmer’s market. So far this year we have made rhubarb vanilla jam, rhubarb walnut muffins, and strawberry rhubarb pies.

Sage – 14 ounces

Spinach – 15 ounces

I’ll be planting more in the fall.

Sprouts –2 pounds 15 ounces

I grew some sprouts this past week for my vegan neighbor Francisco.

Here are instructions for growing your own sprouts.

Strawberries 23 pounds 9 ounces

Besides eating them fresh, so far we have made strawberry kiwi jam, strawberry freezer jam, strawberry pie, and homemade strawberry shortcake.

Swiss Chard 25 pounds 6 ounces

Ugg. {But chickens and neighbors like it}.

Tomatoes 145 pounds 1 ounces

Tomato season has finally arrived and they are keeping me busy!

Wheatgrass – 7 ounces

Zucchini – 23 pounds 6 ounces

As I’m sure you are well aware, unattended zucchinis can grow to the size of baseball bats pretty quickly. 😉

Total Food Harvested in 2013: ~~911 pounds 5 ounces~~ 853 pounds 0 ounces

Total Eggs Collected in 2013: 1,885

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Buttermilk Corn Pancakes

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 3, 2013 · 1 Comment

Have you ever had corn pancakes? If not, stop what you are doing right now and make some. It’s like corn muffins on crack. Corn muffins are to corn pancakes what your county fair is to Disneyland. You’ll enjoy both, but one is just much more awesome than the other.

Here is the recipe. I hope you like it. We sure do.

Ingredients

1/2 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
Salt to taste
Pepper to taste
2 large eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk {How to Make Buttermilk}
1 large ear of corn {husked and kernels cut off}
1 1/2 tablespoons butter

Directions

In a mixing bowl, combine first 4 ingredients. Set aside. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs and then add the buttermilk. Whisk again until well blended. Combine wet and dry ingredients and stir until combined. Stir in the corn kernels.

Heat a large frying pan over medium-high heat. Melt a tsp of the butter in the pan and then drop a few tablespoons of batter in the pan for each pancake {I like to use a 3 tablespoon cookie scoop}. Cook for about 2 minutes on each side, or until golden brown. Before you drop batter for a new pancake, melt another tablespoon of butter. Repeat this process until all batter has been used. Serve warm with butter {sour cream is pretty tasty too}.

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Lisa Turned an Old Dog House into a New Chicken Coop

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 3, 2013 · Leave a Comment

A big THANK YOU to everyone who has sent in their photographs and stories. I hope by sharing other peoples pictures and stories here on One Hundred Dollars a Month we can all get some cool ideas to use in our own homes and gardens.

Check out these photos Lisa sent in of an old dog house she found on Craig’s List.

Her baby chicks needed a home so she got right to work creating a new abode for them.

Lisa used a scrap piece of OSB from Home Depot for $0.50 to make a new front door for the coop. She also added a roosting bar and a nesting box to complete the coop.

Then she built a run to enclose the entire coop for predator-proofing.

Pretty Awesome if you ask me! Way to go Lisa. Thanks for sharing your photos. 🙂

~Mavis

Gorgeous Chicken Coop From Laramie, Wyoming

If you would like to have your garden, chicken coop or something you’ve made featured on One Hundred Dollars a Month, here’s what I’m looking for:

Your Garden Pictures and Tips – I’d especially like to see your garden set ups, growing areas, and know if you are starting seeds indoors this year. If so, show me some picture of how you are going about it.
Your Chicken and Chicken Related Stories – Coops, Chicks, Hen’s, Roosters, Eggs, you name it. If it clucks, send us some pictures to share with the world.
Cool Arts & Crafts – Made from your very own hands with detailed {and well photographed} pictures and instructions.
Your pictures and stories about your pets. The more pictures and details the better.
Garage Sale, Thrift Store and Dumpster Diving pictures and the stories behind the treasures you found including how much you paid for them.

If I feature your pictures and the stories behind them on One Hundred Dollars a Month, I will send you a $20.00 gift card to the greatest store in the world: Amazon.com.

Go HERE for the official rules.

This post may contain affiliate links. These affiliate links help support this site. For more information, please see my disclosure policy. Thank you for supporting One Hundred Dollars a Month.

Creating a New Perennial Herb Garden

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By Mavis Butterfield on September 3, 2013 · 20 Comments

This weekend I finally got around to moving all those herbs I planted into containers this spring over to the greenhouse. Let me tell you Bob, I’m glad that little project is done. I don’t know what I was thinking when I dug up the old herb garden and moved everything in pots. Because the pots were tucked back behind the raspberry plants on the side of the house they barely got watered.

Now that they’ve been planted alongside the greenhouse, I’m sure they’ll be thriving again in not time at all.

Did I mention Lucy helped too? Yep. She dug all the holes for me.

And a few extra ones too. 😉

I’ve decided to go ahead and plant both sides of the greenhouse beds with perennial herbs.

I’m thinking about trying fennel and lavender next year but I need a few more ideas.

On the right side I have purple sage, thyme and chives.

And on the left I have oregano, rosemary and more chives.

Do you have any suggestions? I am in zone 8.

~ Mavis

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