One Hundred Dollars a Month - Page 2005 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.

Does Gardening Count as Exercise?

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 19, 2012 · 1 Comment

Clearing brush in hopes of turning the backyard into a giant vegetable patch is a lot of work. Over the past 3 weeks I have cleared about 1/4th of the land I need to.

I’m suppose to be training to participate in the Tacoma City Marathon on May 6th. Since I haven’t actually done any running or fast walking yet to get in shape {I mean c’mon it is 76 days away for Pete’s sake} I’d like to think pulling weeds and hacking away at brush could be considered an alternative method of training… right?

I mean look at everything I’ve cleared so far.

This area is next. I figure I should be able to get my heart rate up clearing this 40′ x 40′ patch of land this week. Right?

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Peep Show: See Hot Chicks

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 17, 2012 · 9 Comments

Yesterday I went to the feed store to buy a bag of chicken feed.

BIG MISTAKE.

While I was there I noticed the feed store had just received a shipment of baby chicks. I walked around aimlessly for about 20 minutes trying to decided if I should bring a few home.

THEY WERE SO CUTE.

And I didn’t want to leave them there all alone. What if someone creepy bought them? Or worse yet someone who just wanted to steal their eggs, chop off their heads and make chicken soup out of them? These were babies… Pet chickens. Chicken you eat comes from the store right? Not the PET {okay feed} STORE.

So after grilling the cashier as to the sex of the chicks over and over again I ended up going home with a bag of feed. And a 75 gallon stock tank. No chicks. Yet.

But…

As soon the The Girl Who Thinks She’s A Bird and Monkey Boy were finished with school we raced back to the feed store.

This is Squeakers {looking very tired}. Squeakers got her name because she squeaked all the way home from the store. She is a Sex-Link chicken and the smallest in our new flock.

This is Buffy. She is a Buff Orpington.

Big Martha. After little Martha ditched us last fall we decided we needed a replacement for her. Only this time we bought the full sized Barred Plymouth Rock. No more bantams.

The Girl named this cutie Peanut. Peanut is an Easter Egger. I’m hoping for pink or blue eggs from this little chick. We’ll see.

Aren’t they sooooo cute?

Will YOU be getting baby chicks this year? If so will you raise them as pets or are you planning to eat them?

Storey’s Guide to Raising Chickens

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How to Install Gutters in a Greenhouse

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 16, 2012 · 15 Comments

As soon as daylight broke yesterday I was off to the hardware store. I knew the very first thing I wanted to install in my new greenhouse was gutters. I had previously viewed a set of greenhouse gutters once before in a magazine and thought they looked amazing.

Since my greenhouse is 14′ long I decided to purchase 10′ gutters. This would leave me 2′ on both ends to put a container in the corner if I chose to at a later time.

I chose to use galvanized gutters. The gutters ran about $6 each plus another $3 for the end caps.

The L brackets were $2.25 for a set of 2. I called the man who sold me the greenhouse and asked how many I should use. He said 3 per 10′ length should be sufficient. He also added it was not necessary to purchase the heavy-duty brackets, the regular ones would be fine.

I ended up installing 4 10′ gutters along the left side of the greenhouse. I spaced the top 3 about 12″ apart and the bottom one about 24″ from the one above it. My plan was to plant radishes, spinach and Parisian carrots in the top gutters and romaine lettuce in the bottom gutter.

I lined the gutters with 1″ 5/8 minus gravel {I did not drill holes in the bottom of the gutters}.

I then filled the lined gutters with wet Miracle Grow seed starting soil.

The first seeds I planted were Ed Hume’s Easter Egg Radish.

After planting the radish seeds 1/4″ deep I carefully tamped down the soil.

One tray down, three to go. 😉

~Mavis

Update: 1 month later.

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Mavis Gets a Greenhouse!

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By Mavis Butterfield on February 15, 2012 · 19 Comments

Yesterday around 9 am a white delivery truck appeared in my driveway. Wahooo! My 8×14 glass greenhouse finally arrived! I have wanted a greenhouse for years and when the Handsome Husband brought home a brochure a 2 weeks ago we finally decided to take the plunge and order one. The Handsome Husband wanted to put the greenhouse together himself. Ha Ha Ha. I told him I needed the greenhouse installed right away AND properly so I paid the additional fee to have the experts install it.

I think the HH was relived more than offended. The greenhouse guys arrived at 9am with part of the structure already built and left around 2 pm. Since they have built over 1,500 of them together I think it was a wise decision to let the experts handle the installation rather than a rookie.

I told the guys about my plans to grow 2,000lbs of garden veggies in the backyard this summer. They thought I was crazy. Then they went on to tell me I could probably grow 2,000 lbs of produce over a 12 month period in the greenhouse. I think THEY are crazy.

So I went inside and baked cookies.

{click on photo to enlarge}

Do you think it is too early to start lettuce in the greenhouse?

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