Dancing With Plants

I have always wished I had a so-called green thumb. I have heard that my paternal grandmother could make anything grow, and my maternal grandmother has her own garden with vegetables and fruit trees.

My family seems to have had one thing in common whichever end of the family you talk to. A preference for growing, raising and to an extent killing your own food has taken a preferential status to being able to buy fancy foods.

My father was a hunter, and as a child we also raised our own chickens. We had fresh eggs, the occasional chicken and a lot of moose meat come from our own family. We also picked berries and mushrooms in the forest during the autumn and would freeze and make conserves out of a lot of it. My maternal grandmother would give us lettuce, sweet peas, rhubarb, apples and potatoes from her own garden, and she was also quite big on making her own conserves.

As I get older I feel a need to get back to that, unfortunately I am half a world away from the rich harvests of blueberries, wild raspberries, lingonberries and the occasional cloudberries at this time. But there are other things I do feel the need to do. Buy locally sourced. Plant my own lettuce, my own radishes and carrots, peas and herbs. The thought of spending a couple of hours pulling weeds out of a bed of produce almost sounds appealing to me.

I have started with one thing my maternal grandmother has always been good at, and that is knitting. I am knitting little hats and scarves, wrist warmers and thinking about moving on to socks as soon as I can buy those needles needed. I have mended many clothes and feel content working with my hands in such a way. I have started baking a lot more, plain loafs of bread, and I like cooking food from scratch with beans and legumes instead of going the route of commercially processed faux-meats.

I must admit my reluctant ways when it comes to using simple baking soda and vinegar in my cleaning, the smell is not appealing, and as such I am still buying a lot of vegan, cruelty free and environmentally friendly cleaning products. Luckily, they work wonders and smell divine.

The thing is, while I am extremely techno-progressive and love how fast we are progressing (hello, Star Trek fan and lover of the concept of energy accounting here) I feel the need to seek out things that are more sustainable, more close to home, more controllable by yours truly. Knowing that I knitted the hat my husband wears, exactly what went into the bread I made yesterday and exactly how many animals have been hurt brining me those potatoes and those heads of lettuces is appealing.

The big garden? It is probably going to have to wait until we own a home, or at least have a longer lease in place, but until then... perhaps I could start with something small, maybe a herb garden in a box that can be carried around. And, a few non-toxic plants around the house would bring some happiness to it. Maybe a lavender plant, they smell amazing and can be used for teas and scent sachets. :)

Well, for now I will be content with finding and unpacking that juicer I know is laying about somewhere. I have two kilos of carrots and a kilo of apples that are just begging to be juiced. :)