I Hereby Present to You the City 'Stead!

I am very sorry that I've been such a bad little blogger and not keeping you up to date on what I've been up to on the City 'Stead.  Between doing the things you'll see here, homeschooling four children, teaching Zumba and other things, keeping up the household, and dealing with other personal issues, I've been more than my share of busy.  Hopefully now that summer has started, some of those things will start to slow down again and I can catch you up on what I've been doing and what I'm doing as the summer progresses.

Hopefully.

To give you an idea of the level of things that have been done, here are the pictures I showed you before we moved in next to the approximately same view now:

So, yeah, there are some differences.  More in the front yard than the back, but that's because the food is mostly in the back.  Here's more of a breakdown of what these changes are that you're seeing:

This is the view from my back deck.  I have the ramp lined with planters my son planted with lettuce for me.  Off to the side are raised beds we brought with us from the Trailer Park Homestead.

Here you can see the brush pile and wood pile my dad made by cutting down some trees that bordered the yard (with the permission of both my landlord and the neighbors who shared the tree's shade) and the cool, rustic fence my mom built, along with the fire pit I built using bricks I brought from the Trailer Park Homestead (originally found on Freecycle).  There are several blueberry bushes along the fence.  The fence was put there to protect the bushes and the other things in my yard from people who formerly thought it was okay to park beyond the edge of the parking lot at the business next door.  I think I made my point in a very aesthetically pleasing way!

Here is another view of the boxes to the side of the ramp.  I started my planting for the year in the boxes so I could get things like onions, peas, and more (I don't actually remember what all is planted in here and it is dark out and I just heard what sounded like a gunshot a few minutes ago, so I'm not going to go outside and check)

These are the boxes on the other side of the back deck.  I have peas, beans, radishes, carrots, and peppers growing in the back box.  The front box is supposed to have strawberries in it, but they never came up.  I may break down and just buy some plants so I can get them established for next year.  I need a lot of strawberry plants for this family!

This is to the west of my house, just behind the wattle fence that I put up with the help of my mom, my oldest son, and several local homeschooled teens that wanted to learn more about homesteading.  This is my "fruit forest".  I have cherry trees, apple trees, pear trees, and a peach tree in here.  There are also raspberry and blackberry bushes against the fence and more blueberry bushes up next to the house.  Eventually, we should have fruit aplenty!

This is the front yard.  I'm slowly putting in an herb garden in the front yard.  There are a lot of roots up there though, so I'm going to have to dig out the whole thing by hand.  Eventually, I want no grass though.

This is the front yard from another angle.  I want to learn about propagating roses from cuttings because it turns out I really like that rose bush and am thinking I might even border the herb garden with more of them.  It appears to be an heirloom variety and has nice big rosehips, which is the real reason I want more of it.  Rosehips are an excellent source of vitamin C!

Finally, here is a wide view shot of the backyard.  My dad tilled most of the yard for me, but I eventually am going to create real paths in there, so I don't have to have the parts with things actually planted sectioned off like they are now.  This area has corn, pumpkins, watermelons, cucumbers, and tomatoes in the sunny parts, while the shady parts have beans, beets, and carrots.

So I'm no where near "done" (is anyone ever really "done" with a homestead?), since I still have a few more beds to plant in the backyard, the rest of the brush pile to clear up, a bunch of weeds along the back of the yard to clear out and plant, and the front yard to dig up and replace with an herb and flower garden.  Longer term, I still want to get chickens, bees, delve more into growing mushrooms, and perhaps explore aquaponics, as well as putting up some sort of greenhouse for extending the growing season.  Heck, shorter term but blocked by money, I need to get some rainbarrels (I can order them from the city for $51 each, for a total for $204 for the four downspouts I have, but I don't have the money) and need to get a burn permit ($50 to the city) so I can start using the fire pit I built, but that's why I'm not blogging much these days.  I'm trying to earn the money to do the things I want on the 'Stead, but silly bills and daily necessities like gas (yay for Michigan having the highest gas prices in the country right now and my husband working an hour's drive away! *sigh*) keep getting in the way.  They say hard work pays off though, so, with all my hard work, something has to start paying, right?