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Raleigh Fall Vegetable Gardening begins in the Summer
Hey friends! While it’s blazing hot outside, it is time to be planning and planting your fall garden. We are in USDA plant hardiness zone 7b and have a relatively long growing season: April 9 through October 27. These dates are our average last and first frost dates, meaning half the time the first frost of Fall will start up to two weeks before October 27, and half the time it will start up to two weeks after October 27.…
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Carl Alwin Schenck Memorial Forest
Growing up I hiked wilderness foot trails in Tennessee, and having lived in Raleigh, North Carolina since college, I find that most nearby parks have overly managed trails. By overly managed, I mean they are wide enough to allow park vehicle access, there may be a foot trail but it parallels a road for three-quarters the distance to the destination view, or there are so many people that you constantly hear, “On the right!” Schenck Forest is no wilderness, it…
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Neighborhood Watch
There have been many break-ins in our neighborhood over the past few months in broad daylight, and according to the police, it’s a group of kids. Both of my across-the-street neighbors have been targeted, as well as an elderly couple’s house behind ours. I took the neighbor behind us a rotisserie chicken the day she had to go to the bank and change all her accounts. She asked if I still had chickens in my backyard, which cracked us both…
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Sunday Stroll at Lake Johnson
Shortly after we unloaded the car from church, I demanded everyone pack up a snack because we were going on a hike. Joe picked the place, Lake Johnson, which was strategically half way to his favorite pizza place, Michelangelo’s in Apex. Lake Johnson was a spot we discovered in college. We once drove there with my Camry packed to the brim with friends to watch the meteor showers. We also used to take Scoops there when he was a toddler…
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Meet the Chickens!
Last weekend we drove up to The Urban Chicken for their Annual CHICK DAYS Celebration and FLOCK SWAP. I had never heard of this before, but just happened to check their Facebook page an hour before the event was supposed to start. Initially we thought we might wait until the kids were on Spring Break as the coop and run weren’t complete, but word slipped out we might get chickens that day, and the kids were so ecstatic, there was…
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DIY Plastic Bin Worm Farm
Today’s project is making a worm bin or worm farm from the old city recycling bin. First I want to point out how lucky we are that our city collects recycling at the curb and provides bins. Raleigh upgraded to larger recycling carts a few years ago, and we hung on to the smaller bin. I’ve use it around the garden to toss in weeds, and the drain holes ensure that it doesn’t get stinky after a rainfall. This morning…
