Gardening 101

I know that I started to write about this but got side tracked so forgive me or get over it.  It all depends if you are the sensitive type.

Anyway, Shouna's mom went to the store often but my Mom hardly ever went and there were many reasons:

• the store was at a minimum 14 miles away in Shidler and even when there was one in Grainola it was 4 miles away and gas was 11 cents a gallon, pretty expensive gasoline.
• we grew a huge garden -  we raised green beans, corn, radishes (I dislike those red radishes almost as much as I dislike celery), white radishes (also a bad choice), tomatoes to die for, potatoes, rhubarb, carrots, cucumbers (we did not raise pickles even though David from New York thought we would), cantaloupe, watermelon (not too many), squash (yellow mostly)
• we would go to Ark City (Arkansas City, KS for you non-locals) each year and purchase peaches, strawberries, apricots (Mom made the best apricot cobbler ever)  and apples to put up for the winter plus some extra Mom made pies during the canning experience.  
• we raised our own meat - pork from hogs, chickens, beef, an occasional mutton (lamb) and sometimes we would have meat from hunting quail, squirrel and rabbits with a good supply of fish which came from the creek and ponds.
• milk and butter from the barn, not the store and it was whole milk less the cream we used for butter or other things Mom dished up like HOME MADE ICE CREAM
• Chickens provided meat but we also got our eggs from the chicken house and we could trade eggs at the grocery store for other staples (staples are NOT those little wire things you put  in paper to later on jam up your scanner but it is the basics of cooking for a household like flower, salt, pepper, etc..)
• There was too much to do to spend your time going to the store.
• It was a waste of time and money and NOT good for the environment to go to the store everyday when you lived out like we did.  I threw out the liberal environmental thought just to make you choke.  We really did not think about those things much back then but there is a balance of taking care of God's creation and doing the right thing like not throwing trash out for someone else to have to pick up or look at.

What do you learn in the Osage?

• Commitment vs. involved - a chicken is involved when it provides its eggs for the house but is committed when it provides meat
• We can save a lot of money if we plan our meals and raise our vegetables and our fruit and we can save a little on the environment by not needing another plastic bag or trip to the store.

Thanks for listening,

gary@thepioneerman.com