Stuck in an urban neighborhood, with the desire for more open space, we had to adapt to our surroundings. We were adapting our property long before we knew what we were actually doing it for. With the best of intention, some of these changes had good consequences and some had bad. Some of them were very bad, even though they had to be made because we were living with other undesired side effects if we didn't.
One of these decisions were cutting down the many, many trees on the side of our house. They dropped those horrendous gum balls and their large branches loomed over our house. Other than the cost of cutting them down, it seemed like a good idea to rid ourselves of these nuisances. Now years later, due to the lack of shade over a skylight and the west side of our house, we live with a very hot house during the summer and atrocious electrical bills.
So, about two years ago, we started to look at the world a little different. Well, ok, a lot different. I have started a garden, and knowing nothing about "farming" of any sort (city girl here), and I'm still learning on what I'm suppose to be doing with it. Planting too close. Planting too far apart. Planting the right things and the wrong thing next to each other. Why this plant or tree died and the one next to it lived?
We've added water barrels, greenhouse, extended our gardens (front yard and back yard) and planted new foods that I haven't tied before via trading through the local community. We have dreams for this property, for our "dream" property (it is a forever changing image, more about this later) and for our retirement years. Hopefully our story will continue in a direction that meshes with one of our dreams, and if not, then our dream will mesh with our ever changing reality.
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