The plants are not the only ones who need some help over the winter.  One of my previously stated reasons for gardening is that it provides exercise.  But there is much less work outside in Winter.  So, like some of the plants, I bring the workout inside.

This is not a fitness blog so I am keeping this post pretty short. Working-out does not mean you need to spend a lot of money on a fancy gym membership. I manage to get enough exercise over the winter inside my home. Most of my exercise involves free weights.  They are not expensive and do not take up much space.  In addition, I have a yoga mat for stretches and floor exercises. I can do all these workouts in a floor space large enough to lay down in.  This added with a treadmill or stationary bike seems to provide plenty of winter exercise to keep me ready for spring.   
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Working-out does not mean I have to become a “gym rat” or get super pumped over the winter.  I am only looking to maintain the level of fitness I am already used to. This only requires a little work over the winter so the spring is not a huge shock to my body. Usually Spring brings a lot of work.  There are planters to carry, plots to till, bags of dirt and fertilizer to lift, the last of the fall leaves to pick up, and maybe even some mowing.  I am not giving medical advice here.  And I am not a medical professional but I find that spring can be very hard if I approach it unprepared. I have found personally that some minor preparation over the winter prevents a lot of sore muscles later.
 

​I have many reasons to garden.  When I am asked why I bother with all this work many different reasons come to mind. No one reason seems more important than any other.  However, it seems to me that the benefits have always been worth the work. Therefore, I thought it would be a good idea to write these down and share.

Frugality
The most obvious benefit of vegetable gardening is the harvest. Frugality is one of the most common reason for wanting to garden. Seed packets, seedlings, and supplies are often much cheaper to buy than whole produce.  
Gardening does not have to be all about vegetables and food.  I grow many ornamental plants.  Like produce, flowers are very expensive if bought already cut and arranged.  I have used garden flowers to make indoor arrangements and even frugal gifts.

Of course, frugality must consider the value of a person’s time.  Gardening does take some time. But I find many people overestimate the amount of time gardening really takes.  Many plants do not require daily work to produce a good harvest.  Even watering is only a few minutes a few days per week. I work a full-time job and have an active social life.  I still have time for a day or so of gardening in a week.

There are other costs to consider on top of time and seeds.  Of course, many of us have to pay for water.  This expense can be reduced by using underground ollas to provide water to the roots or rain barrels to catch rain water for later use.  Fertilizer and potting soil costs can add up too.  However, this can be reduced by home composting kitchen waste for fertilizer.
 
Fresher food
The produce you grow yourself will very likely be the freshest you have ever eaten.  The entire travel time from the backyard to the kitchen is about 5 minutes for me.  Even buying local will not give you travel times this short. Of course, I find that fresher tastes better. 
 
Cheap exercise
Gardening gives me a practical reason to get up and move around.  Not every task will be heavy work like building raised beds or new flower beds. But the basic maintenance of a garden can provide a good deal of exercise without the gym membership fees. Even the simple task of pulling some weeds will exercise the legs and back. Then there is raking and mowing and harvesting that all involve standing, stooping, and lifting.  This is all done outside in the sun and sometimes the heat or cold. After many years of gardening I find I do not need a gym membership anymore.  And who needs hot yoga when you have outdoor work to get done in 90-degree heat?
 
You meet the neighbors
I met nearly all my neighbors for the first time while doing yardwork.  And if you really think about it, when else do you have the opportunity to even see each other, let alone strike up a conversation? It is common in our modern society to live in a house for many years and never cross paths with the people next door to you. It has become normal to stay inside watch TV and ignore the world outside and all the people in it.

Many neighbors we met while we were each working on our own yard work.  This provided a good foundation for building relationships that have lasted years.  I am not by any means a “prepper” but there are advantages to knowing the people who live in your area.  One of these is the increased security of knowing your closest neighbors.
 
Improves curb appeal
Gardening is one of the simplest ways to add curb appeal and improve your property value.  We purchased the eyesore of the block.  There had been nearly no yard maintenance for at least a year prior to us moving in.  One of the first tasks was to simply clean up the yard.

Better curb appeal is all about presentation and will affect the property value. A house with a well-maintained yard is going to look better than the same house with an overgrown yard of tall weeds. People partially value things based on how others act about that thing. If someone values a place enough to clean it up and make it look the best it can, others will value it higher as well. 

Gardening can increase the property value of other houses around yours.  Please see the previous point about relationships with the neighbors.  We met a few neighbors who came out just to thank us for cleaning up the front yard.  They knew that our efforts made the whole block and their homes look a bit better.  In addition, the bandwagon effect caused some neighbors to start giving more attention to their own yards.

Each year to get into the holiday spirit I put up a small Christmas Tree.  I am familiar with the debate on whether a live tree or artificial tree is better.  Artificial can be used over and over, but the production requires manufacturing facilities and they eventually go into the land fill.  The live trees are biodegradable but they are cut at the base and will die.  Also, dry pine needles are a fire hazard.

I have skipped this debate by using small potted plants in the place of a tree. Some years I use a small potted evergreen but this year I went in a different direction.  This year I started planning ahead for what I want to plant in the spring.  One of these plans is for more lavender in the birdbath garden.  From there I went and looked till I found a small potted lavender plant already trimmed into a tree shape. 

If you do not like lavender a rosemary plant works very well. Other plants such as small evergreens work great too.  There is really no rule here on what type of plant someone may want to dress up.  It could even be cactus if that is what someone wants to use.  Personally, my only rule is that I plan to relocate the plant outside in the spring.

The secret to turning a potted topiary into a Christmas tree is just decorations. Each year I reuse the same miniature ornament set I picked up at a craft store years ago.  This set came with tiny plastic ornaments, battery powered LED lights, a plastic bead strand, and a little star for the top.

The plant sits in a bowl to catch any water that runs through.  It gets moved occasionally to sit with the other plants in the grow lamp.  The rest of the time it sits in the dining room being festive.  It also has its own hardware cloth cage to keep the cats from digging in the dirt.

I have noticed it has grown a bit since I first bought it.  There are shoots of new growth sticking out at the sides. I could trim these to keep the plant in a tree shape or let it go since we are only a few days away from Christmas.  After the holidays I will remove the decorations and store them for next year.  Then I will put the plant in with the citrus trees  under the grow lamp.  As soon as it is warm enough, I will plant it in the garden.

Some plants cannot be brought in during the winter.  Some are planted in the ground but still benefit from a little help over the winter.  One of these is our fig tree.  I have had this tree for many years and each winter it dies down to practically nothing.  This means it has to start all over again in spring.  This year I decided to try to help it keep some of its size over the winter. 

I took some metal plant supports a friend of a friend gave us. I also took the familiar hardware cloth and florist wire from the indoor plant project. I placed four of the plant supports around the fig and drove them deep into the ground with a sledge hammer.  I then took the hardware cloth and florist wire and created a low cage around the base of the fig tree.  I only had enough hardware cloth for the two longest sides.  The two other sides I created with multiple rows of florist wire. I also tied a line of wire around the top of the supports to add more strength to the whole structure.  I then stuffed this cage with leftover straw from the fall decorations and some oak leaves from the yard.  Hopefully this adds enough protection and insulation from the elements that the fig will start out bigger in the spring.
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I did drive the four plant supports rather deep.  And that is OK as I do not plan to remove these for a long time.  While I do plan to remove the insulating straw and leaves in the spring, these metal posts will serve as great supports for a tall covering of bird netting come summer. 

Just in time for another DIY Wednesday post, I realized we had found another use for a part of the old grill.  Like all grills this one had a large grate they you place the food on to cook.  We have used this part to solve a utensil storage problem we had.  Now instead of an unorganized drawer of hard to find cooking utensils we have a hanging storage rack.

This was not the hardest of upcycle projects so this post is rather short. We simply cleaned up and painted the grate.  We then attached it with some spacers so it was not completely flat against the wall but it is secure.  This does not move or swing or even wiggle.  We then took some heavy gauge copper wire and turned it into hooks.
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From these hooks we can hang most of out utensils and of course a braid of garlic from the garden.

Not all the gardening comes to a halt in winter.  I addition to growing garlic and other winter crops, some of the plants come inside.  I have dwarf citrus trees that I knew would not survive a winter outside. Also, both the lemon and cumquat had large unripen fruit that I did not want to waste.
I will give one warning here. Indoor gardening requires a little more advance planning and some additional gear compared to outdoor gardening.  I planned out where the plants would sit.  I cleared a warm spot in one corner of the house.  Being inside will keep the plant from freezing to death. But plants need more than just warmth to live.  They also need light. Even inside near a window, there would never be enough sunlight during the darker winter months to keep citrus plants growing strong all winter.
The solution was to set up a grow lamp. 
Grow lamps do not have to be expensive to work well. I saw plenty online for a lot of money. Instead I bought one for about 20 bucks at the local garden store. It is a simple LED bulb on a clip-on heat lamp base.  But something tells me the plants will not care how the lamp looks compared to how it works. The LED bulb means it never gets hot and it does not use a lot of electricity.  I can leave this lamp on during the day and not worry about the power bill. And the fruit trees will still get enough hours of light to stay alive and maybe mature some fruit.
An additional preparation I had to make was to protect the plants from cats.  Anyone with house cats will know that some like to dig in potted plants.  This will kill the plant. It will also make a huge mess.  In order to prevent this. I built some screens to keep the cats out of the dirt.  These are built onto the planter with chicken wire or hardware cloth and florists wire. I cut the chicken wire and hardware cloth into strips and connected them over the pots and around the plant with small pieces of florist wire. This forms a small cage over the pot and around the base of the plant. I then fastened the “cage” to the pot with more florist wire.  This last step prevents the cats from lifting the barrier off the plant and digging under it.  I made sure to tuck in the ends of the wires so there are no sharp parts sticking up.
The cages are not very attractive but they are functional. I suppose I could have painted these a darker brown to make them blend in if the look really bothered me. Also, I do not think the plant is concerned with the look over the function of the cat barrier cage.   
The cats do still get something from this indoor garden arrangement.  I have been able to extend the lives of their cat grass by placing it in the lamp light.  And, I often find a cat “sunning” itself next to a fruit tree.
 

​This post is about 90% DIY and 10% garden.  Again, this year for Thanksgiving I made a cornucopia bread centerpiece.  This is a fun DIY project that makes an amazing yet affordable display.  This costs only a few cups of flour and other ingredients if you make the dough yourself.  The cornucopia itself takes about three hours from start to finish.  I usually set aside some time the night before to create this. While three hours may seem like a lot of time, remember that bread spends a lot of time in a bowl rising and requiring no direct attention.  So, there are parts of the process where we have an hour or half an hour to do almost anything else.  I would suggest setting a timer and using that time to relax, watch TV, or do anything else.
Step 1. Create the bread dough.  I simply looked up an ornamental bread dough recipe and backed off on the salt so it tastes a bit better. Homemade dough is more frugal than store-bought ready-made dough. Also, I can control the ingredients and amount of dough with a homemade option. Let the dough rise in a covered bowl.
Step 2. Create a form out of aluminum foil.  I made a cone out of foil, curled one end, and filled it with balls of wadded up foil. If the dough is ready, now is a good time to spray all the outside of this form with non-stick cooking spray. Set this on a cookie sheet that you will bake it on later.
Step 3 Get the dough after it has risen once and is ready to be worked.  Begin to roll pieces of it out on a floured surface. A rolling pin is a great tool for this step. Cut one big flat piece into the shape of the bottom of the cornucopia. Cut the other flattened pieces into strips.
Step 4. Set the form on the large flat dough piece.  Starting at the tail end and wrap the other dough strips around the form overlapping a little with the previous strip.  You may need water to “glue” the ends of the strips together.  Work from the tail toward the wide end.  Once the strips are at the part of the form that touches the cookie sheet, start placing the strips between the form and the large dough piece under the form.  Again, water can be used to stick them together. Work the strips all the way to the large end.
Step 5. Make three long round ropes of dough and braid them together into a long braid.  This will go around the opening on the large end.
Step 6. Let this all sit for another hour to rest. I would suggest covering this with a flour sack towel to keep dust off the raw dough.
Step 7. Baste the whole cornucopia with a beaten egg.  This will create the golden color as the bread bakes.
Step 8. This can now be baked per the dough instructions. Mine was to bake at 350F for 30 minutes. I usually check the temperature with a meat thermometer to see if the bread is at 200F.
Step 9. Once the cornucopia is baked it can be removed from the form.  While the bread is still warm, carefully remove the foil from the inside by pulling it out from the large end. 
This can be cooled and then stored covered till the next day when it can be arranged with other food for the centerpiece.
The small portion of this post that is garden related is inside the pumpernickel bread.  The recipe uses a little dried fennel seed and those were from the garden.  The garden is still present here even when it is not visible.
 

We have had the first few killing frosts for the year and that means it is sunchoke harvest time.  Many plants are better harvested after a frost.  Collards, some other greens, and sunchokes are all part of this list.  This is because some plants feel the cold and begin preparing for winter hibernation. The shock of a frost spurs the plant to convert its current energy into sugar and storing it for later. This will sweeten the taste of collards and make sunchoke tuber better tasting. 
 As you can see from the picture here, the leaves and stalks look completely dead from the last frost.

The sunchoke / Jerusalem Artichoke is a misunderstood and underrepresented edible plant.  It is not an Artichoke, nor is it from Jerusalem. Helianthus Tuberosus is a native North American plant in the same genus as Sunflowers. 
If you are in North America, growing these is very, very, easy. Controlling these is very, very, difficult. This plant knows it is home and it will take over the whole garden if you let it.  I know this is not an exaggeration as I have found patches of it growing wild in my area. Therefore, I took some extra precautions before planting these.  I first started these in a planter.  I then transferred them to an open bottom bucket I had once used for potatoes.  I then built a large raised bed just for them.  What started as one sunchoke in a planter is has now filled the raised bed with large tubers. Had I placed any other plants in this raised bed, they would have been “choked out” but the sunchokes. There is almost no more room for these tubers in the bed. Out of curiosity I raked my hand across the ground and one tuber popped up into my hand.  
Harvesting these is not always that simple, but they are not hard to harvest either.  I cut the stalks back and just pulled the plants up.  The tubers popped right out with them.  If some are a little stubborn to come up, a garden fork works great too. Just put the fork under the roots and pivot the handle down. The fork tines will lift the tubers up.

​One may ask, “why bother growing something that is so much work to contain”.   That person has probably never eaten a sunchoke. They are very tasty and very versatile.  They can be used in anyway someone may use a potato.  The flavor is like a buttery potato but also similar to a parsnip or turnip.

​An unexpected advantage of having a garden is that Thanksgiving becomes a legit harvest party. This year I harvested half the raised bed and roasted the sunchokes for Thanksgiving.  Roasting is my favorite method for eating sunchokes.  They taste great roasted and the process is easy.  I chop up the washed sunchokes into cubes.  This will require you to cut off the little bulb sides.  Then I add olive oil, salt, pepper, and some fresh rosemary from the herb garden. I spread them on a cookie sheet and back at 350 till they are tender and brown. This is about 30 minutes. The longer they are roasted, the darker they get.  So, if you want them darker, just leave them in a little longer.  The goal is really just to get them cooked thoroughly. These make a perfect addition to a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. 

​Dehydrated Jalapenos
In addition to garlic, many other types of garden produce are perfect for dehydrating.  This year we had a bumper crop of jalapeno peppers.  The weather turned hot had dry this summer and the peppers loved it.  I quickly found that the easiest way to preserve these were to cut them in half and place them in the dehydrator after a good washing.
Dehydrating is by far less work than canning, pickling, or jellying them.  I have in the past made jalapeno jelly.  The work to balance the sugar and the pectin is not an easy job.  Sometimes the mix refuses to set up.  Other times the mix sets too hard. Also, this is a type of canning so again I had to sterilize jars and boil the final product.

Dehydrating yields better results than freezing in my opinion.  Frozen peppers can be kept for a while but they eventually always develop freezer burn or that “freezer taste”.  And there is always the threat of losing power.  If they thaw out, they have to be thrown out.

The dehydrated peppers work great for sauces and stews.  We just toss one or two in and they rehydrate from the liquid in the stew or sauce. They are very dry and brittle when they are done dehydrating.  This makes it easy to chop them up and crush them when using them.

These are shelf stable.  They require no more effort or electricity to store them.  I store them in cleaned reused jars in a cabinet with the other spices.

The one warning I will issue on this topic is it to wear food prep gloves when cutting the peppers, loading the dehydrator, and unloading the dehydrator.  The capsaicin can be strong and once it settles into your skin it will create a burning feeling that can last for hours. The dehydrating process does not seem to break down the capsaicin.  These peppers were too hot to handle even when I put them in the jar. I still need gloves to use them as an ingredient.

 Dehydrated Fennel Seeds

In addition to the peppers the fennel plant has done an amazing job this year. The plant soon grew to be the largest thing in the herb garden.  It was even larger than the statue it sits next to. The underground bulb part of this plant is edible. I have used fennel bulb in some recipes. But the more commonly used part of fennel is the seeds.  This is a common addition of ours to some rye breads, soda breads, and tomato sauces.

I patiently waited for the blooms to produce seeds.  I then waited for the seeds to turn a little brown.  Then I harvested and washed them.  I placed the whole seed heads into the dehydrator.  Then once the seeds and seed heads were totally dried, I separated the seeds from the stems and kept only the seeds. 

The last step of separating out the seeds was the most labor-intensive part of the whole process. This step is simple but takes time. I did this over many days while sitting and watching videos and doing other activities on the internet.

Like the peppers I store the dried fennel seeds in cleaned reused jars and they are shelf stable.
 

A dehydrator may seem like a large investment up front. (And I did resist purchasing one for a long time.)  I can say it pays for itself if you want to grow your own food. Dehydrating takes much less time and materials than canning.  The process is very simple and produces shelf stable food that last at least a year. The dehydrator may take longer to process but the hands-on work it is much less.  Once the dehydrator is set up, it just runs in the background while you do something else. 

There are no additional materials to buy with a dehydrator.  Canning always requires new lids if you want to be certain of safety.  And the bands often get bent or rust and need replaced as well.  Sometimes your jars break and have to be replaced.  The dehydrator runs on electricity of course, so there is that expense to consider.  But, I have an electric range and canning requires me to boil GALLONS of water.  So canning surely used more electricity. 

Below is the garlic I peeled and dried in one day. I do have a garlic peeler.  That is also something I avoided buying for a long time.  But I had a chance to try one, and deicded it was well worth a few dollars.

The next picture is the sliced garlic cloves on the dehydrator before I closed it up and turned it on.