I just bought a house with a completely empty back yard. I think the prior owners used it as a dog toilet. There’s nothing there, not even grass - just dried out, compacted soil. It’s rock-hard. What tools do you recommend for cultivating that soil and what should I be doing to it to prepare it for planting? I’m a complete newbie and the only gardening I’ve ever done before was in pots.
Lara Mig wrote:I’m not sure which ones of those “natural shampoos” could actually be safely eaten, or how “non-toxic” they really are. For that matter, I wouldn’t eat soap either. But if I use something on my head that can be absorbed through the skin, I want to know exactly what’s in it and how it was made, and I don’t trust the manufacturer to disclose all the relevant information.
I use diluted Dr Bronner’s soap to wash my hair, followed by diluted apple cider vinegar, which gets me perfectly clean and smelling good. There never was a transition period either. Sometimes I use diluted baking soda instead of Dr Bronner’s, which works just as well.
My point was not that one should be eating soap, merely that the ingredients are safe enough that you could consume them. Everything in the Dr Bronners bar soap I buy is ‘edible’. Maybe you did not have a transition period because you did not go pooless- ie- only water? You say you don’t trust the manufacturers yet it seems you trust Dr Bronner? Isn’t that a manufacturer?
They are not cheap, but there are several high quality non-toxic natural shampoos similar to Bronners, and yes, I trust those companies to disclose all the ingredients. Why wouldn’t they? It’s to their advantage to market honestly, because anyone paying $20+ for a bottle of shampoo is going to be someone who knows what they want it to do, and what ingredients are acceptable or not. And of course by law they have to (ironically, laws for labeling cosmetics, including shampoo, are stricter than for processed food). I realize not everyone can afford expensive non-toxic shampoo, and baking soda and ACV are probably good alternatives, just as ‘water only’ may be perfectly fine for some folks. But my comment was addressing the idea that there is no harm to your body or the environment when a soap/shampoo has simple, natural ingredients that one could even ingest without harm. So you don’t need to feel guilty. Or greasy or icky either!
I’m just not sure why I need to bother. I know that plain Castile soap, which is what Dr Bronner’s is, is safe. I know that apple cider vinegar is safe. I know that baking soda is safe. Ditto for lemons. All of these things keep me clean and unsmelly and keep my hair looking good.
I guess I could do a whole lot of research on the various chemicals used in all those all-natural shampoos, find a whole lot of articles about all the fragrance ingredients and detergents and preservatives, read up on each ingredient and learn about what it does to my body, learn about their interactions, find out what the long term effects are, and keep track of any changes in their formulations, but it kinda sounds like a full time job and I already have one. Maybe I’ll find a wonderful shampoo that doesn’t do anything bad to me, but the minuscule improvement in my looks really doesn’t seem worth all that research.
I had to post an update - I decided not to throw away the infested mycelium. Instead, I put it outside so the fruit flies wouldn’t be in the house.
Well, I’m getting pinning. Tiny little baby mushrooms with tiny little baby caps. I have no idea what will happen with them, but for now I’m terribly impressed and surprised.
I understand the desire to avoid chemicals, but I’m really baffled by this obsession of going ‘pooless’. I’m quite happy with natural, chemical free shampoos, which are non-toxic and could be safely eaten. Ditto for soap. I don’t like fragrances, aside from essential oils, but I also don’t like to feel grungy or smell bad.
I’m not sure which ones of those “natural shampoos” could actually be safely eaten, or how “non-toxic” they really are. For that matter, I wouldn’t eat soap either. But if I use something on my head that can be absorbed through the skin, I want to know exactly what’s in it and how it was made, and I don’t trust the manufacturer to disclose all the relevant information.
I use diluted Dr Bronner’s soap to wash my hair, followed by diluted apple cider vinegar, which gets me perfectly clean and smelling good. There never was a transition period either. Sometimes I use diluted baking soda instead of Dr Bronner’s, which works just as well.
Having tried all sorts of natural deodorants, the only thing that has ever worked for me is a simple lemon slice. Anything else either hurt my skin or didn’t cut the odor. The lemon slices work as well as commercial deodorant.
I’m growing my “garden” in an urban apartment, all indoors. I already harvested one potato plant. Now, I’ve got a tangled mess of cucumbers and some tomatoes in progress (both about to bloom), some kale, a couple more potatoes, black-eyed peas, and some miscellaneous herbs. I also have some king oyster mushroom mycelium growing on some cardboard and coffee grounds in a couple of buckets. My apartment gets a lot of sun, which seems to make all these plants happy. As for the mycelium, I have very little clue what I’m doing, but what I’ve read is that oyster mushrooms like to eat paper products, so I guess we’ll see what happens.
I just cut my wife’s hair yesterday, for the first time. She has a very short hairstyle (basically a man’s haircut), so I was very nervous. It actually turned out OK, and all the mistakes are on the back of her head where it won’t show up on a Zoom call. I plan to do better next time around, and we definitely won’t be going back to the hair salons even after they reopen.
So I’ve been growing mycelium on cardboard to prepare it for some sort of happy life in a substrate. It’s just a few sheets of cardboard. I left it too long, alas, and now there are white dots in the cardboard mycelium. Does it mean it’s getting ready to fruit? And what kind of fruit will I get on three small pieces of cardboard? (Presumably not much). Would I get any sort of mushrooms at all?
Mostly, can I still throw it into my bucket of soaked cardboard, coffee grounds, and wheat bran, or would it mess it up?
Ouch - I have so much sympathy for you. Been there done that. Going without sleep like this was the hardest thing I've ever done in my life.
Basically, your husband needs to step up. This is unsustainable for you, you can't do without sleep (especially when you've got two other kids to care for), and you'll break if you keep doing this. Can you express some milk, put it in bottles, and let Hubby take a night so you can sleep?
Another thing that you may bend on is cosleeping. What helped us the most was for my partner to cosleep with Baby in another room and text me when the baby needed feeding. I would come in, feed the baby, and then go back to sleep in a separate room. It helped me stay sane and actually sleep while the baby was sleeping.
And also, to give you hope: my baby was a horrible sleeper like yours, but at about 8 months of age, something changed and she started sleeping in 4-5 hour stretches. I have no idea what it was - we never did any "sleep training" or any such nonsense - I guess she just reached the right developmental stage. Hang in there.
I had great luck sprouting and growing grocery store potatoes. My very first successful harvest was a red potato that sprouted in the plastic bag; I planted it and eventually got 5 beautiful new potatoes, just in a flowerpot indoors. I just planted a white potato in another (bigger) flowerpot.
The really badly infested one is coffee grounds. The other one was a mix of coffee grounds and wheat bran. I think I got rid of all the larvae in that one (my kid and I spent a few days picking out the pupae with tweezers), but the other one is in a jar and we can’t get at the bugs as easily. I will toss that one.
I have a container in which I have just planted a potato. It’s a big container, though, and there is room for more plants in it. Can I plant kale in the same pot?
I’ve got two indoor containers with king oyster mushroom mycelium in it. Both are infested with fruit flies, as it seems. The mycelium looks fine and healthy, but I don’t want a fruit fly infestation in the house. I’m planning to throw out the worst one (swarming with larvae), but is there some way to prevent this from happening again? Or to get rid of the fruit fly larvae infesting those coffee grounds without throwing out the mycelium? Halp?
I have some king oyster mushroom mycelium that I got from a kit, raised to fruition, and then tried to propagate on cardboard. I got a few sheets of boiled and soaked cardboard and put it in a dish and now it’s all coated with mycelium. It’s just a few sheets, though - 3 small sheets of mycelium in a dish. Is that enough for mushrooms or should I add more and put it in a bigger container?
I found this forum through my research on mushroom growing, and thought I’d introduce myself.
I live with my wife and 4 year old daughter in an urban apartment in San Francisco and we’ve been in lockdown for 3 months. During lockdown, I started experimenting with indoor container gardening and discovered I love it. We’ve already harvested some lovely potatoes that I grew in a flowerpot in my home office, and I’ve got some tomatoes and cucumbers growing now, along with some black eyed peas and a very sad onion plant.
My latest experiment is king oyster mushrooms. I got a kit online and already harvested it (yum!); then I took some of the mycelium and tried propagating it in a mixture of wheat bran and coffee grounds (We grind our own flour and we get more wheat bran than we know what to do with). It’s growing and seems to be pretty happy, though it’s too early to tell, I guess.
We are pondering a move to suburbia, and I’m looking forward to getting an actual back yard to play with. I want to get a beehive once that happens, and I’m sure I’ll be here asking stupid questions about beekeeping.
