Laura Hans

Bought our place 20 years ago or so as a get away/future retirement home. Life in the city/military/tech industry was fast and complicated.   It is called Simple Haven.  

We are a mile and a half off the county road so to get to it I named the two tack road "Mt N Plain View Road" (One can seen each depending on whether you're coming or going) And our 1/2 mile driveway, "Simple Haven Road".   We put up  the green street signs on steel poles, like in the city. Ha!  We had a hand carved sign on the cabin porch but it blew away.  

After a wild fire took all the tree wind block  we may have to change it to Insane Winds.

After 40 some years of receiving and collecting cherished ornaments and the memories they bring, I am opting for something like this. Fir scented candles, or potpourri for the smell.  If I get really motivated, I'll decoratiean outdoor tree with popcorn strings and other goodies as  a gift for the wild critters.  Plan to plant a blue spruce in a strategic spot, once we are established in our new digs. That will become the future living Christmas tree.


https://images.app.goo.gl/GUS6EHzC52L9Y9od7

Though I find this one intriguing.

https://images.app.goo.gl/vAST1bqcD3znMFSd8

This is a Great topic.   I've sewn and mended since I was a teen. You do that once you know the work that goes into a thing. I have had to hire for darning, though I knit and crochet. Some of these videos may inspire me to give it a go myself.

Can almost tell the age of folks by favorite song.   I have two.

Off grid so not online much.  Yes. CO = Colorado STD = Standard.   I should also add the interior walls are drywalled with a vapor barrior paint mixed with a heat sink additive.  Little thermal mass beads of a material whose name escapes me right now.

Our experience in CO with a 10' × 14' room we added, 2×4 frame on a deck set on piers.  STD paperbacked fiberglass insulation in walls, 1,5 inch foam board and 1/2 inch chip board under floor, pad and rug inside.  STD roof insulation. Only air leak e as a light fixture which was not caulked.  Even doing all that, nothing could keep it warm until we closed in the "crawl space".  Used left over galvenized roofing bermed with dirt.  Mainly heat migrates from the main house.  But, a coil of black 4 inch irrigation piping on a south exposure exhausts into that space underneath. We screened the ends.
Seems heating the underside helps the most.

I have grown lovage for about 20 years in the high and dry of the the front range of CO.  It seems to prefer soil more on the clay side.   I have better luck
starting from seed than trying to transplant.  You need a large root ball to get it to transplant.  My best growers are usually against a privacy fence or house.
Don't know if that is due to the shelter from the wind but that is now where I put them.  They will spread.  They seem to companion well with my rhubarb.

I also keep honey bees and have noted that they attract wasps and native bees, so my honey bees avoid them.  I don't plant them near my hives, or put my
hives close to my lovage patches.

The celery flavor is much stronger than regular celery.  I dry the large leaves and use them like a bay leaf.   My husband will chew the stalk but it is too
much for my palate.  The seed I use like fennel seed, or celery seed.

The dried stalks are hollow and if bundled, make great native bee habitat.

 

We live in the high desert area of the southern rockies.  Our "soil" is mostly sand.  Blue grama grass grows naturally here and is highly valuable as open
range forage. It is low bunch grass of a light minty turquiose color so not quite what midwesterners consider a lawn.  The spring seed heads are quite showy.
You may also want to first plant with some green manure cover crops like clover, and buckwheat, native wild flowers,  let them amend the soil then seed in the
with the lawn,.  

Good morning Dr. Leo,

We built the de Layens hive per your free online plans, then ordered unassembled frames from you.  Thank you. The bees are installed and doing well.  We also built a horizontal Langstroph hive using
similar concept.  We repurposed some hollow core closet doors filled with paper shards.  We installed a package of bees in it as well to run a comparison.  Both seem to be doing well.  The two hives
we installed from nucs last year in standard Langstroph hives, barely survived the winter and are struggling.  It will be an interesting experimental season for us here in the foot hills of the southern Rockies.
We also ran a package of bees in a Warre hive last year.  They did not survive the winter.  They left 8 pounds of honey in the hive, so did not starve.  I believe they either froze or smothered.  There were 40 degree
diurnal swings which confused them as well.

https://photos.app.goo.gl/yHucdBxGqXxdC4xX8

I also use kitchenware, but mostly in container garden.