Zen rock gardens, monastery rose gardens, even your grandmother's vegetable garden all have been described as places of refuge and reflection. Drawing on her experience working at Seattle's premier gardening center, Zen teacher Geri Larkin shows how the act of gardening can help you uncover your inner creativity, enthusiasm, vigilance, and joy. As your garden grows, so will your spirit.Larkin takes you through the steps of planning, planting, nurturing, and maintaining a garden while offering funny stories and inspiring lessons on what plants can teach us about our lives. As soothing as a bowl of homemade vegetable soup, Plant Seed, Pull Weed will entertain, charm, and inspire you to get your hands dirty and dig deep to cultivate your inner self.

    In the sequel to The Essential Earthman, the Washington Post columnist offers a harvest of sharp observations and humorous adventures gathered during a year in his garden, along with much down-to-earth advice on horticulture.

    Worms are the latest (as well as, of course, perhaps the oldest!) trend in earth-friendly gardening, and in this handy guide, the authors of DEAD SNAILS LEAVE NO TRAILS demystify the world of worm wrangling, with everything you need to know to build your own worm bin, make your garden worm-friendly, pamper your soil, and much much more.

    The Thrifty Gardener is about creating the garden of your dreams, regardless of resources or limited space. It will eliminate the intimidation factor and reveal the ins-and-outs of soil, seeds, sowing and growing. At the heart of this book is a DIY ethic that says you don't always have to buy what you need – you can make it, take it or swap it with friends. From creating window boxes out of champagne cases to creating your own elegant compost bin, from bulking up perennials to finding plants for free, this book is packed with offbeat projects for a new generation of gardeners.

    Irish makes it easy for beginners to learn the creative craft of woodburning in Pyrography Basics. All that aspiring beginners need is this book and an inexpensive woodburning tool to start adorning wood, gourds, leather, paper and more with beautifully burned images and patterns. The author provides a thorough introduction to basic tools, materials and techniques. Readers learn how to set up a practice board to experiment with strokes and settings before moving on to working projects with confidence. Six skill-building projects provide step-by-step exercises in using temperature, time, layering, and texturing to create artistic tonal values.

    A witty and informative guide for amateur gardeners shares economical, time-saving advice on how to create a beautiful backyard garden, covering everything from garden design to planting bulbs and pruning trees.

    A small pool of reflection in a forest of words is all it takes to escape the worries of the day. Join us for tea in the form of poetry, the wilds are waiting to heal you. A collection of poems to soothe your soul and set free your worry. Sometimes whimsical, sometimes sad, we all need a balance so we don't go mad. This collection of poems is brought to you by a heart that has been through the worst and bloomed again and again. A book full of hope and magic.

    You may find it for free on the web. Purchase of the Kindle edition includes wireless delivery.

    From constructing coops to rearing chicks, you’ll learn everything you need to know to make sure your chickens stay happy and healthy all year round.Which breed of chicken is right for you? What’s the best coop-bedding material? What sort of feed should you use? Let expert chicken keeper Anne Kuo answer these questions—and many others—in The Beginner’s Guide to Raising Chickens.The Beginner’s Guide to Raising Chickens includes: All cooped up—Create the perfect home for raising chickens using detailed backyard coop designs and construction guides. From chickens to eggs—Find out how to pick the right breed, raise chicks, collect eggs, keep your birds safe from predators, and more. Learn to speak bird—Start talking the talk thanks to an extensive glossary of common chicken-keeping terms. Get your own flock started in no time—The Beginner’s Guide to Raising Chickens shows you how.

    As a subsistence farmer, he builds his own house and barn, puts in a garden and an orchard, acquires a milk cow, and takes up beekeeping. In these pages, we hear his thoughts on such subjects as the weather, seasonal changes, machinery repair, the flora and fauna of the region, and vegetarian cooking. His philosophy, like his lifestyle, is simple, yet profoundly wise.

    Whether you want to grow better-tasting fruit and vegetables untainted by chemicals, find natural methods of pest and weed control, or create a garden that is safer for your children, pets and wildlife, Organic Gardening is your practical, easy-to-follow guide to gardening with, rather than against, nature.

     Anyone can have the same healthy, balanced lifestyle and a closer connection to their food—whether you live in a house in the suburbs, a farmhouse in the countryside, or an apartment in the city. The Homegrown Paleo Cookbook shows you how. With over 100 seasonal Paleo recipes, guides to growing your own food and raising animals, and inspiring how-tos for crafts and entertaining,The Homegrown Paleo Cookbook is a guide not just for better eating, but for better living—and a better world.

    But earth gardens are a lot of work. They require a plot of plantable land and a significant time commitment to sowing, watering, weeding, and tending each plant. Is there a solution? Self-watering containers allow vegetable gardeners—from the casual weekender interested in a tomato plant or two to the very dedicated gardener with limited space—to grow richly producing plants in a controlled, low-maintenance environment. Lifelong gardener Ed Smith became fascinated with the possibilities of self-watering containers and began testing dozens of vegetables in various containers, experimenting with nutrients, soil mixtures, plant varieties, and container positioning. Now Smith is here to tell gardeners that anyone can grow and enjoy wonderful organic vegetables, using pots with continuous- flow watering systems. Smith shares advice on choosing appropriate containers, how to provide balanced nutrition using his secret soil formula, and what additional tools benefit the container gardener. The reader will also find advice on starting from seed versus buying plants, which vegetables thrive in containers and which might be a bit more challenging, along with space-saving tips on pairing plants in single containers. After the last green tomato has been picked and is ripening on the windowsill, Smith wraps everything up with a chapter on fall clean-up and preparing for next spring. Now there’s really no excuse for store-bought tomatoes!

    Her spectacular photographs render the look and atmosphere of these gardens, while her text focuses on easily grown, readily available plants that are adaptable to a wide variety of climatic and soil conditions. In the back of the book—completely updated for this new edition—may be found specific horticultural information on a wide variety of cottage garden plants commonly available in the United States, glossaries of Latin and common names, and a list of sources for old rose varieties. The gardens in this beautiful book are not those of the great estates of England, manicured by staffs of professional gardeners. They are, instead, labors of love on the part of individual homeowners, many of whom started with bleak, rubble-strewn lots and went on to create the enchanted settings pictured here.

    She will also provide recipes that highlight these unique flavor combinations so you can make use out of every canned good! From jams, jellies and preserves to pickles and relishes to drunken fruit and pressure canning, this book has something for everyone. Some recipes will require the use of pressure canners, but not all.Make your mama proud but don't tell her you can can better than her!