On Thanksgiving morning Jon and I woke up in Oceanside, Oregon and wandered down to the wide, rock-strewn beach. Waves were gently breaking against the sand and a surfer and a sea lion bobbed up and down a few yards off shore.

The weather was calm, but the beach gave us a hint of the strong storm system that had blown through a few days before. Smashed shells and tumbled logs littered the sand. At the edge of the high tide mark we found a gigantic pile of kelp. The long, whip-like sea plants were twisted around each other like a nest of snakes.

Huge kelp forests grow under the waters off the Pacific shoreline. The forests provide oxygen, shelter, and food for seabirds, otters, fish, sea lions, seals, and other ocean creatures. Kelp, of course, is also an excellent fertilizer for plants, especially vegetables. I was tempted to gather some of the kelp and bring it home with me, but I had no way to get it off the beach and I wasn’t sure what the harvest rules were. So we swung a few pieces around like bull whips, gave Domino a chance to throughly investigate the pile, and then left it alone.

This morning I looked up the rules regarding harvesting kelp in Oregon, and I found the language bureaucratic and confusing. Individuals may harvest up to 2000 pounds of kelp for personal use from submerged lands and 10 pounds per day from intertidal areas. I interpreted this to mean that you can pick up 10 pounds a day from the beach and you can take out a boat and harvest up to two tons, all without a permit.

With what seems to be an ample source of nutrient-rich, organic material available just a short drive from my door, I’d like to investigate using fresh kelp in the garden and making my own fertilizer. But I hesitate, because I do not know what the impact of removing the kelp from the beaches and near offshore waters has on the complex ecosystem that lives within the kelp forests. Finding the kelp pile also made me think for the first time about the source of the kelp in the fertilizer products I buy and about the sustainability and regulations surrounding the commercial harvest. My curiosity is sufficiently piqued that I’m going to do a little poking around to see what I can find out.

I love a good wall calendar. It is so fun to flip over a page and find a new piece of artwork every single month. And at the end of the year, I always page back through the calendar and remember vacations, and trips to the beach, and dinners with friends. It’s just not quite the same on my iPhone.

Heidi Schweigert, a Minnesota-based graphic designer and illustrator, put together a wonderful 2011 calendar celebrating the gardening season. The calendar’s ingenious design allows you to cut the calendar sheets down into 5 x7 postcards at years end! A perfect gift a gardener—or anyone who appreciates lovely vegetables—don’t you think?

The Market Calendar with Bulldog Clip is available for $25 on Heidi’s Etsy shop, Redcruiser. The inspiration for the calendar came from Heidi’s own kitchen garden, where she grows ’Black of Tula’, ‘Brandywine’, and ‘Juane Flamme’ tomatoes and my favorite butterhead lettuce, ‘Little Gem’.

I started growing beets because I love their greens. Beets and Swiss chard happen to be different varieties of the same species, Beta vulgaris. Beet greens look quite similar to chard, but they have a tender texture and a slightly more refined, spinach-like flavor. We eat the greens all the time in winter. I love to fold feta, dill, and sauteed beet greens into a puff pastry tart shell and serve it with a bowl of soup.

It took me awhile to grow to like, and then eventually love, beetroot. My grandmother canned beets when I was young and served them often. To this day I cannot get over how vinegary, clove-y chunks of pickled beet look like they are bleeding all over the plate.

Based on my dislike of pickled beets, I avoided eating all beetroot, no matter how it was prepared. Then, a few years ago I tried roasted beets with marcona almond butter at Cafe Juanita.

It was one of the best things I’ve ever eaten. Seriously. That dish reminded me to never wholesale disregard a food. Now that I eat beetroot, I prefer to roast them. Roasting pushes the earthy quality of beets into the background and brings forth a sweeter, caramelized flavor. I often just chop the roasted roots and drizzle them with a bit of olive oil and salt pepper before serving them. I also toss like to toss chunks of roasted beets with vinaigrette and serve them over arugula with chopped Marcona almonds. Lately I’ve been making grilled sandwiches with chevre and very thinly sliced golden beets. Sounds weird, but it is totally delicious!

Roasted Beets

To prevent the beets from bleeding their brightly colored juice everywhere, twist—-don’t cut—off their leaves and snip the long taproot down to a 1-inch long nub. Peeling and chopping beets prior to roasting causes a huge mess. Instead, I roast the beets whole in packets of foil and then peel off their skins.

To do so, tear off a 12 inch length of aluminum foil. Place a single large beet, or a couple of smaller ones, in the middle of the foil. Draw the long sides of the foil up over the beet and then fold them together. Crimp the short edges together to form the sealed packet. Roast different colored beets (i.e. red, ‘Golden’, or ‘Chioggia’) in separate packets.

Place the packets seam side up on a rimmed baking sheet and roast in a 400 degree F oven until the roots are fork tender (about 45 to 60 minutes depending on their size). Remove the beets from the oven and carefully open the steamy packets. Slip the skins off the roots when they are cool enough to handle. Chop or slice the beets. If working with multiple colors of beets always chop or slice ‘Golden’ or ‘Chioggia’ beets first. Set them aside, each in their own bowl, and then prepare the red beets. If serving the different colored beets together, wait until the last moment before assembling the dish.

I have a million things that I need to do right now, including writing, unpacking boxes, and balancing the checkbook. But I can’t help daydreaming about our new garden and what I want to fill it with. I’d really like to make the garden a place that is relaxing. Here are a few things I have my eye on (clockwise from top left):

1. Vintage Light String (Restoration Hardware, $179). Next to actually building the garden, my top priority is to dress up the patio. I want to string these fun lights overhead to add a little mood lighting to summertime dinners.

2. Large Glass Cloche (Target, $29). I collect glass cloches and use them both indoors and out.  I’m always looking to add to my collection and this cloche from Target is the right price. In spring I protect brassica seedlings, herbs, and basil from super chilly nights with cloches (I have some plastic ones, too).

3. Adirondack Chair (Manchester Wood, $229.95). I adore Adirondack chairs and would really love to place a pair of bright yellow ones under our tree. They would add such a nice bright, pop of color to the yard. At the moment, they are not in the budget, so I might build a couple chairs out of reclaimed palletsand paint them.

4. Dash and Albert Rug in Sprout and White (Lavender Fields, $34). Our cement patio has a nice weathered look to it, but it isn’t the most attractive patio surface on the planet. I think I might use this indoor/outdoor rug to cover up some of the patio and break up the big swath of grey.

5. Element by Fuego Grill (Sears, $649.00). Okay, admittedly, this grill is pricey, but dang, it looks good! Plus, since it is gas I’d probably actually use more than once a summer.

6. Soji Illume Solar Lights (Allsop Garden, $29.99). These 14-inch globe lanters look like they are made of paper, but their wire frames are actually wrapped in nylon. The lanterns are lit with white, solar-operated LED lights. I want to hang several at various heights in our tree.

I am going to focus on colorful vegetables, herbs, and flowers since our house and garage are painted grey green and most of the plants in the garden are dark green. Here are a few that caught my eye:

1. ‘Queen of the Night’ Sweet Peas (Renee’s Garden, $2.79). My very favorite sweet pea mix. Lusciously fragrant with a beautiful blend of flowers, including the navy blue ‘Lord Nelson’.

2. ‘Marketmore’ cucumber (Botanical Interests, $1.89). I want to grow trailing plants over the little retaining wall that separates the yard from the patio. ‘Marketmore’ always produces well for me and its pretty yellow flowers will provide a nice contrast to the concrete wall.

3. ‘Whirlybird Nasturtiums’ (Renee’s Garden, $2.79). These semi-double rose, yellow, peach, tangerine, mahogany, scarlet, and golden nasturtiums bloom all summer long (or until the aphids get them, anyways). I hope to edge the veggie bed with them, so they creep over the wall and steps!

4. ‘Red Acre’ Cabbage (Botanical Interests, $1.69). A row of these purple cabbages would look dramatic from my kitchen window, especially if they were covered with glass cloches!

5. ‘Trionfo Violetto’ (Botanical Interests, $2.39). I want to put my wrought iron obelisk right in the middle of the bed above the patio and plant it with peas in spring and these colorful pole beans in the summer.

6. ‘Scented Basil Trio’ (Renee’s Garden, $2.99). This trio of basils contains three of my favorite varieties: ‘Cinnamon’, ‘Red Rubin’, and ‘Mrs. Burn’s Lemon’. I might just plant up a whisky barrel with this mix and put it right next to the back stoop.

When we were looking for a house to rent in Portland, the number one question was, “Is there a space to vegetable garden?” We got lucky and rented a very cute little 1940s cottage that came with room—and permission—to garden. The house faces south and the front yard gets bright sunshine all day. In the back, a narrow area just above the patio gets at least 6 hours of southwestern sun a day, as does about 1/2 of the rectangular bed that runs between the sidewalk and our detached garage.

The yard definitely needs a little TLC, but it has great bones. There is a big tree in the middle of the back lawn, which unfortunately has a large broken branch that I need to take care of. Trees aren’t my area of expertise, but it looks to be a crabapple or perhaps an ornamental cherry. I didn’t spot any fruit. In the corner, to the right of the tree and beyond the garage is the perfect spot for a chicken coop and a compost bin.

There is a nice, mossy cement patio and cute brick steps lead up into the yard. I’m planning on putting a large vegetable bed between the steps and the wisteria in the corner. I’m also going to bring down this giant container we have stored in Seattle and place it at the corner of the garage. My least favorite area of the yard is a weedy patch of lawn just on the other side of the patio. I’m tempted to string a roll of bamboo fencing between the house and the retaining wall and just ignore the area…though it would make a very cute gravel patio with an herb garden in the middle. I also think it would be really fun to  set up a few bamboo poles above the garden bed and string lights from the house out over our outdoor dining area.

(Via Dwell)

At our new house there is a small structure attached to the back of the garage that features slatted wood walls, a brick floor, and a corrugated plastic roof. I imagine it was used to store wheelbarrows in the past, but it also happens to be the perfect spot for chickens. Our plan is to transform the area into a large and comfy chicken run by stapling 1/4-inch hardware cloth along the inside of the walls and building a door.

We have not yet decided if we will place the coop inside the run or just outside, but I do know that this go round I want to take the time to build a coop that is easy on the eyes and easy to clean. Over the weekend I started pulling together a file of inspirational coops, and was surprised to find so many coops with a modern design, including the coop up top, which was designed and built by Portland-based architect Mitchell Snyder to house his three hens.

(Via Dwell)

I’m not sure how practical an egg-shaped coop is, but it looks cool! With both this coop and the popular Eglu, my concern is the run and coop are both quite small. In my experience, hens get along best and peck the least when they have at least a 10 square feet of space per bird.

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