Erica & Wes go to the Oklahoma City Home & Garden Show.

As you know, Wes & I became first-time homeowners last summer. We went to a small home and garden expo a few months after we bought our house but it was nothing exciting...it was actually rather boring. A couple of weeks ago, Home & Garden Events mailed us some junk mail that ended up being quite a treat. We received four complimentary tickets to the Oklahoma City Home & Garden Show. I think Wes was a little reluctant to go after our lackluster experience at the previous show but I insisted (because you can't let free tickets go to waste!) We went to watch some presentations Saturday evening and then returned Sunday to look at the exhibits and participate in the DIY activities.

The show was housed in three buildings on the OKC Fairgrounds. The presentations were on the Lifestyle Stage in the Pavilion. The first presentation we watched was Joel Karsten teaching us about straw bale gardens. Straw bale gardening is a technique he invented using straw bales instead of planting in the ground. Its a great method of "alternative agriculture" (his phrase) because there are no insects or weeds involved. Basically, you get a straw bale and pour some fertilizer & nitrogen (or urine, he suggested that works just as well) onto the straw bale to condition it. Then after a few days, you put your seeds or plants in there and they'll start growing. The bales last for two years. Then you can break it open and find great composted soil in there. I'm not sure how he came up with this idea but he's spread it all over the world. He went to Cambodia to teach farmers the technique and it helped to solve some of their agricultural problems. I was hoping for a more instructional presentation, but it was mostly about the history of straw bale gardening and what impacts it is having on communities now. It was still pretty interesting and I'd love to start my own if someone wants to give me a straw bale or two.

The other presentation we saw was DIY Herb Gardening with Tony Mussatto. I really enjoyed this presentation; it was educational and entertaining (much like the nerdy podcasts I listen to, LOL). Tony went through two lists of perennial and annual herbs and explained the uses of each and different techniques for growing them. He also gave us some tips on which recipes to use the herbs for and the wildlife the herbs will attract. Pineapple sage attracts humming birds, fennel attracts caterpillars and catnip attracts partying felines. (The last one was a joke he made!) Lastly, we learned some herb preservation methods, such as hanging the herbs upside-down in a paper bag to dry or freezing them into ice cubes for future use. We also learned that perennial herbs need to be mulched each year. I planted some basil in the backyard when we first moved in and it totally died... probably because I didn't mulch it. *sad face*

 I want that birdcage chair for my craft show booth! The bunny was adorable & soft. Wes thought the taxidermy raccoon eating Cracker Jacks was a hoot.

 A few pictures from "Landscapers Lane" 

For day #2, we just walked around to look at the exhibits and vendors. It was mostly salespeople hawking new windows, tornado/storm shelters and roofing...nothing we really need. We checked out a few flooring options because I want to go from carpet to laminate but that won't be for quite some time. I enjoyed looking at all the landscaping models...our yard does need work. Wes saw a fire pit he liked (we might DIY it this summer) and gutter guards that we should probably install. We weren't harassed by too many aggressive salespeople so that was good. The only ones I stopped to talk to were the Made-in-Oklahoma vendors and I ended up buying a few small things.

My favorite part of the show was the hands-on activities. They all started and ended at the same time so I couldn't participate in all of them. StateFarm Insurance had a booth that required you to fill out a short survey (unless you're already a customer, which we are, so we got to skip that part of the line. YAY!) and then pick out and plant your very own succulent.

A calligraphy instructor from Pen to Paper taught us how to make a "faux calligraphy" sign. I see these things at every craft show I go to (SO trendy right now!) and I assumed it was pretty hard to do. But it is actually extremely simple. All you do is find a pattern you like (she provided us with an original she made), transfer it onto your canvas using carbon paper, and then fill it in with Sharpie marker. The sign I made took me less than half and hour and it looks super cute!

Before we left, we had to stop at the food trucks. I got the Asian food and Wes got the American food because we are hilariously stereotypical. LOL, just kidding, it was purely coincidence. The weather was amazing so we ate outside. The only complaint we had was the strong wind but we live in Oklahoma so it is to be expected. I'm glad we took advantage of our complimentary tickets; I'm not sure we would have gone if we didn't get them in the mail. We didn't really buy much but we also didn't go with the intention of remodeling our house...just to observe. Wes liked that the show was large enough to fill three buildings. We had a great time and found it to be a nice way to spend our weekend.

Our spoils at the end of the weekend.

Erica and Wes are growing a garden!

Indie Trunk Show kinda took over my life last month, so I have to apologize for not blogging about this... I GOT MARRIED!!!

ERICA AND WESLEY ARE HUSBAND AND WIFE \(^.^)/ WHOOT WHOOT

I'm going to be in another show in August so I'm pretty sure my life will be taken over by my sewing machine once more pretty soon. (Its a good kind of takeover, though.) I want to do a show each quarter. My spring show was Indie Trunk Show. My summer show will be (appropriately titled) The Summer Show in Yukon. I applied to be in Earlywine YMCA's Arts and Crafts Fair in south OKC for my fall show and The Santa Market in Edmond for my winter show. I also plan to apply for a show at the Cleveland County Fairgrounds (also for fall) but that hasn't happened, yet. I don't even remember what it's called so I can't shamelessly promote. LOL No word on my official acceptance into these shows but I feel pretty good about it. They were all referrals from vendors I met at the Indie Trunk Show who all had good things to say about RagsReborn. They are also smaller shows so they'll be a much better fit for me.

But before craft show insanity sets in, I want to blog about my wonderful domestic life with my husband. <3 I usually don't do mushy barf stuff but I figured I should at least once since I am married now. Wes and I are trying to get a little garden together on our balcony. We have a couple plants from last year and two new crops I started a few months ago. Look, progress!

I took some really awesome pictures in the daytime and got some action shots of Wes pruning the pepper plants but then I accidentally deleted them off my phone. So now we have "oh shit, I deleted the good pictures so here are some make up ones" pictures.

One thing Wes & I always do together is cook and eat our meals.  No matter how busy our individual schedules get, we try our darnedest to have dinner. Over the last year or so, I've gotten into the organic farm to market movement.  Last summer I decided that we should just grow our own herbs and some vegetables. (It's cheaper than shopping at Whole Foods!) We started with some mint sprigs a friend of ours gave us. Then we got some seeds for peppers. This year I got some more seeds and now, we have mint, basil (actually no real basil, yet, they're just tiny little sprouts now), green beans and banana peppers.

The basil has sprouts... even if you can't see them in this picture.

I can't say I'm an expert but there have been lessons learned from our two summers of gardening that I would like to share. This was actually Wes' idea. He goes, "You should blog about our plants since they're doing so well." I guess he wants me to diversify... crafts, recipes, infertility, shows... what don't I do?!?! LOL Anyway, back to this week's topic. Top three tips for home gardening:

1. Don't let the soil stay moist! 

Last year we experienced gnat-mageddon. It was TERRIBLE!  I didn't even water the plants that much. But it was just enough to get a few gnats and then those suckers laid eggs and then we could not get rid of them for months. I think we had gnats from March until November. The apartment supposedly came out and sprayed and we had fly strips all over and around the plants but nothing helped. 

So there we were with our little baby plants and an army of gnats... AND moldy soil. Since we let the soil get too moist, fuzzy patches of mold started showing up. We ended up having to stop watering the plants completely and then we pretty much re-potted the plants with new dry soil. We use a spray bottle for watering now. I spritz the indoor plants about every other day.

2. Take them outside. 

I didn't want to bring the plants out this spring because of all the rain we've been getting. I was afraid that our plants would all just drown. And all the seed packets say to start your plants indoors for x number of weeks. Wes pushed for them being taken outside so I finally gave in. They looked like they weren't going to make it after the first few storms. But then, our mint grew a lot fuller and our banana pepper grew into a really hardy stalk.  We had the spindliest banana pepper plant last summer and it barely had any buds on it. Took it outside for a month and it has improved tenfold. The only thing we still have indoors is our baby basil.

Our luscious mint.

3. Get multiple small pots.

Last year, we got two large pots and I crammed all our seeds into them. I had a packet of basil seeds, a packet of pepper seeds and the sprigs of mint from Kristin. At first they all grew... then they all died. The mint took over everything and the basil never made it.  Our peppers were looking more and more weak. I finally let the mint have their own pot and separated the peppers into two pots with one stalk each. This year, I got four Jiffy Strips. Two for basil and two for green beans. We only put one green bean seed in each and a few basil seeds in each. The beans are sprouting up a storm and the basil is starting to grow, too.

I want to grow other vegetables but I think planting season is over. I think we'll add to our garden each year. Maybe two new crops a year since that's what we've been doing. We are going to have tons of banana peppers this summer. Wes suggested pickling them. I've never pickled anything before and Wes made it sound like a difficult ordeal. Has anyone out there pickled peppers? And can you give us tips?