Search Results for: label/lawns/page/3/2010/06/the-urban-homestead

422 results

Three Power Tools Every Urban Homesteader Should Own

Mr. Homegrown
Tools
21 Comments
On nearly all the work I’ve done on our house, everything from chicken coops to wood floors I’ve used just three power tools: corded drill circular saw sabre sawjig saw While I also own a router, a miter saw, a sander and a few other miscellaneous power tools, the three tools above I consider essential. Even if you don’t own a house, but would like to build some furniture or help a friend or relative with a repair project,...

Continue reading…

Google Sketchup as an Urban Homesteading Tool

Mr. Homegrown
Animals, Chickens, Design
21 Comments
I just completed a new chicken run, greatly assisted by an amazing and free 3d design program: Trimble SketchUp (formerly Google SketchUp). While it takes some time to learn (I’m still learning!), this program helped me visualize the chicken run as well as estimate the amount of materials I’d need to buy. Here’s how I used it to create the run: Previous runs either did not work (chickens squeezed out and flew over) or were hid...

Continue reading…

Urban Homesteading Mistakes: Landscape Fabric

Mr. Homegrown
Mistakes
32 Comments
Since you all seem to enjoy accounts of our many failures around the Root Simple compound, I thought I’d share what must be one of the worst mistakes I’ve made. It’s a error up in our great chandelier of failures along with buying a 91 year old house on a hill with a bad foundation. Two words for you: landscape fabric–that plastic stuff sold in rolls at big box stores that allegedly blocks out weeds. Just after we bough...

Continue reading…

Happy Thanksgiving, Now Go Buy Something

Mr. Homegrown
Miscellaneous
1 Comment
We’re kidding. Well, sort of. Hopefully you’ll negotiate a truce with your family today to forgo expensive and wasteful holiday gift giving. Like us, you probably are also heavy users of the public library. But just in case you need to find the right gift for the fanatical urban homesteader in your life we’ve opened a Homegrown Evolution Amazon Store which contains books and tools that we actually own and use around our humble...

Continue reading…

Homegrown Evolution at Modern Times San Francisco

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
1 Comment
Mrs. Homegrown Evolution will be delivering a talk and doing a book signing of our book The Urban Homestead at Modern Times Bookstore in San Francisco this Wednesday October 15th at 7:30 p.m (Mr. Homegrown will be resting his polyester clad derriere back at the urban homestead in Los Angeles). Modern Times is located at 888 Valencia Street in the beating heart of the Mission District. Come on out and support this indepedent, collectively owned b...

Continue reading…

And on the Seventh Day Petals Fell in Petaluma

Mr. Homegrown
Permaculture
RLeave a comment
The ducks of Petaluma Urban Homestead A big thanks to Suzanne and Paul of Petaluma Urban Homestead for giving us a tour of their bit of heaven on earth. Homegrown Revolution forgot to bring the camera so you’ll have to check out their blog to see what they are up to. They make a damn good hard cider by the way. We also had the privilege of meeting the inspiring Trathen Heckman of Daily Acts, publisher of the journal Ripples. If that w...

Continue reading…

Our Holiday Gift Suggestions

Mr. Homegrown
Reviews
4 Comments
That dreaded holiday seasons is just around the corner. With unemployment still high we hope that many of you have negotiated a family gift truce to limit tedious shopping. Or perhaps you’re making things to give away. But if you still need to get a little something for that special homesteader on your shopping list, we’ve got a few suggestions from our Homegrown Evolution Amazon Store. Even if you just click through the store and b...

Continue reading…

Shameless Self Promotion, With Kitten

Mr. Homegrown
Events
12 Comments
We’ve heard from several people that Making It is an excellent sleep aid. Just a reminder that our two books, Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World and The Urban Homestead make great holiday gifts. There’s also a Kindle edition of both Making It andThe Urban Homestead if you’re e-inclined. Even if you just click through our Amazon bookstore (on the right column) and don’t buy any of our books, we...

Continue reading…

Transcendental Taggers

Mr. Homegrown
Thoughtstylings
RLeave a comment
ty, that is to bring the amenities of rural life, i.e. nature and agriculture, to our lives here in this somewhat ugly but interesting place we call home, the City of Los Angeles. In short, we intend to put the Urban in Urban Homestead. By the way, to the transcendentalist gangbangers who did the tagging – nice handwriting – you are obviously not the product of the same public schools we are....

Continue reading…