Build Your Own Furniture

October 27, 2006

Design

...ack in the 60s and 70s left a few highly useful and groovy how-to books on making your own suburban-workshop-modernist furniture with a humble 4 x 8 sheet of plywood. The amazing art/architecture collective Simparch tipped us off to the world of plywood modernism how-to books and we at Homegrown Evolution recommend the stunning Sunset Magazine produced Furniture You Can Build, which is sadly way out of print and very expensive on Amazon, but avail...

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Home cooking advice?

Mrs. Homegrown

June 4, 2014

Food

30 Comments

...t happen. The tomatoes want to be with garlic and the chickpeas and the eggplants. They all get along. My spice shelf is starting to make sense. Leftovers harmonize under this system. If we have a supper of leftovers, instead of the table resembling a low-end Las Vegas buffet at about 3 AM, I can just put everything I’ve got on hand in little bowls and announce, “Meze!” It’s very impressive. I like this simplicity thing so much, I’m considering bo...

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Return of the Caftan?

Mr. Homegrown

December 2, 2014

Domesticus

5 Comments

...we’ve already hosted a shoe making workshop we might as well host a caftan making class. That, I said, would make us fodder for Portlandia parody. Reaction to the caftan post fell into two camps. Baby Boomers chastised my Generation X cynicism and noted that caftans are comfortable and practical. Others thought the idea is as ridiculous as, well, hosting a shoe making workshop and grinding your own flour. In Facebook, someone posted the picture ab...

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Big List of Earth-Friendly (homemade, compostable, recyclable, no-plastic) Holiday Decorations

Mrs. Homegrown

December 16, 2014

Miscellaneous

8 Comments

...ts biodegradable by choosing cotton or wool yarn, and natural fiber cloth. Making little cloth ornaments is a great way to use up scrap cloth and yarn. Save colorful scrap paper for the paper projects. Popcorn/cranberry strings (pro-tip: stale popcorn threads better) Gather a few evergreen branches by the branch ends to make a broom or fan shape, decorate with a spray of berries, tie with a ribbon. Much easier than a wreath! A few cranberries stru...

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George Rector: M.F.K. Fisher’s Dirty Old Uncle

Mrs. Homegrown

February 11, 2016

Recipes, Reviews

5 Comments

...p. Speaking of befuddled menfolk, Erik is quite fond of this passage about making Hollandaise sauce (from the chapter titled “A Touch of Eggomania”), not least because it has introduced the term “hen fruit” into our lives: For eggs Benedict, you need Hollandaise sauce, an additional contribution of the hen fruit to the pleasures of the palate, and to the confusion of cooks. Hold on to your hats and we’ll round that curve. Add four egg yolks, beate...

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