SIPS and Kraut at Project Butterfly

...our community and our planet. Erik Knutzen and Kelly Coyne, authors of The Urban Homestead, have become increasingly interested in the concept of urban sustainability since moving to Los Angeles in 1998. In that time, they’ve slowly converted their 1920 hilltop bungalow into a mini-farm, and along the way have explored the traditional home arts of baking, pickling, bicycling and brewing, chronicling all their activities on their blog Homegrown Evo...

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New National Center for Home Food Preservation Blog: Preserving Food at Home

...kin surplus as well as the dangers of pumpkin butter. Home food preservation is very safe but, to be honest, I’ve been alarmed at a few of the questions I’ve received while interacting with the public as a Master Food Preserver. Preserving Food at Home is an important food safety resource and I’m looking forward to reading their weekly posts. Do you have a favorite food preservation blog? Leave a comment . . ....

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Urban Homesteading: What Went Wrong

...es of future posts I’d like to look back at the ideas in our two books The Urban Homestead and Making It: Radical Home Ec for a Post-Consumer World. I’ll consider both the broader ideas in the books as well as what might have changed in terms of specific methods in subjects such as gardening and beekeeping. First let me peel back the curtain for those of you have have never written a book and describe how awkward and weird it can be to read your o...

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Non-Toxic Cleaning for the Home

...s a pound of poison! Use window screens. Keep counters and floors clear of food, put away pet food after feeding time. Don’t let garbage sit. Insect sprays and bombs are toxic and unnecessary—literally overkill. If you are bothered by ants, for instance, no need to spray with a poison like Raid. A spritz of vinegar or rubbing alcohol will kill them quickly, as will hot soapy water. Ants follow scent trails laid down by scouts. Wipe down their trav...

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iMac Drive Upgrade

...e into possession of. I repaired an iPod and a iPad. Last week I revived my 2010 iMac. In order to upgrade that iMac with a new solid state drive, I had to find an identification number. The i.d. number I needed was printed on the bottom of the “foot” that holds the heavy screen in a microscopic type printed gray on a gray background. Apple has a fetishistic design aesthetic that I’ve come to see as getting in the way of the functioning of the mac...

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