Backyard Edible Garden

My family and I are transitioning to a more "green" way of life.  I would have never thought I'd be interested in this sort of thing, because it seemed very time-consuming.  Now I realize it doesn't take much effort and is so beneficial for our health and the well-being of our planet (and our wallets).  We are looking into solar energy, energy efficient appliances, growing our own organic food, raising chickens to lay eggs and anything else that might seem interesting along the way. 

As I've written before, I am looking into the possibility of installing solar panels for the entire house or at least for the air conditioning unit.  I have contacted several vendors and am waiting for their responses ( more on this in an upcoming post).  When the time comes I plan to purchase all energy-star appliances.

In addition, a friend that lives in the neighborhood, recently put in a chicken coup.  This, in addition to the garden where they grow a lot of the organic vegetables and herbs they use for cooking.  When I heard about the chicken coup I was very interested in getting one for the new casa.  The idea of my children being able to experience that and being able to eat eggs laid by our own chickens, made me very excited.  I think it will be fun for them to experience. 

With the chickens we will definitely be moving into a new realm of obtaining food we've never done before.  Earlier this week I was watching one of my favorite HGTV shows, The Outdoor Room with Jamie Durie, and came across this episode where he built an edible backyard garden.  I was inspired to do this at the new casa also.  We've had an herb garden in our current casa but we were not very consistent in keeping up with it.  We grew a variety of herbs, eggplants and tomatoes.  It was convenient to have, but when it was too overgrown it looked ugly and messy and one day I just took it all out.  I like the idea of growing the food vertically...it seems less messy and cleaner and at least I know our pets won't be able to get into it (other animals I'm not sure about). 

It's also nice that it can be grown in a condensed area rather that taking up a lot of land.  We have an acre but I have big plans for that acre!

I found a website to purchase the "pockets" for vertical gardening.  Woolly pockets are flexible, breathable, modular gardening containers.  There are a couple of options for these pockets, horizontal, on the ground or vertical, hanging on the wall. 
Here's a link to a post with the steps for starting your own vertical edible garden: http://www.good.is/post/how-to-grow-an-edible-vertical-garden-in-5-steps/

I look forward to growing my own herbs and veggies again!  I plan to include posts in the future when I actually set up my edible gardens and eventually start using them.