A few weeks ago, Shawdee remarked that with everything that we've got growing in the yardway, we should have a meal at Ruby St with everything hyper-locally sourced.  Tonight, after picking the first heirloom tomato of the season, we came pretty close.

Home-baked Tartine bread, with starter cultivated and fed on the premises

Basil starts originally from the Edible Schoolyard,
but reaching new heights right here at Ruby St

Just in case you couldn't tell, those are really big basil leaves
(and lest you think that the tomato is just really small,
a penny, for scale)

Yum!

Before and After: Concrete Edition

If you recall, there used to be bushes in front of the concrete pedestals, but nothing that a saw and a hatchet couldn't take care of.

Site prep

Securing the concrete forms

Mixing the concrete

Ta da!

Leaving a legacy

Harv List Update

A Boy Scout is Always Prepared.

Harv, the Eagle Scout, came a few months back for the first project off the Harv List: platforms for the two great big dragon pots we bought at The East Bay Depot for Creative ReUse (or Creative Home Depot as I like to call it).  He came prepared (see suitcase photo above) - with hammers and files and 8" long nails to use as spikes and concrete smoothing tools, and toothpaste.

We forgot to take good before and after photos [Ed note: We forgot to post before and after photos, but that situation has been rectified].  Below is a glimpse of the concrete pads we built forms for, mixed and poured the concrete for, and carved super secret signatures into.   This created an even surface to put the pots on.  Before there were jagged areas where the two porch armrests had been removed, leaving the partially demolished footings behind.  The pots are filled with rocks, dirt, a bit of mulch and ceanothus (aka wild lilac).  Better photos to follow.

Striped Woolen Goodness

In addition to exterior, building scale work, we've also been slowly making progress inside.

My dear friend, Becca, runs a small farm and large family (child number four arrived this spring) on Vashon Island in Washington state.  She has goats and sheep and runs a cheese c.s.a.  I wish she lived closer so we could eat her delicious goat sausage every week and her daughter, Amelia, could help us walk Marla Rocket.  While I don't see that happening soon, I have been able to bring a bit of Becca's life to Ruby Street.  Each year they sheer the sheep, send the wool to MacAusland's Woollen Mills in Canada, and produce these lovely striped blankets.  Below is a photo of the one of first milled blankets (grey) and one that Becca wove on her new(ish) loom. 

Below is our blanket, from the second batch, along with a table cloth turned bedspread and silk scarf turned pillow.