EBooks Archives - Country Living in a Cariboo Valley

Vegetable Garden Planner Printable: Grow Your Best Garden Ever

The awesome worksheets in this printable vegetable garden planner will help you keep track of everything you need to remember!

Growing veggies takes planning, smart timing, and tips from seed to harvest, all of which you will find in this veggie garden planner.

I don’t know about you, but I am always keeping notes when it comes to gardening. I want to know the answers to questions like this:

How many bean plants did I put in last year?
What variety of carrots did we enjoy so much 2 years ago?
Which type of lettuce bolted so quickly 3 years ago?

Now, I’ve got some wonderful printables that help SO much when it comes to keeping track of the vegetable garden. And, I want to share them with you.

Vegetable Garden planner sheets laid out. — Get your Food Garden Planner today!

If you want a paper review to have on hand instead of having information on your iPad or in a spreadsheet, you will love this printable. The garden planner database is a great way to plan for the plot you have.

Use the printable as guidance and feedback for the perfect place to plant each of our plants. Create a dream garden that is full of a mix of vegetable varieties that you will enjoy.

This vegetable garden planner printable is what we use every year to grow this large garden of healthy vegetables. — Food gardens need planning. Use this vegetable garden planner to figure out your gardening season.

Are you ready to start planning your garden? If yes, then this vegetable garden printable will give you everything you need to start your garden from beginning to end. Real life tips to help you have a successful garden with a fruitful year.

With a layout sheet, vegetable seed starting date tracker, water schedule worksheet, plant care notes, and so much more this full garden planner will ensure you have maximum success with your family garden this year!

The Best Vegetable Garden Planner Printable is right here

You may have heard that to achieve certain things in life that you need a plan.

This concept holds for gardeners, too! Using my best garden planner printable, you’ll have everything you need from start to finish. I’m convinced that you’ll have a larger harvest of healthy food for your family when you use this garden planner.

The first step is taking an inventory of what you have for seeds, and then thinking about how much food you’ll need for your family.

This planner will help along the way with a simple one-page template for every action you’ll take throughout the gardening process.

If you have kids around the house, this garden planner provides a simple water log sheet where they can color in the circle for each time they go out to water the plants.

This is an excellent option for parents who want their kids to learn where their food comes from and how to grow it.

Garlic growing alongside raspberry plants — This small garden includes lots of garlic plants, growing alongside raspberry plants, rhubarb and herbs.

Growing your own food allows you to be more self sufficient. You’ll no longer have to wait for fresh produce to be in stock, or for the prices to drop on fruits and vegetables.

And using this planning printable, you’ll be well on your way towards growing healthy crops year after year.

Use the zone you are in, to make sure you are in the right climate for growth period, and start planting and prep work as you wait for harvest time.

Already know that you WANT this?

Grab your Vegetable Garden Planner printable now!

Only $7.99

Are you still debating if this garden planner is needed? Okay, I understand that.

So I’m going to share some of the amazing benefits you’ll get when you buy my garden planner printable today:

Easily select which plants you want to grow using our monthly and weekly tasks alongside the seasonal planner of this garden planner.
Save time with the planning process of your garden year after year.
Use our simple graph sheet to plan your garden layout so the whole family can help.
Simplifies the process of a family garden so that you save time, money, and are focused on growing healthy crops.

As you can see there are many benefits of using this garden planner. For starters, at this amazing price of just $7.99, you’ll receive a tool that could otherwise cost you hundreds of dollars.

I’m here to simplify the process of gardening for you, using my tried and true methods.

When you purchase this garden planner printable you’ll get:

Vegetable garden layout planner
Garden calendar monthly tasks
Garden calendar seasonal tasks
Seed starting tracker
Planting schedule
Watering log
Seed inventory
Weekly garden journal
Plant care notes
Seed packet template

Everything has already been figured everything out for you, so you simply need to print off this garden planner, make some notes, and get started with your goal to grow a healthy family garden this year.

Grab your Vegetable Garden Planner printable now!

Only $7.99

And…these vegetable garden planner printables are the PERFECT match to go along with our book “Grow Enough Food for a Year“.

Everything you need to know about growing food in small spaces is included, including container gardening and vertical gardening too! Take a look here:

Yes I want to know more about growing enough food for a year for my family!

Grow Enough Food for a Year

By Annie

Ever wondered how to grow enough food for a year? We’ve got you covered!

Our BEST SELLING book to grow your own food is on SALE this weekend only! Grab it today and save BIG!

Grocery store prices continue to climb and having a backyard garden where you can grow some of your own food is becoming more and more important every year.

And it is possible to grow a year’s supply of food, at least vegetables and fruits to satisfy your family’s needs.

While we are able to have a very big dedicated garden area, you certainly do not have to have the room for that.

So whether you have a city sized yard or even smaller, it’s possible to grow a garden and have almost a continuous harvest of fresh food.

You will need to be as efficient as possible with the space you have – practice companion planting and succession planting, vertical growing, the use of cold frames or maybe a small greenhouse, but it can be done.

Self-sufficiency to at least some degree, is becoming more important every year, with the changes in our current world.

Even if you have only a small garden plot, put it to use, plant some seeds and make this the year to start harvesting lots of different varieties of vegetables.

Every year we grow enough food here for us to eat all year round. Even though we have a short growing season, we pack a lot into those few months.

If you live in a more moderate climate than us, you can easily plant TWO gardens a year, instead of one.

So, whether you live in a northern climate or a more moderate climate with a longer growing season, you can learn to grow the food your family loves to eat.

Grow enough food for a year includes harvests of radishes, beans, greens and more — You CAN grow enough food for your family!

How to Grow Enough Food for a Year

This book is all about growing food for your family. And in this book is everything you need to know to grow a backyard vegetable garden.

Whether you are growing in one garden space or using a container gardening system, this book has what you want to learn.

This book covers:

Information and important links to this site’s posts to provide all the details for growing:

Potatoes
Onions
Tomatoes
Carrots
Leafy greens like Spinach, Kale, Lettuce, all kinds of Salad Greens
Zucchini
Cauliflower
Broccoli
Green beans and pole beans
Peas
Beets
Cabbages
Peppers

In addition, the book covers:

How much room do you need to grow the vegetables?
Where to find your gardening zone
Can you grow what you want where you live?
Eating Seasonally
Unique Ways to Grow Vegetable Crops
- Community Gardens
- Container Gardening
  - Rain Gutters
  - Hanging Baskets
  - Containers and Totes
  - Container Sizes for Growing Vegetables
- Vertical Gardening
  - Trellis
  - Wooden Pallets
  - Netting
  - What Vegetables to Grow in a Vertical Garden
- Microclimates
- Garden Soil
- Vegetable Seeds
- Planting (and Thinning) the Garden
- Watering
- Fertilizing
- Mulching
- Weeding
- Succession Planting
- Ongoing Maintenance
- Determining What to Plant for Your Family
  - Worksheets
- Food Storage Ideas and Possibilities
- Resources
  - Growing your Vegetables
  - Storing your Food
  - Preserving Food

$14.99 nope! On SALE now for ONLY

$9.99

Healthy, organic and very inexpensive – plant a vegetable garden this year!

Grab your book and make this THE year you grow a garden!

NOW ONLY $9.99

AND…. don’t forget to check out our comprehensive Vegetable Garden Planner, full of worksheets – grab it for only $4.99

8 Pounds in 8 Weeks: Raising Day Old Chicks for the Dinner Table

By Annie

Raising chicks for meat is a great way to eat healthy and reduce meat costs!

Read on to find the best breed of chicks to raise for meat, right in your backyard. Homegrown chickens taste so much better than the chicken we used to buy at the grocery store.

Once we started raising a few birds every year, we were convinced raising our own day-old chicks for meat was the way to go. Filling the freezer is pretty easy and it only takes 8 weeks from start to finish.

Pictures of chicks, growing chickens, processed chickens with text overlay saying How to Raise Chicks for Meat — Save this to your Pinterest Chickens board.

Now, almost every year we raise a few meat birds in the backyard to enjoy all year around. We keep the largest two and have them at Thanksgiving and Christmas!

We think raising meat birds is perfect we wrote a book all about how to raise them – from ordering through to butchering.

A 9 pound homegrown chicken ready for the freezer — Yes that really is a 9 pound chicken. Disclaimer: Weight varies!

Already know you want this book? Buy it now!

Why raising baby chicks for meat is perfect for any homestead

We operate mostly on a seasonal calendar basis here on our farm. We like having the winters free from daily work (as much as possible).

So we try to raise our livestock on a seasonal basis. Let me explain how that works for us.

In any given year, we may raise pigs (from weaner pig to full size) and chickens. If we decide to raise pigs for pork, we buy them at the end of March.

They live here, pigging out eating our pasture and also eating vegetables we feed on a daily basis. They are butchered in November.

You can read more about raising pigs in your backyard here

When we raise chickens for meat, they arrive as chicks at the end of June. They are in the freezer by the end of August (at 8 weeks of age).

This philosophy of a seasonal operating means that meat chickens FIT RIGHT IN! It’s really quite perfect; raising chickens for meat is only an 8 week commitment.

So basically, you can pick whatever 8 week period works best for you. In warmer climates, you could get them in May and be done by mid-July.

Whatever your schedule, you can fit raising chickens around the best time frame for you.

Raising chicks for meat only takes 8 weeks.

Raising Day Old Chicks for Meat

We are all about self-sufficiency here. Since we try to raise about 85% of our own food here on our property, chickens are a no brainer.

We already have hens for eggs; these layers earn their keep by cleaning up our compost and manure piles and eating bugs.

Most years, we order in about 25 chicks from an Alberta hatchery. We buy straight run, which means we order them unsexed. It doesn’t matter to us if they will be roosters on hens.

There are a variety of chicken breeds of course – we usually order Cornish Cross meat chicks, but you can find Cornish Giants, Red Rangers, Freedom Rangers or another dual-purpose breed.

We like having the choice of smaller and larger birds. The males will grow to a heavier weight than the females.

For eight weeks the chickens live here, first in our shop (toasty and warm) and then in their own room at the barn (spacious and clean).

During the day they are enjoying sunshine, bugs and lots of fresh air while they hang out in their fenced outdoor run. Evenings we lock them back into their attached room, safe from predators.

Meat birds are easy to raise and provide us with a lot of manure enriched bedding from both their room and the run. We add this to the compost and manure piles.

Once it decomposes, it becomes a fantastic fertilizer for our food gardens. Having old hay mixed with manure ends up being the most wonderful garden soil.

Raising chicks for meat means you will fill your freezer with good meat

Raise meat chicks to broiler size in 8 weeks

Want to learn about raising your own chickens for meat? They can really grow out to 8 pounds in 8 weeks!

Our Book includes everything from choosing which breed of chicks to order to setting up a homemade brooder to growing them out – everything you need to know is here.

Covers:

chicken brooder
chicken pen
chicken feeder info
chicken coop
reducing feed costs
starter feed info
and more

Order your book at the link.

Thinking of raising meat chickens?

Here’s how we fill our freezer with chickens.

8 Pounds in 8 Weeks: Raising Day Old Chicks for the Dinner Table here!

Cooking with Dandelions (Dandelion Recipes)

By Annie

Have you ever cooked with dandelions before? This post covers a collection of Dandelion Recipes that are a great way to utilize the plant. There’s even an EBook with even more information and lots of recipes you can’t find on the site!

Gone are the days of treating dandelions like a pesky weed to get rid of. Now you can put these plants to use in your cooking! Dandelion roots, flowers, and leaves can all be used in recipes.

Instead of killing off dandelions sprayed with pesticides, check out these tasty recipes and harvest dandelions to eat. You’ll love cooking with the unique and distinct bitter flavor of dandelions, and they’re a great source of vitamins and minerals.

And if you can’t get enough of growing and harvesting your own food, check out this guide on how to Grow Enough Food for a Year!

cooking with dandelions, eat dandelions — These delicious dandelion recipes will open your eyes to how useful and delicious dandelion plants an be in the kitchen!

Why Cook with Dandelions?

If someone tells you that dandelions are merely a weed, don’t believe them. And whatever you do, don’t spray those dandelions with chemicals to get rid of them!

Dandelions are not weeds – they are edible and delicious. Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) is a plant that you’ll find all over the Northern Hemisphere. Dandelion flowers have a distinct yellow color, which makes them easy to spot. Cook with the flowers, leaves, and roots to infuse dishes with a slightly bitter and tangy flavor that’s not unlike spinach.

You can use dandelions to make a healthy side dish, to infuse things like dandelion jelly, dandelion honey, vinegar, dandelion syrup, and even ice cream! Once you get a taste of this versatile plant, you’ll wonder why you’ve been pulling and killing them all these years. Next time you spot a dandelion blossom, pick it and bring it home with you.

Want to start cooking with dandelions? Take a look at my ebook – Delicious Dandelions: A Recipe Collection.

Health Benefits of Dandelion

The health benefits of the lowly dandelion are quite astounding – take a look at just some of the vitamins, minerals and nutrients found in these plants. Read about just how good Dandelion Greens are for you to be eating! Dandelion blossoms contain lots of nutritious components like calcium, vitamin A, vitamin C, and more.

Historically, dandelions have been used for purposes like liver detoxification, healing skin problems, and fighting fever, among others. You can even make a dandelion salve to soothe aching joints and muscles.

Best of all, they are free! And they are probably in your yard every Spring.

I spent years (in the distant past) spraying my lawn to get rid of weeds and this included dandelions. What on earth was I thinking? That was when I was doing everything I could to have a beautiful lawn – you know, one that is green and lush. That was before I realized just how bad it is to be spraying chemicals to get rid of those weeds.

Now, I don’t even want a beautiful lush green lawn. I want a lawn that is healthy enough that it crowds out those weeds. But I do want some dandelion petals. And since we never use chemicals here on anything growing, I know I can safely pick those dandelions and start cooking with them!

Dandelion Recipes

Chopping dandelion root. — Everything from the flowers to the leaves to the dandelion stems can be used to create yummy dishes.

I’ve put together a bunch of Dandelion recipes, all in one new ebook. Here’s just some of the recipes included:

Dandelion Stir Fry
Dandelion Cookies (yummy!)
Fried Dandelion Roots
Dandelion Fritters

And yes, I have also included our Dandelion Jelly and even one of our other favourites, Dandelion Wine!

But there are more recipes that don’t appear on our website. So grab the book!

A mason jar of dandelion jelly. — This unique and gorgeous dandelion jelly is a great way to add some excitement to your breakfast, and it also makes a fantastic homemade gift the recipient won’t ever forget!

Wondering just how to use the root of the Dandelion? There’s a recipe for that!

So when Dandelions are blooming in your yard, grab a shovel and dig in. Then use every single part of the plant for cooking. If you enjoy foraging for wild foods, you will also enjoy this recipe book.

For some other ideas, you can make dandelion cupcakes or even dandelion root coffee for a caffeine free alternative. For a simple side dish, make sautéed dandelion greens by cooking the leaves in some extra virgin olive oil (or homemade dandelion oil!) and about a teaspoon of salt. You can even pickle unopened dandelion buds to make homemade capers.

The possibilities when it comes to dandelion cuisine go on and on, so be sure to check out the EBook to learn how to use these flowers in the kitchen.

What Flavors Pair Well with Dandelion?

Because of their distinct texture and somewhat bold flavor that balances bitter and tangy, there are a number of ways you can soften the sharpness of dandelions and use them to enhance other flavors. Overall, you’ll get the best results when your dandelion leaves are young and tender, much like with other greens.

Make a salad with cheese and sweet, fresh fruits to balance the dandelion flavor. You can use dandelion greens as a way to enhance just about any salad and add some more natural greens. Any citrusy dressing or other ingredients work wonders for counteracting the bitter flavor.
Cook your dandelion greens in oil, butter, or even leftover bacon grease.
Pair cooked dandelion greens with ingredients like Parmesan cheese and pine nuts.
White beans like cannellini or navy beans pair well with dandelion greens.
Cooked dandelion greens can be added to dishes like pasta or even eggs for breakfast as a way to incorporate additional nutrition and unique flavor. Dandelion greens are also a fantastic add-on to soups.
Employ ingredients like garlic, ginger, black pepper, and lemon juice to enhance the taste of dandelion.

Old time delicious Dandelion recipes. Fritters, cookies, jelly, wine and more dandelion recipes. #dandelion #recipes #preserving — For the full collection of dandelion recipes, be sure to take a look at this handy EBook that compiles some of the best dishes!

Grab your copy of Delicious Dandelions: A Recipe Collection today!

More Recipes You’ll Enjoy

Love cooking with home-grown ingredients? Try one of these other recipes that features fresh and organic produce.

How to Roast Garlic with Oil – Turn home grown garlic into a delicious and flavorful delicacy by roasting in oil. Perfect for garlic lovers and a great way to ensure your garlic goes to good use!
Homemade Chunky Salsa – You’ll love this flavorful salsa bursting with classic and fresh ingredients that you can grow in your own garden, buy from the farmer’s market, or find at the store.
No Cook Strawberry Jam – A secret ingredient makes it so easy to make this strawberry jam without any cooking. Take your freshly harvested strawberries and turn them into a delicious jam that you can use for toast, as a topping for desserts, and more.
Guide to Preserving Food – Not sure yet how you want to use all of your homegrown produce? Take a look at this guide on how to preserve food so you can safely store it until you’re ready to cook.
Growing a Salad Garden – This helpful post from Savvy Gardening will teach you everything you need to know about growing all of the veggies you’ll need for the perfect garden salad!

originally published 2017; latest update April, 2023

Saskatoon Raspberry Wine – Our eBook

By Annie

If you enjoy a nice glass of homemade wine, you will want to try this Berry Wine. We made it with Saskatoon berries (native to parts of Canada) and Raspberries, which we grew in the garden.

You can use a mix of any types of berries for this. We often mix 4 different types of berries and call it a Bumbleberry Wine. We enjoy this wine so much we wrote an eBook with the recipe and process for making this Wild Wine!

If you haven’t made homemade wine before, you will need to get a wine making supply kit. You’ll pay it off easily with this first batch of homemade wine.

We’ve made a blended Saskatoon Raspberry wine for the last three or four years and it is easily our favourite homemade wine to sip on.

This year, we were able to put up a 5 gallon batch, as the wild berry season here was so incredibly heavy this year.

So if you like to make your own wine, take a look at this eBook. It’s been written for beginning wine makers so the whole process is covered, from crushing the berries to bottling the finished product.

Like any type of homemade wine, this Berry Wine needs to sit in the bottle for several months before drinking. At least 8 months, then just give one bottle a try.

Since we are always so busy here in the summer, I just pick and then freeze the berries in large Ziplock bags.

Then, when winter rolls around and our daily works lessens so much, we just defrost the berries and get a batch of Berry wine on the go!

Beautiful colour and delicious – try making your own Berry Wine. We think you will enjoy it as much as we do.

Vegetable Garden Planner Printable: Grow Your Best Garden Ever

The Best Vegetable Garden Planner Printable is right here

Grab your Vegetable Garden Planner printable now!

When you purchase this garden planner printable you’ll get:

Grow Enough Food for a Year

How to Grow Enough Food for a Year

More articles about growing food for a year

8 Pounds in 8 Weeks: Raising Day Old Chicks for the Dinner Table

Why raising baby chicks for meat is perfect for any homestead

Raising Day Old Chicks for Meat

Raise meat chicks to broiler size in 8 weeks

Thinking of raising meat chickens?

Here’s how we fill our freezer with chickens.

8 Pounds in 8 Weeks: Raising Day Old Chicks for the Dinner Table here!

Cooking with Dandelions (Dandelion Recipes)

Why Cook with Dandelions?

Health Benefits of Dandelion

Dandelion Recipes

What Flavors Pair Well with Dandelion?

Grab your copy of Delicious Dandelions: A Recipe Collection today!

More Recipes You’ll Enjoy

Saskatoon Raspberry Wine – Our eBook

How to Preserve Garlic in Oil – and Other Ways to Store Garlic

Easy Pickled Brussels Sprouts Recipe (Water Bath Canning)

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