How to Attend Hands-On Classes in Gardens, Kitchens, Forests, and Even a Late 1800’s Cabin

It’s here. The garden classes are in gardens, the cooking classes are in kitchens, the nature study is in forests, the raspberries taste like raspberries, and the snozzberries taste like snozzberries! I worked for weeks on the lesson plans for these hands-on classes, workshops, and tours and am so excited to finally roll them out. Click here for my entire…

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Update: Public Permaculture Demo Garden Progress

When I founded the SC Upstate Permaculture Society I had no idea we’d be this popular, but we’re up to 644 members with multiple people joining each week. If you live in upstate South Carolina (or nearby) we welcome you to join us. Last October we broke ground on a huge new garden that is already stacking functions by being…

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How to Have Perennial Food Plants & No Disease for Your 2015 Garden

Okay, maybe not NO disease, but insignificant diseases and pests sounds good, right? Plus, perennial fruits and veggies mean less work for more harvest. Eliza loves teaching the two class topics available this week at the Swamp Rabbit Cafe & Grocery. Click here to sign up for class or click here to see the full 2014-2015 class schedule. THIS WEEK:…

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How to Sign Up for February’s Classes

This month’s giveaway contest is over, congratulations to the winner, Christina Weit! Christina won four February classes. Today is gorgeous, has spring fever hit you? Eliza’s urban homesteading classes at the Swamp Rabbit Cafe and Grocery start next week! Come learn about edible landscaping, backyard chickens, beekeeping basics, composting, and more… now is the time to get prepared for your…

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How to Become an Expert Gardener

We’ve got an amazing variety of class topics available right now — with limited seating so reserve your space ASAP! Are you a beginner gardener? Our January block of classes starts with the absolute basics and ends with you knowing how to design your dream garden (and what plants to stock it with). Not only that, but they’re available on…

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How to Take Eliza’s Classes at the Swamp Rabbit Cafe & Grocery

Scenario: Instead of figuring out what’s for dinner, head over to the Swamp Rabbit Cafe & Grocery to choose from their delicious menu and enjoy an evening of information and inspiring photo eye-candy. Cappuccino? Soup? An entire bar of artisan chocolate? Treat yourself or buy a gift for a friend! The choice of topics is huge and there’s something to…

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How to Take Our Classes

We have new classes available! Click here to see the list of topics. We have classes for beginners through experts on subjects like permaculture, soil, insects, beneficial wildlife habitats, plant propagation, fruits, vegetables, seeds, heirlooms, backyard chickens, beekeeping, winter growing, and preparing a garden for next season. We’re teaching small classes (limited to 12 students per class and available first…

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How to Tour Local Permaculture Sites – Part 1

Touring, photographing, and sharing permaculture gardens in my area seems like I task I will never get tired of. With that in mind, welcome to my new blog series. I will be showcasing “official” tours as well as informal visits to existing and aspiring permaculture sites in the region. Learning from the ingenious little ways people connect to their ecosystem…

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How to Feel Inspired by Ornamental Gardens

For me, guilty pleasure isn’t buying a bag of Doritos or reading People magazine (especially since I have no idea who most celebrities are these days). Instead, I feel sheepish when I grow plants without being able to explain what they’re good for. “Useless” plants is how I got in to gardening in the first place. Around the age of…

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How to Cook Over a Hearth

Since my daughter is really into wild skills her grandma enrolled her in some classes as a Christmas present — including a full day of hearth cooking at the Hagood Mill in Pickens, SC. This class is taught by Carol Bozarth through the Pickens County Museum of Art and History. We booked 2 slots for the April 13th class (yes,…

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How to “Permiculturefy” an Urban Farm

I often do or learn a heap of things at once and think I’m going to break it down into a series of bite-sized blog posts. It almost never happens — I post the first segment and then get too distracted to finish the rest. The orphaned contents of Appalachian Feet’s “drafts” folder is bursting at the seams. I don’t…

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How to Identify Pests and Control them Naturally with Beneficial Bugs, Trap Crops, and More

Consider this article “Sustainable Pest Control 101.” Once you’ve read this, you’ll be an expert at dealing with insects on the farm or in the garden. One of the classes I taught at Saturday’s SC Organic Growers Conference was Insect Garden Ecology. This is a topic that overwhelms growers everywhere… people often tell me they just aren’t good at remembering…

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How to Attend Our Classes (and Other Great Classes) at SC’s Organic Growing Conference

We love the Organic Growers School in North Carolina and are delighted that we now have a similar version for South Carolina! This is the 2nd year for the annual SC Organic Growing Conference which occurs on March 2nd, 2013. It’s run by the SC Organization for Organic Living (SCOOL) which you can find on their website or on Facebook….

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How to Attend Classes at Appalachian Feet

The Greenville Urban Farm Tour is over for this year and we hope our visitors went home inspired to make their own green paradise. During the UFT, we set up an “ask the site owner” table in our garden and one of the most frequent questions was, “do you consult and when are you going to offer classes?” How about…

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How to Go on the 2012 Greenville Urban Farm Tour

It’s time for the Greenville Urban Farm Tour again! When? This coming Saturday, May 12th, from 9am – 5pm. Tickets are $8 per adult (children under 12 free) and there is a group rate available on the UFT website. This year there are 31 sites to visit, 16 free workshops at the UFT’s headquarters (Crescent Studios), and bicycle tours offered…

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How to Watch My Urban Farm Pecha Kucha Talk

What’s Pecha Kucha, anyway? You could describe it as TED Talks for people with short attention spans or a good way to get presenters to keep it short. Every Pecha Kucha is 20 slides long, 20 seconds each slide. Pecha Kucha Greenville adds to the 20×20 theme by also scheduling their events at 20:20 (8:20pm). They have around 6 presenters…

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How to Find Out When We Sell Things or Give Talks (and a Garden Update)

We started an Appalachian Feet Market email list last year for people who want to know when our urban farm products are for sale or when we are giving talks the public can attend. Then we planned a wedding… and never used it. If you live in the Greenville, SC area and would like to be on the list, click…

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How to Grow Tasty Citrus Outside in Zone 7+ (Tangerines, Grapefruit, Oranges, & More)

On Friday, February 25th we left our Appalachian foothills home at 9:30am and drove to a nursery that grows tangerines, satsuma mandarins, naval oranges, kumquats, grapefruits, and other citrus in an outdoor orchard.  No, not Florida! Even after touring the nursery for over an hour, stopping for lunch, driving slowly through heavy thunderstorms, and navigating rush-hour traffic, we still made…

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How to Get Fuzzy Bees Drunk

We have Passiflora incarnata (maypop passionvine) growing outside our back door. I’ve written in the past about how to grow this native plant for its delicious fruit, but today I wanted to share a video of our “bee bar.” I’d say they show up at first light, but really, they never leave. These sluggish insects gorge on nectar, becoming increasingly…

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How to Feel Inspired by an Urban Farm

Our city’s Urban Farm Tour is over for this year and by all accounts was a great success — GOFO sold out of tickets early in the day and had to scramble to print even more of them! I hope everyone who toured came away feeling inspired, I was so impressed by all the enthusiastic visitors we met at our…

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