Urban Homestead

While Dickie and I lived in Chicago, we often sat in our Lincoln Park apartment staring out at the crowded streets below discussing the charmed life of country livin’. He would tell me stories of running miles through the humid cornfields as he trained each summer for the upcoming track season or times he would sit on his front porch hearing nothing but the singing locusts and I would tell him about riding horses on mountain trails and learning how to milk a cow on my childhood ranch. Of course we missed open spaces and long hikes in the woods, but after almost two years of dirty concrete and crowded spaces, we began missing more than just the country, we began missing our roots too, so to speak.

We knew we wouldn’t be buying a farm in Indiana or working on a ranch in Western Montana, but we both yearned for soil in our hands and sun on our backs.  When our plans of returning to New Mexico cemented, we began envisioning and daydreaming of an urban homestead.  A home that was conveniently located near all the places we like to be; bars, restaurants, parks, museums, shops, and public transportation. But we also wanted an abode that could nurture us; that could sustain us as a family.

This idyllic home we had in our minds may be the reason it took us nearly five months to find a place worth buying that suited our needs and stayed within our fixed budget. Although we considered several sub-par places, thankfully we never relented, because this little home of ours has served us perfectly. We live less than a mile from downtown where we can walk to my work, breweries/bars, restaurants, theatres, museums, the library, the train station, shops, etc. We have about 700 square feet to work with inside and maybe triple that outside, and although we were nervous the small space wouldn’t be enough, it has more than served our needs. Of course we are learning little by little and have discovered we have much to improve upon next year, we are however, quite pleased with the crop our efforts have begun to produce.

Edible Front Yard

Since we use our back yard for a place to lock up my Subaru and Dickie’s Yamaha our wide-open space for a garden was limited, so we had to get creative. We have enough room for three apple trees, two rows of corn, and three beds for arugula, tomatoes, peppers, onions, garlic and herbs in the back. So, therefore our front yard was the remaining space we could use for your typical vegetable garden. Although the space is small and humble, it will produce green beans, lima beans, peas, lettuce, beats, carrots, radishes, potatoes, eggplant, cucumber, squash, zucchini, pumpkin and we even have grapes, strawberries, rhubarb, and watermelon. And in pots we’re growing more herbs as well as pomegranate, lemon, and kumquat trees.

Lemon Tree

We’re using nearly the entire yard for edible and useful plants, so we have no room for a lawn, but that seems to serve the drought weary land of Albuquerque well, I think. We did, of course, leave room for native plants like prickly pear cactus, desert honeysuckle, succulents, agave and lavender. Now short on space, we’re brainstorming where we could possibly build a compost pile. Although we’re struggling to come up with a good spot for the compost heap, we did ingeniously create a space for our little hennies. A darling little coop nestles in below our bedroom window between the house and the fence. Poncho and Lefty are welcomed as the newest members of our family. The hens are about four months old and they grow larger every day (probably all that arugula and compost we’ve been feeding them) and there’s nothing I like more than hearing the purring cluck of those girls first thing in the morning. These ladies should begin producing eggs in late July or August and we’re preparing by collecting egg crates and feeding them greens packed with important nutrients, like calcium that they’ll need this time next month to grow big strong eggs.

Pancho & Lefty

The homestead is coming along, the gardens are even beginning to produce fruit, but every day we think of things we would like to do next. We plan to build a pergola over the back patio to provide a space to grow hops for shade as well as beer brewing in the fall. We will also be installing rain barrels to capture and utilize the precious water we’ll receive during the monsoon season.

Back Yard Garden & Coop

I love and treasure my homestead and its small space has provided me a huge learning tool and it more than suits the needs of Dickie and I for now. But, someday we’ll need to expand. Not only will our family grow, our dreams will grow as well. Once we have conquered the ins and outs of sustaining an urban homestead we see community gardens, permaculture, community supported agriculture programs and sustainable organic farms in our future. I want to grow beautiful and nutritious food for my family as well as my neighbors. I want to teach my children how to plant seeds and how to tend chickens, but I also want to teach my neighbors’ children these same things. Goats, more poultry, and space to produce affordable organic food and an opportunity to teach people how to grow food that is good for them is all sitting in my future, just waiting to be cultivated.