Tierra Divina, building a permacultural oasis

Crazy months ahead of us. We are preparing the grounds of our kitchen, compost toilet, tool shed and finishing our sewing room.

This beauty was infront of the house when we moved in, we transplanted it couple of meters away so we can walk to the entrance of the cave house without stepping on a tree. Now she is in bloom, making seeds and attracting all sorts of buzzing friends. She is going to be the tree between our kitchen and our main cave house.

The beauty of spring can be appreciated in the desert too. It is a short one, as summer is approaching very quick.

When everithing is turning brown, the sand begins to fly around in the strong winds and the heat is making sure there is little outside work during the day..
The flowers are amazing. There is plenty of marigolds, calendulas, irises, poppies, lavanders,... And lots of bees.
Welcome summer, the doors are wide open to accept you.

Here are some interesting facts about the dandelion flower:

The dandelion is the only flower that represents the 3 celestial bodies of the sun, moon and stars. ☀️ 🌙 ⭐️. The yellow flower resembles the sun, the puff ball resembles the moon and the dispersing seeds resemble the stars.

The dandelion flower opens to greet the morning and closes in the evening to go to sleep. 😴

Every part of the dandelion is useful: root, leaves, flower. It can be used for food, medicine and dye for coloring.

Up until the 1800s people would pull grass out of their lawns to make room for dandelions and other useful “weeds” like chickweed, malva, and chamomile.

The name dandelion is taken from the French word “dent de lion” meaning lion’s tooth, referring to the coarsely-toothed leaves. 🦁

Dandelions have one of the longest flowering seasons of any plant.

Dandelion seeds are often transported away by a gust of wind and they travel like tiny parachutes. Seeds are often carried as many as 5 miles from their origin!

Animals such as birds, insects and butterflies consume nectar or seed of dandelion.🐦 🐛 🐜 🦋 🐝.

Dandelion flowers do not need to be pollinated to form seed.

Dandelion can be used in the production of wine and root beer. Root of dandelion can be used as a substitute for coffee. 🍷 🍺

Dandelions have sunk their roots deep into history. They were well known to ancient Egyptians, Greeks and Romans, and have been used in Chinese traditional medicine for over a thousand years.

Dandelion is used in folk medicine to treat infections and liver disorders. Tea made of dandelion act as diuretic.

If you mow dandelions, they’ll grow shorter stalks to spite you.

Dandelions are, quite possibly, the most successful plants that exist, masters of survival worldwide. 💪

A not so fun fact: Every year countries spend millions on lawn pesticides to have uniform lawns of non-native grasses, and we use 30% of the country’s water supply to keep them green.

We had our pleasure to eat the biggest broccoli we have ever seen in our garden or elsewhere.

Was enough for 2 meals, one group picoteo and a third to share. Lots!!!

If all the brocollis that we planted or seeded would be like this one it would be one hell of a brocolli harvest!

From the first batch of saplings (30 plants) none got through the caterpillar infestation in november. The second batch left us with 6 beautiful plants, one of them this one. There was around 30 more plants that were scattered around the proprety in our garden beds and the one that made it look like they enjoy their baby state and don't want to grow up.

Gardening is painted very fairy taily sometimes, it is not that- at all. There is lots of losses and disappointments, specially in the begging. Even more so if you are transforming a desert plot that was mistreated for years and years and you need to reestablished the local flora and fauna to start to work in symbiosis and come to the balance that once was there.

Let the new cicle be full of amazing nutrients for our soil, microorganisms in it, the bugs and animals and for us aswell.

I hope and wish for an permacultural abundance and full rainbow of colors.

Thank you pachamama for all the beauty you give us every day and for all the lessions and tips you leave us on our path.

🌿Tagasaste🌿

Cytisus proliferus, tagasaste or tree lucerne, is a small spreading evergreen tree that grows 3–4 m (10–13 ft) high. It is a well known fertilizer tree. It is a member of the Fabaceae (pea) family and is indigenous to the dry volcanic slopes of the Canary Islands.

A very important element in the ecosystem.
I am one of those people that are grossed out by them, what about you?

Hello visitor🍀🌼

atropos

You are welcome here, we don't believe you bring evil spirits, but (more then wished for) biodiversity.

Polla rossa.
Radicchio that tastes like raddichio in the middle of summer on tenerife. Never saw it in the farmers markets and I surely was missing it.
Love it !

Cave workout.

Carrots surprised us with going into flower and look forward to see the seed ❤️

Today's harvest was one of the most spectacular ones.

When I planted the pimientos padron I was sure I was planting normal peppers. They just looked bigger as a plant so I tought that they are pepper. I bought 40 plantings of one and 40 of the other in the local ecological nursery. Most of my saplings are from my own seeds but pepper just seem to not like to start to grow with me since we are here. So I decided in begging of june to plant some from the nursery. Planted one tipe on one level of our finca and the other on the bottom one.

The bottom level, which is now much more developed and green, at that point hosted just the peppers and some herbs. In a matter of a week everithing was eaten by a rabbit. Our dog got him in the next days so no more cute bunny to eat our food. Anyways, I was sure that we lost the pimientos padron and that the one growing on the top level were the normal pepper. Well, today I was surprised to find a whole bunch of pimientos padron in our garden, fully grown, in a matter of 5 min they were on the grill with some salt and in our belly.

Haven't had better pimientos padron in my life and belive me.... I love this guys!

Spiky little thing we have in the front of our cave house.
Eve's needle or Austrocylindropuntia subulata - desert cactai from Andes, doesn't require water, but full sun. Perfect for our site.

Somebody came to visit us this evening.

Today something amazing happend.
I don't think I was ever so proud of myself 😂

Hot composting in a desert is really not as easy you might think.

You cannot see the beauty in everything you see on your path.
Sometimes certain things look and feel super unkind, ugly and uncomfortable at first glance.

You can choose to find some beauty and reason in those ones by yourself or by waiting for the nature to show you the reason and the way around them.

There is a purpose, there is a path, there is a way..

And then are... The things that are just gorgeous, amazing and absolutely beautiful. Just because they are. They definitely ARE.

Beetroot. 4 saplings coming out of one seed. Craaazy.
Everything that I planted from seed in the last 2 weeks seems so be doing great.
Some seeds sprouted in 3-4 days. Super crazy.

The garden is starting to give us back our love that we gave couple of months ago. Even though we left it with bare minimum for a month, he still surprised us with bounty and amazing food.

Now with some more work and attention we can just prepare ourselves for some of the most amazing meals of our lives.

Today we went to the store to buy some last bits for our bath that is coming together nice. It will be such a treat to have a place to shower... As we had a super tiny space just besides a toilet to rince ourselfs with a scoop, water heated on a stove...
A bathtub and a gas heater will make lots of difference.

We came from the store and we were invited to this enchanted scene of fog that is dancing with rain. Not a normal and rutine scene here in Tenerife.
I expect it is going to be one of the last ones before the summer heat.
The veggies are super happy.

The happiness in this childs face when she takes out and eats carrots is truly a blessing.

Marigolds are flowering all around the proprety, letting us know there is food for beautiful mariposas that come by and give us the pleasure of their light and playful flight.

Our little lady turned 4 in the past week. Seeing her developing through our hippie adventures and becoming a self sustainable little being, like our dreams, feels very calming.
Eating our own food is ridiculously fulfilling and seeing her plucking one thing after another, knowing what to take, and eating with a big appetite makes me smile. She is the happiest with flowers. Today she started the day with brocoli flowers, rucola flowers and then she ate a 2 tiny small courgettes and 2 carrots.

It's been a hell of a ride last month.
We did a unexpected trip to Slovenia,
closed a very important chapter in my life, said goodbye to people that needed to be removed from our search for peace and stability.
Helped our old car to find the best owners that the universe can send us and got a new van instead, for a future home. For us, for wwofers and whoever will walk with us on this amazing journey.

Coming back home without Mike, that is bringing the van on a ferry trip, is a bit sour. I am soaking in all the beauty and bounty, feeling very happy but at the same time I feel like I am stopping myself and trying to leave it there when he comes back. It is definitely not the same seeing it by myself and not being able to share it. It is only couple of days, but the moment is here and now and the feeling is very real. Missing.

Amazing. Amazing the neighbors that watered our work and made it grow. Amazing all little things I am discovering around the plot. So many ladybugs, grasshoppers, small things that fly around when I caress the clover. Never tought I will be so happy about clover and wheat that sprouted from straw that I used for covering the top soil.
I made our first potatoes yesterday, we ate them with a big bowl of salad and Laura munched on a whole flower of broccoli. Today will be a kale day if everything goes by plans. Mmmmmmm.

Amazing. Truly. Inspired. Appreciation. Gratitude. Sunshine. Home. Peaceful. Tranquility.

This is how she picks the strawberries at 7am and eats them at 8am.

Goofball.

There is something about this 'salatina' as we call it on the coast of Slovenia that I cannot substitute in any other salad.
So much work, specially when you don't have a lot and you want it to grow and grow but so much worth it. Leaf by leaf, but the enjoyment is immense.
Cannot compare it to any head lettuce.

There is something about sunflowers... I cannot help myself...

🌻

Planted raddishes only because they have a very short cicle but it turned out one member of the family likes them 😍

So happy that she is experiencing the growth of vegetables and sees where the real food comes from.

We are here long enough that we harvested kale from the raised bed so many times that it is already starting to be an adult plant. Having stronger, harder leaves, starting to go in height.
We had too many plants in one spot, caterpillars all over them, so they got a new home. From 20x20cm spot got plants for a neighbor, community nearby and still around 20 plants waiting to be replanted on our finca.
(It's been around 3 months since we are here ❤️)

Crazy how many plants survived and actually did so well in such a little place.
We have sown some individual seeds in a seeder last month and those went into soil a week or so ago and I am eager to see the difference between the two ways of planting.

The beauty has awaken.

🌺