Growing Vegetables in the Driveway: A Square Foot Gardening Experiment

By Robin and Ed

This summer we are embarking on an experiment; we're growing our vegetables in our driveway. We have gardened for many years, but recently our backyard has become unfriendly to garden plants.  Our hand was forced - we needed to find an underused, sunny spot to grow our veggies.

Our latest experiment: growing vegetables in our driveway!

Does it sound a bit crazy?

For lots of reasons it isn't for us. For one, we only have one car (and we save over $7,200 a year this way).  And two, we have a crazy long driveway (last year we made it weed-free).  We've quite easily fit 5 cars in it - such a waste of space for us.

Our hypothesis is that

cars and carrots can coexist in harmony. 

But besides the alliterative value of those words, we have some other good reasons to give some of our driveway over to plants:

• Our backyard has a big black walnut tree that severely limited what could be grown near it.  Do you have one of these?  If you don't know about these big, beautiful trees, black walnut's secrete a substance (juglone) that kills many varieties of plants, trees and shrubs. It was easier to move the garden than the tree.

• Our driveway is south facing and has near constant sun all day.  No other available part of our property has sun like this.  In a late spring like this one, we will value every warm day we can get.

• We want to try container gardening - in particular Square Foot Gardening. We read about it years ago, but when we had an "in-ground" garden, it made less sense. We are all really excited to have a garden that starts weed-free and is easy to keep that way.

• It is easier to get the kids involved. They are older now, and can help more. Plus the container aspect clearly defines where the garden is and isn't, so they won't walk on the tender seedlings while they frolic to and fro all the live long day.

So this summer we will share our Driveway Garden experiment. We hope you'll follow along.  And hey - if anyone reading has already done this and will share some tips or "Watch-Out-Fors" along the way - we'd be truly thankful.


Our next post will be how we made the raised garden boxes!



What do you think? Waste of a good parking spot or useful source of produce?

Be Your Own Investment Manager Series ~ Part 1 ~ The Best Time to Start

By Ed

This is the first part in an 9 part (and growing!) series.  

This post was first published in January of 2012.

First off, I  don't have the get rich quick scheme.  No one does.

(Correction, my 3rd year Finance Prof. said that every once and awhile there really is a stock picker who can just read the market and makes a mint.  You and I don't hear about him or her because they work for an institution for a few years, then retire to a mountain villa by age 30.  They don't star in Wall Street 3 or write a book telling you how to do it.)

So, I'm not going to write about getting rich.  I am going to write about managing your money and general financial literacy.  Why do I imagine that I can tell you about these topics?

• My undergrad degree is in Finance with a minor in Economics.  I passed the Level 1 of the Chartered Financial Analyst (the CFA is a the professional money management designation) Exam before the teaching bug bit me.  Actually, it was because I was trying to teach people how to invest and not just telling them to invest with me that made me realize I was doing the wrong thing.

• I have been licensed to sell Mutual Funds, Insurance and passed the Canadian Securities Course and IFIC Operations course.  All pretty unrelated to each other (if you know the industry) but I just want you to know that I'm not making this stuff up.

• I now teach one of the only personal finance courses a high school student can take before he or she gets out into the real world, so I feel compelled to know my stuff.  Oh, and the course is optional.  Just like when we were in high school, you can't graduate without reading Shakespeare (important, don't get me wrong, I'm not a Bard-hater), but you can graduate without knowing what a mutual fund is or how to write a budget.

I'm glad that is done; I like writing about my qualifications about as much as you probably liked reading them, but I still thought it was important to toss them out there.   

Before you get financial advice from anyone, 

you need to learn and understand their qualifications.

One final note: I am not working for anybody who sells investments.  This may be the single-best thing I have going for me as an investment advisor.  When you go to a bank and ask for investment advice, it is like going to a Ford Dealership and asking which is the best car to drive.  It is a commission-driven industry and everyone has their own thing they can sell you.

Yes, there are ethical standards and tests and certifications, but at the end of the day, no one will send you across the street to the competition.

So class lets get started. One simple concept to begin with: Time.

Quick and Easy Crustless Quiche Recipe for Mother's Day (or any day!)

By Ed

Robin does not like eggs, but she does have a few egg dishes she loves.  When I asked the kids what they wanted to do for Mother`s Day Breakfast, they said her absolute favourite egg dish: Quiche.

This simple, crustless quiche is great for days (and dads) who want to make a fancy, delicious breakfast, but with little labour and clean-up (its early in the morning, damn it).  

A Free Cookbook: Deliciously Healthy Family Meals

by Robin

Sometimes the hardest part about feeding your family is finding the right meal idea. Do you agree?


At our house, we ask a lot of our recipes. We want them to be: 

• Healthy, 
• Affordable and 
• Simple to prepare. 
• As if that wasn't enough, we also want our family to enjoy eating them! 

To make our meals easier to plan and make, we created our Master List of Meals.  These are our "go to" meals that meet all the criteria above.  (You can check our Master List out here.)  And even though our family's Master List has over 20 meals on it, we are often looking for more ideas.


But, I don't want the expense or clutter or too many cookbooks, so when I found a free cookbook that fit with our style of cooking and eating - I was thrilled.



It's Deliciously Healthy Family Meals. It's put out by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). It's really good!  We've made the Hawaiian Huli Huli Chicken with rave reviews at our table.


This cookbook is also laid out really well, with great added features like:

• Healthier Classics
• Leftover Friendly symbols
• Chef in Training Tips
• Healthy Eating Two Ways - to modify the meal for different palates.

What's your "go-to" source for family friendly recipes?