For a while, I imagined my next chapter on one acre, as you have already seen. I worked through what I could grow there, how I would use the harvest, and how the garden could support the recipes I already make. It was an exciting idea. But the more seriously I considered buying a one-acre plot, the more clearly, I understood something about myself: I don’t want to move right now. I just have not got to that point yet.
I have lived here for 19 years. At this point in my life, I can’t quite bring myself to leave the place I know and begin again somewhere else. Besides, here is where me and my late husband began. I have grown to love it as much as he did. That realization took some time to accept. I had put real thought into the larger homestead, and changing course can feel like setting a dream aside. But staying isn’t the same as giving up on the dream. It means asking what kind of homestead I can build right here, where I already am. And is it what I can actually handle at my age?
My home is in Northern California; Siskiyou County and my gardening zone is 8B. The front yard is terraced, and it is a small, complicated place to grow food. The house blocks the southern sun. In summer the best parts of the yard get about four hours of direct sunlight, mostly from the west; in winter, there is very little direct sun at all. Cedars and mountains are part of the setting. No amount of wishful thinking will turn this into an open, sunny acre.
Still, there is room to begin.
Starting in spring 2027, I plan to put two long vegetable beds on the upper terrace. They will each be 4 by 32 feet, and I intend to use square-foot planting to make the most of the space I have. Greens will be a priority, along with cabbage-family vegetables, roots, herbs and some fresh peas. I like John Seymour’s practical approach: I’ll give the peas twiggy sticks to climb and try one Italian paste tomato tied to a sturdy stick, trained to four fruit trusses. I know that tomato may be a modest producer in this light. I still want to try it.
I also want the garden to carry food into the colder months. My hope is to grow Brussels sprouts for winter picking and plant spring cabbage in the fall, letting it overwinter and finish when the light returns. A small greenhouse—no more than 4 by 8 feet—could help with seedlings and winter greens, with supplemental lighting where it makes sense. I want to find out what this particular yard can actually produce, season by season, rather than assume a calendar or a growing-zone number will tell me.
The fruit is another part of the picture. I hope to train two apple and two pear cordons along the lower fence, with blueberries and black currants in front of them. I would like a grapevine on the west fence, a little strawberry bed beside the lawn, and perhaps a genetic dwarf peach in the rounded corner if the space and the tree truly fit. This is for my late husband – peaches were his favorite fruit. These are plans to test, not trees I have already planted or harvests I can count on. Fruit needs sunlight, and I know I will have to be patient and realistic.
There will be two compost bins near the garden, too. They will help produce the fertility the garden needs.
My food plans are changing with the yard. I will keep the familiar rotation of casseroles and the other recipes I worked out for the one-acre idea. I plan to buy the grains, dry beans, edible seeds and nuts—including my popcorn—and grow as much as I can of the greens, vegetables, berries and fruit. This small, partly shaded property may never provide every serving I would like. But there is always the grocery store that I can use if it doesn’t produce enough, but I really hope it comes close.
Maybe there will be another property someday. I don’t need to decide that now. For the foreseeable future, I’m staying. After 19 years, this is home, and I want to put my energy into developing the place I already have. My homestead doesn’t have to begin with a move. It can begin here.
