The Story Behind "Age of Asparagus"

When my daughter was about eight months old, we gave her some well-done asparagus spears to chomp. She loved (and still loves) her fruits and veggies--good girl! She was rather enthusiastic about the asparagus and nommed away until only the crunchy bits were left. As she ate with glee, I sang to her: "This is the dawning of the Age of Asparagus, the Age of Asparagus!" And so, my new blog shall be christened "Age of Asparagus" in honor of my little one, and with obvious reference to the subject of the blog: self-sufficiency, sustainable living, do-it-yourself homesteading, growing things and making your land (whatever there is of it) work for you.
I have been rifling through books, magazines, and websites for information about homesteading and self-sufficiency. The latter is the idea of doing as much for yourself as you can: growing and storing your own foods; making your own household cleaners; conserving energy and finding new sources where you can; and generally becoming less reliant on others for your daily needs. I don't have any intention of going "off-grid" or recommending it. That is too much for me! My goal is to do as much for myself as I can, within reason. For example, some people prefer to gather and store their own electricity. I don't have the room here, nor do I have an interest, given the expense. But, the topic may come up! The idea of "off-grid" living has its appeal and there is much to be learned from those who are completely 100% Doing It Themselves, and God bless them! But, it's not for me. So, in this blog, I will review books and such, discuss relevant topics to the do-it-yourself lifestyle, and wax poetic about my own attempts at growing and storing food and making things for myself.
This goal of being self-sufficient has many motives: saving money is big on the list. There are so many ways to save money by doing things the Old-Fashioned way, or doing/growing/making it yourself. Sure, you aren't going to save We're Going to Europe kinds of dough, but, hey, "a penny saved" and all that. Being environmentally friendly is also on the list. Every little bit of effort counts toward preserving the environment.
Homesteading, which I mentioned earlier, is a way of life that has fallen out of practice. It used to be that each family had a farm and they raised their own chickens, a dairy cow, fruits, veggies, herbs... They would preserve and store as much as possible to get them through winter. Now, we have grocery stores that carry apples all year 'round and even bring in exotic fruits (the aptly-named Ugli fruit!). We've gotten used to having our ease, which is fine, but I want something else. A return to the connection we used to have with our food. We wouldn't be paranoid about pesticides if we were growing our own veggies and weren't using any chemicals to do so. Would we even know what High Fructose Corn Syrup was if we were all making our own jelly, tomato sauce and ice cream?
I could go on, but this was meant to be an introduction of sorts. I'll save the soap-boxing for another post, eh?
I intend to share here information that I found inspiring and/or helpful about growing and preserving food, making household cleaners (laundry soap, All-Purpose cleaner, window cleaner, toilet scrubs, air fresheners), and cutting back on expenses wherever I can.
P.S. I wont be doing any soap-boxing, just providing information. Promise.     : )