My Vegetable Garden

and how I ended up with an orchard, berries and more...

Hi, my name is Chris and this is my story of how I ended up with a large vegetable garden, orchard, berries, chickens and two websites!

I have early memories growing up as a child in Kent in southern England in my mum and grandmother's vegetable gardens. I can remember mum growing various plants in a small greenhouse, heated by a small kerosene (paraffin) heater in the colder months.

Mum grew a larger veggie patch when we migrated to Australia nearly 30 years ago and I have had one ever since I left home.

I started with a "strip" garden, grown along the boundary in our rented property, squeezed in a bed only 40cm deep, but very long, down the side of the driveway.

When we moved to our current home on the peninsula, we were lucky to have acreage. When you have more space, well, obviously you can't help but fill it up!

That's how I ended up with all the beds you see above, plus the citrus and stone fruit orchards and berries.

The Bantam chickens have always featured somewhere and have grown in numbers as we bred them. Over time we have tried commercially available seedlings and seeds and heirloom varieties as well as imported seeds and this site covers all so you can choose which best suits you.

This site is my journey. Follow us over the year and see everything you need to know to grow your own fresh vegetables and fruit at home. There is NOTHING as rewarding as growing and picking your own food (well in my opinion anyway)

So what about this site?

Well after having another chat in the office one day (yes, I have a full time job), it occured to me that a lot of people are interested in good, fresh healthy food, but just don't know where to start. This is how I came up with the idea of a sharing my experiences in an easy to follow, interactive site that people, no matter how much space they have, can follow and successfully grow their own food.
At Christmas in 2007 I was using the internet to research antique pocket watches as an intended gift. I found an amazing site all about antique pocket watches and down the bottom, was a link to "SBI! and my site".

And this is where it all began. Dubious, I started reading how SBI! could help me build a website. Now before you stop and think "I can't do that, BELIEVE me you can. You don't need ANY skills. All you need is to be passionate about something, after all, everyone knows about something (remember this, because you'll hear it again and again and it's true) and you can turn that passion into an amazing website!

What amazed me when I took a look at the video tutorial, was that the emphasis over and over again, was that this was NOT about being a get rich quick scheme nor a quick and easy way out. I've always believed you don't get something for nothing and here, again, was this message, reinforced again.
It's about research, planning and quality information... What's the point in paying someone to build you a flashy looking website that NO-ONE ever finds on the internet? I have friends that have done this for their businesses and my site already gets more visitors after one year on the internet!

The more I looked, the more I found there is to SBI! and seeing the no risk trial, I figured it was worth a shot.

This is the video tour I watched SBI Video Tour But it's not just for beginners, SBI! caters for ALL levels of experience when it comes to the internet and I can't recommend them highly enough. It's now 2 years since I started this journey and every day I work on SBI!, I find more information and help and am now embarking on adding my own video to my site! Who would have thought! Twelve months ago, I didn't even know what a Blog was ( I had to look it up on Google!)

SBI! stands for Site Build It. They'll help you find the right topic and approach for your site, help you build it, help you get traffic to it and teach you how to make money from it. My goal was always to make a website on Model T's, then I started this site armed with the knowledge of my previous learning curve, the fact that it can pay for itself is a bonus. Have a look at these successful people who all used SBI!

There are hundreds of examples in the categories and they are all in the Top 1% of websites on the internet.

Time Poor?

Yes it does take work and it does take time. And before you say you don't have time, you do! Really! I used to say that. I commute on one of the worst freeways for congestion in my home state here in Victoria. I get up at 4-45am everyday to drive 40 miles (65 km's) that at BEST takes me an hour, work a full time job, commute back home (which is always slower), work on my vegetable garden and restore Vintage Caravans and Vintage and Classic cars on Sundays (another hobby) As you've read, I live on acreage that needs mowing and maintaining, so if I can find time, so can you! Do what I did, sacrifice a night of TV and dedicate it to something worthwhile.

Are you a stay at home parent?
Do you want to do something, maybe a work from home business? Look at what stay at home parents have done.
Or are you a retiree or planning to retire? Then read this...

So, now you know..

ANYBODY can do this and be successful, actually MORE successful than many of the professionally built sites around. I figured "What have I got to lose other than a few hours of my time?" It's risk free with a total money back guarantee. I had a go at it, and look! You're here on my site.. Why not try it yourself? If you have a go, and want help, I'm happy to pay it forward and pass on what I've learnt, you only have to ask.

I hope you enjoy my site and will join the members group and follow our journey over the coming year..

Regards,

Chris