Birthday Week - Links

When I started writing Bean-Sprouts one year ago this week, I was something of a blog virgin. I had spent a bit of time surfing the blogosphere, but because my surfing wasn't really targeted I discovered that 99% of blogs are crap. The trick is to find the 1% that are interesting and worth reading. I was lucky to find quite early on some great self-sufficiency and gardening blogs. By reciprocal links, by leaving comments on good blogs and having good bloggers comment here, I now feel part of a community of green, sustainable living bloggers, which is an unlooked-for bonus.

Here are a few of my favourite blogs and bloggers:

1. Pumpkin Soup - great content and a great look on this allotment blog


2. Welsh Girl's Allotment - another allotment blogger, it's been fun watching her start from a severely bramble-infested plot and building it up into a little patch of heaven


3. The Worsted Witch - witty craft blog with attitude


4. …but it’s dirty! - Burro is totally bonkers. His gardening blog is always a good read


5. Musings from a Stonehead - Stonehead is several years ahead of where we are now, working his own smallholding in Aberdeenshire and writing a warts-and-all account of it


6. Hedgewizard's Diary - Hedgie has been a great friend of Bean-Sprouts from the beginning, and I enjoy reading his rants and rambles as much as his accounts of planting, sowing and harvesting


7. Welcome to Voluntary Simplicity - Dibnah is in a similar situation to us, trying to live a simple and thoughtful life without moving to a five-acre smallholding in the back of beyond


8. Ducking for Apples - Ally proves you can have chickens, bees, grow vegetables, get pregnant, and still keep your sense of humour


9. Irish Sally Garden - much further along the sustainable living continuum than we are, and a continuous source of inspiration


10. The Allotment Junkies - two friends write about how their allotment is coming along, and their harrowing experiences with the mental health care system, both with equal optimism and insight

There are loads of other blogs in the right-hand sidebar. Why not have a browse and look at some you haven't seen before? When you find one you really like, I recommend you either:

• Save it in your browser's "favourites"


• Subscribe to the feed so you receive the latest posts by email


• Or save it in a blog aggregator so you can read all the latest posts from your favourite blogs just by visiting one web page

That way you can find it again easily and keep up-to-date with the latest posts effortlessly.