I do still buy my onion sets and seed potatoes, but other than canning lids and freezer bags there really is no expense. Ok, maybe the electricity to run an extra freezer. Each year through layer/lasagna gardening our gardens get bigger. It’s less hubby has to mow, too!
We’ve been doing the weedless/lasagna method for about 5 years now. The soil in one garden, that had been a gravel parking lot (seriously), is now rich dark and fluffy. Still gravely but the tomatoes and peppers don’t seem to mind one bit. I was picking 5 gallon buckets of maters from that plot 2 summers ago. And it’s never been tilled once. I’ve got my winter squash there this year, and they seem perfectly happy with it.
That’s winter squash I use to make breakfast bread that my kids eat. Pumpkin bread is a big deal at my house in the winter. With brown sugar, cinnamon then toasted and buttered. I save big bucks grown my own ‘pumpkins’.
I grow most of my veggies, and with any luck, I’ll have a place to hunt this deer season. I live where some of my neighbors have enough land to keep cattle and hogs-some slaughter in the Fall, and sometimes in Spring, so you can buy or barter meat.
https://www.youtube.com/user/growingyourgreens/videos?view=0
Have you seen this guy’s garden? He’s sort of a friendly nutjob. His raised beds are something else though. Wish I could get as motivated as him.