2009 Harvest

Today I decided to see what the garden had been working so hard on all season.

We only got one pumpkin, the darn squirrels (or a skunk?) got to the other 2 and ate them right off the vine a couple months ago. The carrots were a surprise- I'd forgotton how many seeds we had planted. Somehow I thought it was just a couple squares' worth.

The potatoes were so much fun to dig up! They didn't get very big, but for the first time ever growing spuds I am delighted. Can hardly wait to see how they taste. yum.

I went ahead and picked all the tomatoes since the weather folks have been threatening snow sometime soon. (gasp! snow??) Only a few greenies left, and the rest will ripen pretty quickly I'll bet.

And the beets! yeah for beets. I am planning to can these tonight (or maybe in a couple days if I run short on time...) into pickled beets. This will be a new one for me, I've never tried to can beets before. wish me luck!

July's garden update

Sorry I haven't been posting to the blog much lately, I've been outside tending to my garden nearly every day! It's so nice to have all the hard work of Springtime done, now I can enjoy being in the garden a lot without having to work so hard. Watering is still a necessary chore, and spot weeding here and there. But overall I'm so happy with how everything is just growing and growing.

I have a bunch of sunflowers along the back fence in the back yard- they are just about to bloom. I'll take a photo of them in the next week or two. The plants are already as tall (if not taller!) than I am. I think some of them will get to be 7-8 feet high.

The flowerbeds are doing well this year, they seem to like all the rainy weather we've been having. And lucky for us the hailstorms have been very mild, with no bigger than pea-sized hailstones. phew!

I am really pleased with the Russian sage we planted last year, it wintered over just fine, and is bigger and lovelier this summer.

I like the tiny purple flowers (so do the bees!) and it makes a nice contrast to the yellow/orange poppies, rudbekias and coreopsis that are all in bloom. I also planted some lavender and purple verbena to play on the contrast.

Here's a pic of the sage with some poppies:


Like I told Chuck, you can take the girl out of California, but you can't take the California out of me! I love having those bright orange poppies in the front flower beds each year. We also have some cream-colored ones which seem just as happy in the hot, sunny bed. They both re-seeded themselves this year, which was really a surprise for me this spring. Quite unexpected considering all the snow and bitter cold weather we had last winter.

The roses are about to bloom again. It seems we have a week or two with all 10 bushes in full bloom, then after we cut back the spent roses it takes a few weeks for them to re-bud and bloom again, so they look all plain and green for the time in between blooming. I wish there was a way to have some of the roses green while the others show off their blooms, then it wouldn't seem so plain in-between roses! I guess a solution might be to plant something among the rosebushes that bloomed more frequently. Hmm... I'll have to think about that for next year!

This rose is one of my favorites, I just love the shade of pink.

This weekend I am finally able to harvest some vegetables! We have 4 huge heads of broccoli, 2 crookneck squashes, and the first of the tomatoes.

I didn't get a picture of the first tomato, as I ate it within 10 minutes of it being picked! Chuck and I had scrambled eggs with toasted english muffins for breakfast, so I decided to use the first tomato, and made mine into an egg and tomato sandwich. Oh my- so delicious. Seriously, nothing beats the flavor and texture of a home-grown tomato. This one was an heirloom variety named "Cherokee Purple". Yum! I gave one to Pat later in the afternoon, and the 3rd one is pictured above. It will make a great addition to some cheese and crackers for snack at work tomorrow!

Thank goodness Chuck doesn't like tomatoes, so I don't have to share with him. :)

Have a great week everyone!

Gardening is a joy

Our vegetable and flower gardens are in full swing, and I've been meaning to share some photos. So here we go!

I was up early and decided to grab the camera to take with me as I walked around the yard. I really like the early morning sunlight on the plants, it makes the colors glow and everything is so fresh and crisp.

This is the new flower bed we made this spring. There was a triangle-shaped portion of space that was covered in mulch and then had large pots of flowers in it every year. We tore it all out, reshaped the bed and laid sod (the part on the left) so that there is more space walking from one area of the back yard to the other.

The new flower bed is smaller, but this way the plants are in the ground, and we used a lot of perennials, with some annual color as well. I'm really happy with how the flower bed turned out!



This is a campanula that just started blooming, one of my favorite flowers. It's right next to my lavender plant that is blooming as well, making a nice blue contrast to all the pink and red going on in front of the bed with the dianthus, nicotiana, and petunias.



We also planted 3 lilac bushes, 2 hydrangeas, and there are about 4 rose bushes that were transplanted from the front yard over the last few years. We jokingly call it the rose-graveyard, because if a rose plant isn't performing well out front Pat wants to move it to the back yard and get something new and pretty for the rose planters out front. But then eventually the roses settle in out back and do very well, none of them have died as we had expected, in fact the two that have been in the "graveyard" the longest are blooming like crazy right now!

Here's a planter Pat has over on her side of the backyard, I just love the hot pink and dark purple colors together. The geranium has nicely variegated leaves which shows well with all the bright colors of the flowers.



Ahhh... the veggie garden. My pride and joy! :)

Everything is growing very well so far this year. There's also another planter along the back fence that Chuck has several rows of corn growing, next to it are a bunch of sunflowers and hollyhocks. They were still in shadow so I didn't snap a photo... I'll post something once they've grown up a bit more. The sunflowers are the really tall 6 to 7 foot variety, so they'll peek their flowers over the top of the fence, should be really pretty by late summer.



We use the square-foot gardening method and I've been really happy with it. I like the tidy look of the garden, and it's kind of amazing how many plants you can get into the boxes, since we don't need a whole row of pumpkins or beets, just a few sections of the garden is plenty.

Below is the box that holds two pumpkin plants, a mini one, and a regular jack-o-lantern one. In the middle are Leeks growing from seed, but they're still too tiny to see well in the photo. I noticed the big pumpkin plant already has some buds on it, so we should see little baby pumpkins in another few weeks. yeah!



Next is the tomato box, 4 heirloom tomatoes, two red, a yellow and a Cherokee purple. yum yum yum. Last fall Pat and I were able to can the last of the harvest, and I'm hoping to have enough this year again.

I plant marigolds in the garden because they have a scent that the bad insects don't care for, so they stay away from the veggies. I also think the blossoms are good for attracting bees, which I need to get everything pollinated. My garden would be nothing without the precious bees in the area.



There are several green 'matoes on the vine, I'll have to keep a close watch on them. I am so excited for homegrown tomatoes, they taste so much better than the ones in the grocery store!



This box holds some cucumber plants and celery plants. I also have a jalapeno and anaheim chili plant in the middle. They are doing well, I noticed some peppers looking nearly ready to harvest!





And there are little itty-bitty- cucumbers too- right behind the little yellow flower is the baby cucumber. so cute!



We are growing broccoli this year, a new plant for me. I only got four seedlings, because I didn't know if they would grow well, but they seem to be doing fine. In this box there are more marigolds, cilantro (that's already going to seed) and lettuce.

In the right lower corner is a zucchini plant... hello chocolate-zucchini cake!



This planter is my herb-garden. Anise, fennel, sage, lavender, basil, mint, cilantro, oregano... you get the idea. There is also a yellow crook-neck squash plant in the lower left corner, because I had nowhere else to put it. You have to be careful not to plant your squashes and cucumbers too close together, or they will get cross-pollinated while the bees are buzzing about from plant to plant, and you'll end up with weird veggies!!



Chukani decided to plant Potatoes this year too. (it was an adventure at the garden center for sure!) The back of this planter is the dozen or so potato plants, and then the rest is filled with beets, carrots, and radishes.



In fact, the radishes are ready! So I harvested those this morning. I also made a discovery- our dog Keena loves to eat radishes. I gave her one, and she happily crunched away, so I gave her another just to be sure. Yep, she thinks they taste delicious.



Well, thanks for touring the garden with me. I have some pics from the flower beds in the front yard, but I'll share them next time.

The flower beds and veggie gardens are doing great this year. Chuck and Pat and I have really worked hard in the last couple years to build up the flower beds in the front yard. We re-did the planter between the two front doors last summer, and that led to many other projects in sprucing up the front yard. It looks so nice now, with everything in bloom. I love being out there in the early evening as the day cools off, just watering the flowers, or dead-headding the spent blossoms, mostly just enjoying the beauty of each plant.

I just did that very thing, except I had the camera with me, so I could share the flowers and plants with you! Here are some of our roses blooming this afternoon:



And the coreopsis and verbena in the big planter outside Pat's front door. I love the contrast of the purple and yellow flowers. The other plant is vinca that's spilling over the edge, it has a nice grayish tone to the leaves which looks good with the dark foilage of the moonbeam coreopsis.
In the back yard, Pat has several big pots full of brightly colored petunias and geraniums, they are in their full summer glory right now, and attract lots of butterflies into the yard.

My herb garden is growing well this year. Basil, peppermint, catnip, parsley, and some marigolds because they keep the bad insects away, while attracting the beneficial ones. I had radishes in the empty squares, but they were harvested last week. And the lettuce in the lower right corner is looking like it's next to go. yum!
The big zucchini plants are starting to produce. We've had zucchini for dinner, and I've given a few away, and I think I'll be making zucchini bread this weekend. Anyone interested in some delicious zucchini? Just let me know- I've got plenty!!

I took a bunch more photos, but Chuck and Pat want to go to dinner now, so this will have to do. I'll post again soon! :)