Day 20: Personal Entry: Garden Update

I'm mostly sad to say that garden season is officially over. This weekend we tore out the garden. Even though there were still some tomatoes growing and a few other straggling plants. It has been getting really cold at night and whatever produce was growing wouldn't have lasted long.

All in all, it was a good year. We had an amazing crop of tomatoes, mostly Roma, and mostly on the small grape/cherry size side but we still were able to can a ton of tomatoes and tomato products (4 gallons of tomato soup, 5 gallons of stewed/diced/whole tomatoes and 12 pints of salsa). Our green beans were a bust - they were really woody - and our peas were abysmal. I think we got about 10 peas off before the weeds choked out the pea plants, which was only 3 out of the 12 we planted. The watermelons just didn't get big or ripen and the honeydew died right away. The cantaloupe, however, did pretty well and we all enjoyed a few of them. Everything else grew just enough for us to use them and enjoy them but not be overwhelmed by them (like the zucchini and summer squash last year). Our pride and joy was the kale and collard greens, which we're actually letting grow a little longer for our green juices.

It's a little bittersweet because we know that we'll be moving out of this house next year and won't be able to plant a garden again here. It's also bittersweet because, even though our neighbors didn't use the garden as much as they had hoped.. and maybe didn't weed as much as they'd hoped, it's sad knowing we won't get to share a garden with them again.

This garden was our biggest and yet still our most reasonable as far as produce went. It is also where we spent a lot of time on our weekends before Emerson was born.. including the morning before her arrival!

So we spent yesterday with the neighbors ripping out the plants we tenderly planted and cursing the weeds one last time. The kids brought some of their chickens over to help with clean up (they didn't) and were supposed to be picking up any left over produce to put in the chicken food pile. One of their girls kept getting distracted by every pretty thing and was always adding things to her pile for making bouquets. I loved how much she romanticized every plant.

After we finished, they invited us over for dinner and we got to see her handy work. I think she has a knack for arranging bouquets don't you?

Their table. Notice the Kale, rosemary and in the bouquet on the right, those are either weeds or veggies :)

I love this one. She did incorporate some of our roses too, but notice the
onion in the back and the kale.. there are a few weeds in there too :)

And how sweet is this!? This is what they left as a surprise
for their mom on her nightstand. 

A sweet ending to a sweet garden year!

Garden Update

We've been enjoying our garden and all the produce it provides us. So far the harvest includes: zucchini, yellow squash, cucumbers, tomatoes, watermelon, cantaloupe, tomatoes, spinach, lettuce varieties, kale, beets, carrots, radishes, potatoes, green beans, snap peas, tomatoes, jalapenos and other hot peppers and more tomatoes. Still to come are: winter squashes, onions and tomatillos.

We've also grown a ridiculous crop of weeds. Every kind imaginable and a much greater variety than last year. Oh my! We pulled hundreds.. if you recall that was how I spent the morning that I was in labor.. but alas, when you just have a baby certain things just slide and weeding the garden was one of them. We eventually resorted to essentially mowing them with the weed eater but now we've all but given up and are resolved to just wading through them.

Can you believe the before and after:

Before..  you can hardly see the 30+ tomato plants because they're so small..

Now you can't see the tomatoes because the grass completely hides even their cages! The beans are
looking good, and the cucumbers have been generous.

The dark green 'bush' is our purple kale plants! They're huge! 

I haven't taken many produce shots but just today I decided to dig up some
potatoes to see how they were doing.. I'd say we might be a little late on harvesting these!

We will definitely miss this garden space next year. Our house sitting/rental term is up when the owners get back from Russia at the end of May. Hopefully there's room for a garden whenever we move to. We've enjoyed the fresh produce (and obviously haven't been too bothered by the weeds)!

Sprung

I don't really know when it happened, and I feel like I missed the entire season, but all of a sudden I look around and realize that spring has sprung.

I'm not sure I'll ever get used to the weather here. I think it feels like I missed spring because we only had maybe five days of rain and maybe a handful of gray/cloudy days outside of that. Where I come from, spring (and most of winter) is months and months of rain and overcast days. Not here.

Essentially, around here it almost always looks like summer, but only feels like summer during the summer months. The rest of the year it is about the same from the inside looking out: bright and brown. Spring and early summer are the rare exceptions when things start to bloom and turn green and you could possibly describe certain areas as 'pretty'. After spring it gets so hot that things turn brown and stay that way again until next spring :).

As I looked around our yard last weekend I realized that the tulips had bloomed and died, the trees had bloomed and were now growing leaves instead of petals and the weeds are already establishing their nasty roots. All of a sudden it's still daylight out by the time we're done with dinner and the sun is up before me. When did this happen? Where did spring go? There were no weeks of crummy weather to remind me to curl up with a hot drink and look out the window at the spring flowers. I'll have to set a reminder on my phone for next year, since the weather didn't seem to clue me in. I suppose I'm also a little preoccupied lately too ;).

I'm really looking forward to summer for several reasons (not working, enjoying the outdoors and, oh ya, having a baby!) but I didn't want to take spring for granted. I'm trying to stop and smell the roses (or rather watch the roses grow and hopefully bud) a little more with life in general and hopefully this will help me appreciate what is left of spring. It's so easy to look forward to the next stage of life without stopping to appreciate the stage you're about to leave.

We started planting the garden last weekend! Soon everything will be growing like a weed... or rather growing lots of weeds.. but for now it's so fun to see the little starts, lattice and cages all set up with lots of open space in between. We primarily planted those vegetables that we are starting from seed, since we still have a few weeks before we're safe from the danger of frost and hopefully those little seeds will take their full time to germinate so they don't get frostbite between now and then. We're also taking measures against the rabbits this year!

Garden Update

The garden is thriving! Even in spite of the massive earwig infestation we've been enduring. I discovered a non-toxic way to kill them on-contact, I'll share it at the end. I took these pictures a few days ago and already things have changed.

We've been harvesting more summer squash and zucchini than we can consume, but our neighbors are taking some off our hands now and then. Yesterday Blake and I ate four squash between lunch and dinner, fresh off the grill both times. Tonight, we made stuffed zucchini out of that big one you see in the picture below. It was delicious.

Right now the pile on the counter is a little smaller, but we pull off more each day.

We ate those two tomatoes above, these, and some of their friends with dinner tonight

Our one little pea, the plant is only about 8" tall so we're pleasantly surprised
that it could produce anything yet. Today we found two more!? 

This little cucumber got a little bigger, and we ate it with those
tomatoes in a little Greek salad. 

Clockwise starting with the cabbage, onions, celery, okra, eggplant and Thai chilies. 

More eggplant, cucumber, strange bean plant with red flowers, tiny peas and pole beans.
These were all late planters or replants thanks to the rabbits.

Three varieties of peppers and our mess of tomatoes.

Our goofy cauliflower and broccoli, out of five plants only one looks normal, beets, carrots and artichoke. 

Butternut squash!! This plant is HUGE and there are tiny to medium little squash all over it. 

Acorn squash!! Same situation as the butternut, we are going to be up to our eyeballs.

The massive bramble of squash plants and the corn.. oh man.

Yams and potatoes! Not 100% sure what to do with these but hopefully we'll find something in that dirt later.

We also have some adorable little watermelons and cantaloupe developing overnight. Yesterday we found a melon the size of an eyeball (the rest are about marble size) and today it was the size of a chicken egg!! I didn't get pictures of it, but man they are cute :). I think we'll have an easier time sharing the plethora of melon than we will with the squash.

We are mostly flying by the seat of our pants with this garden, but we're learning a lot about what to do next year. We're also getting some nice sun burns tans and have discovered that weeding is a compulsion more than a chore or passion.

: :

Non-toxic Earwig Spray: 1 Tablespoon of non-toxic dish soap - I use Method brand - and 50 oz of water. I put it in a hand held pump sprayer just for that purpose. Blake and I go out at night with our head lamps and catch the little devils in the act. They are on everything! We just spray them and within 6-10 seconds they stop moving. After several nights in a row of spraying them while they're out and about, we've noticed a significant reduction in their numbers. They did some serious damage to a row of our corn, but the other plants seem to be bouncing back. So far, the soap doesn't seem to hurt any of the plants. While I was testing out the ratio of soap to water, we had a few pretty sudsy batches, and we rinsed those plants down with water just in case.

Garden Weekend

This weekend we devoted ourselves to our new garden. The couple that owns the house that we will be renting are kind enough to let us come and start a garden while it's time for planting. We had our work cut out for us.

Here are some before shots from my phone:

Grass, everywhere.

Grass and weeds!

After we pulled most of the grass and weeds and then some more grass, it was time to till.

Blake pretty much handled this part.

I planned the layout and then took some pictures. I did other supportive things too, like bringing water and making comments on his manliness. Unfortunately, my plan isn't to scale and I didn't leave adequate room to draw the mounds that we planted squash and watermelon in, or the rows of big onions we planted off to the right side of the boxes. Next year, I'll get it right.

We are using the Square Foot Gardening method.

Here are some of the flowers I'll be taking care of. It's interesting to be moving into an established house with fully landscaped flowerbeds and lawn. Lets hope we can keep it up ;)

Not sure what kind of tree this is...

I *might* resort to using this photo for my photo challenge
day 4 - clouds. So don't look too hard if you're a part of that group ;)

We went out to dinner - a rare treat - and went home and hit the sack. We were beat! We only got half of the space tilled (which is only half of the garden that we're using). Blake got up early on Saturday and finished tilling and leveled it out some. He also had some garden dirt delivered and built some raised beds with the neighbors leftover boards and landscaping fabric (Score! We have awesome neighbors!). We were worried that all of that grass and those weeds would just come back, since most of it had already gone to seed. We figured we'd keep some weeds out by lining the bottom of the boxes and using new dirt. We'll see how effective it was in a few weeks!

I was productive at home while Blake was working.. but who takes pictures of vacuming, laundry and cleaning toilets ;). Once the dirt was delivered and boxes built, I showed up with the results of my plant buying trip that afternoon. Now the action really begins! We got most of it done on Saturday, but had to come back Sunday after church and plant the things that are outside of the boxes (corn, squash, melon and onions).

Lots of shoveling dirt, super dry dirt, which took forever to wet down.
That was the hardest part of it all, wetting and mixing the dirt!

First box planted! 8 little peppers and several tomatoes in this one.

The last plants to go in were the onions.
Walla Walla Sweets and red onions

A row of corn started, a row of corn in seeds, and in two weeks,
we'll plant another row of corn from seeds. That should space out the harvest.

All done! 

We planted:
Tomatoes - three varieties, hot peppers - three varieties, beans, sugar snap peas, artichoke, cauliflower, broccoli, okra, carrots - regular and rainbow, beats - golden and red, cucumbers, onions, celery, corn, butternut squash, acorn squash, watermelon, zucchini, yellow squash, oh, and cabbage.

We have one empty square in one box, not sure what will go there, and some empty squares in another box for spinach and lettuces. We'll wait to plant those until we've moved in, because once they start producing, you have to stay on top of them or it will bolt in no time flat.

We bought what we could find in starts, but had to plant some things in seeds. I hope they come up! I'll keep you posted ;)