Fall Garden

As summer comes to an end, the garden is definitely changing. The yellow squash and zucchini are still producing, but my focus will definitely be changing to the "greens" over the next couple of months. Above, I planted this Mesclun mix (Gourmet Greens Mixture) and it looks ready for some pretty salads.
The basil plant never got super huge, but it has given me a modest amount of leaves that I've enjoyed cooking with.

A couple of weeks ago, I planted some more Sugar Snap Peas for a fall harvest. Alayna and Gavin both loved picking and eating them right off the vine!
I was very pleased with my tomatoes! This was my first shot at growing them. I hoped to get maybe a half dozen red tomatoes and I got way more than I bargained for. I've picked at least 20 red tomatoes and as you can see, there's still more on the bush!
My Sage (top, closest to fence) and Oregano are taking over my herb garden area!
I planted some Spinach in this little spot and cut out one of those plastic containers that plants are sold in. I did this so that I wouldn't forget where I planted the seeds. I did this with my Greens Mix and then removed the plastic marker when the sprouts were large enough to see and I'd know not to step on them. However, these seeds don't seem to be taking. There are a couple tiny sprouts (if you squint, maybe you can see them) but I'm thinking those might be weeds! I'm wondering if the mulch I covered the soil with is too big for the sprouts to come through. Anyway, I re-planted a few more seeds today in hopes that I'll have some Spinach for salads and cooking.
This is a tiny Kale sprout. I planted this at the same time as the Spinach....it seems to be faring a bit better. I planted four Kale seeds in about a one foot cube area and three of them sprouted.

The corn is just about ready for harvest. Even the little plants got a tiny ear of corn on them. Probably won't have many kernels, I'm guessing....we'll see....I'm looking forward to using the stalks as Halloween decorations for the front of the house!
Here's some yellow crookneck squash......it got a late start, but its been producing very well recently.
.....and some more squash!
Zucchini ready for harvest
The green beans are pretty much done. It looks pretty ugly, but I just haven't gotten a chance to cut all of the dead vines out.

Bountiful Harvest

Here is what I was able to pick out of the garden today. Of course, Alayna decided to pick some of the green tomatoes as well!

Alayna Picked a Pepper

Gardening with a two-year-old certainly has its challenges. The main one is letting her "help" without completely ruining the plants. I was a bit sad when Alayna picked this little pepper, but I know she was only trying to help mommy. I ended up cutting it up and putting it in a pasta salad. It was pretty good..... a bit bitter, so maybe it was better that it was eaten while it was small.

Can you spot the corn? (hint: there are two ears!)

I have Peppers!

I didn't have much hope for my green and red bell pepper plants. With the unusually cool weather we had this year I didn't think I'd actually have any. But, the past week has been unseasonably hot and I just noticed these small peppers growing. It seems funny to me because the entire plant isn't much more than a foot tall. If the peppers grow to full size, it'll look very lopsided. Its hard to tell size in the picture, but both peppers (I have one per plant at the moment) are slightly smaller than a ping pong ball.


The corn is really starting to grow now.....well at least the stalk is. I haven't seen any corn yet, but Gavin has been oohing and aahing over the stalk that is shooting into the air. Its weird how they are not growing uniformly. The one is quite taller than the others. Not sure if that one is just getting more water or has a little better soil around it or what. Kind of weird! Oh, and that bushy plant next to the corn is my yellow squash. It, too, is off to a slow start, but I finally saw one small squash growing just the other day. Last year I had so much squash we didn't know what to do with it all. Its just been a rough year for produce!

Cooking from the Garden

This is just how I imagined it would be to have a vegetable garden. I went out in the morning and picked some zucchinis (see below). I shredded about half of them for freezing (to make zucchini bread some time later in the year) and made this great saute with the rest of it. The tomatoes are also from the garden and, oh, they taste like heaven. Now, you have to understand that I'm not a tomato-loving person. I normally don't buy tomatoes because I've never really cared for them. Then, one time while my mom was visiting, she asked if I've ever eaten tomatoes right off the vine. I admitted I hadn't and that got me to thinking that maybe I'd try to grow tomatoes this year. Well, that was about the best decision ever because these tomatoes are just delicious!

So, for you cooking-types out there, this is how I made the above yumminess: Saute a small amount of chopped onions (like maybe an 1/8 to 1/4 cup, if you want a measurement) with some garlic (I think I used 2 small cloves) in some butter. Add the zucchini (I used 2 small ones from the garden, thinly sliced) and saute for 3 or 4 minutes. Top with shredded cheddar cheese, chopped tomatoes and sliced olives. Turn heat off but leave on burner and cover until cheese is melted (about a minute or two). This makes two good-sized servings, so you'd want to double it to feed a normal-sized family. I made this small serving because Chad was out of town and I wasn't sure if the kiddos would eat it (however, let me just say Gavin LOVED it!....Alayna didn't but what can I say....typical 2-yr-old!). Plus, I didn't want leftovers because it didn't look like it would reheat well.

Today in the Garden

The permanent locations for the two bell pepper plants and the watermelon plant. My tomato plant has grown greatly over the last couple of weeks...and yes, that is Alayna's arm in the picture.

The Romaine Lettuce has formed heads. I harvested one the other day and it was delicious! I've been planting lettuce about every 2 to 3 weeks and I'm set for a continuous supply for the entire season.

Lots of little green tomatoes

Pea-sized tomatoes

I think this is zucchini, but if not its cucumber. I planted the two types of seeds next to each other and forgot which was which.

Better Late than Never

(clockwise from the top) My sage & oregano plants came back in full force this year; I bought two bell pepper plants and a watermelon plant the other day...hopefully, I'll be planting them in the next day or two...its on my garden "to do" list; I planted two types of lettuce this year... mint green romaine on top and lighter green salad bowl lettuce on bottom.

As you can see, I've enlarged my garden this year. This picture is probably only a third of it. The sugar snap peas are climbing the vine in the back. The stake (to the left) is marking the yellow summer squash I planted and the clusters in front (there are actually two, although the one on the left is much bigger) are zucchini and cucumbers.

My little corn plants. I planted five, so we'll see how it goes. I figured it would be fun to try to grow it and best case scenario is we get lots of fresh corn on the cob (yum!) and worse case scenario is we still get corn stalks to decorate our porch on halloween!

Sugar Snap Peas ~ They seemed to have appeared overnight!

I have two tomatoes growing... yay!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We added a new member to our family this spring! Cade Thomas was born May 20, 2008. Suffice it to say, the garden took a bit of a back seat. I tried to compensate ahead of time by making sure my seeds were planted well before my due date, however the weather decided not to cooperate. I'm still a novice gardener and learning new things all the time. What I learned this year is that planting early only helps if the sun is shining. Out here in the Pacific Northwest, that seems to be our biggest obstacle. This year was especially difficult because while the rest of the country had record high temperatures, we had record lows. I even heard a local farmer comment on tv (he was being interviewed by the local news) that his wife had nicknamed the month of June "June-uary".

However, now that the garden finally seems to be taking off, I'm getting very excited about it. I tried some new vegetables this year: sugar snap peas, tomatoes, zucchini, corn and bell peppers. Actually, I thought I was trying bell peppers last year, but the plants that came up were not pepper plants. Not sure if there was a mix-up at the seed packaging factory or what.... we never did determine what on earth those plants were. I also just picked up a watermelon plant. Not sure if I'll actually be able to grow a watermelon, but thought it would be fun to try and Gavin is extremely excited about it! Back by popular demand (my family's, that is) are cucumbers (oh those were so good last year!), green beans, yellow summer squash and lots and lots of herbs!