Garden Blog We try to update it once a week. (Well, okay now monthly. It's fall and winter - eh?)
Where we note gardening ideas and hints. Sorrows and joys!
2010
2/09/2010 - SNOW! A very pretty "christmas" snow.
2/08/2010 - It is time to start seeds! The daffodils are up about 4 inches.
1/08/2010 - When we got back from our Christmas travels, we suddenly had six cats - and our male cat did not have kittens!! So, we have chosen to take in one of the strays that came to our house. We welcomed Maggie into our household. She is freshly washed and drying in front of the heater. Jasper doesn't know what to think!
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2009 - AKA - The Garden That Ate My Summer
10/20/09 - I recently heard that the record number of growing season days in this area was 246 days. Last Monday, 11/16, was 240 days. The tomato plants are still producing. The peppers are still running wild. We have planted some lettuce and the leaves are very green. There are some volunteer marigolds that are gorgeous. AND we are still eating a few strawberries from the beds!!! The blackberries are budding out. Recently, while picking pecans at a friend's, I noticed there were violets blooming under all the fallen leaves. What weird weather and events!!
Mitch has returned after a sucessful hunting season in Michigan. Jane painted the living room, stairwell, foyer and upstairs landing while he was away - highlights below. BEFORE, DURING and AFTER.
PS - we named the kitten - Jasper. After the colouring he has and the vampire from the Twilight series. Because the kitty has a biting problem! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
10/1/09 - Where to begin? Mitch canned our sauerkraut while Jane was traveling. The tomotoes are finally giving up the ghost. The peppers are producing like there was no tomorrow. We are drying them for chili. The dried peppers take up the juice if the chili is too liquid. We are still getting red and gold raspberries - yummy! the strawberries are still coming in.
The second batch of lettuce for the winter beds went in. The first planting is almost ready to start harvesting. We will have to get the doors back on the beds before frost comes.
We are down to one kitten. A neighbor's dog grabbed one of our little guys and "played" with him. He didn't make it. We are in process of renaming the remaining kitten.
Jane had surgery on September 28th. Yes, again! It needs to be the last one. She is dealing with meing dizzy from the pain meds and trying to learn to walk om crutches.
We both worked at the Houston County fair this year. Mitch demonstrated again. Jane helped him and the beekeepers.
Jane and Michelle had a grand time in the Pacific Northwest.
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8/31/09 - I am canning, preparing produce, sewing, cleaning and sorting, yard work, getting ready for travel (10 days in Washington - the state) and we adopted 2 kittens.
Meet “The Katzenjammer Kids” - Fritz (red and white one) and Hans (red one). I remember reading the comic books with Mamma Katzenjammer and the twin sons that played pranks on her. They are a handful.
We had a friend visit for a few days. She showed us how to make fried okra. It was good. We are also trying a recipe for pickled okra provided by a co-worker of Mitch’s.
We have filled the freezer with zucchini - they make a great Chocolate Zucchini Cake and Zucchini Fritters with Tzatziki sauce is yummy!
More peppers are drying. Pesto is put up.
The Peaches and Cream corn was coming in and coming in. Maque Choux (pronounced "mock shoe") made with corn is another favourite of ours now - loads of veggies! If we can keep it away from the raccoons we will have our second crop, this time a shoe-peg corn.
The fawns ate all our carrot tops! Then they tried to paw-up the carrots. So we pulled all the carrots and canned them. The deer can fend for themselves. Thffffffffffffrpt :)~
The cantaloupe is coming in along with a few strawberries. That makes a good breakfast!
We had one small pumpkin that turned orange. We are going to roast it in the oven, sprinkle it with cinnamon and sugar. Then we will serve with ice cream. Pumpkin pie without the crust!
I am headed to Washington and Oregon with Michelle. She is presenting an abstract at a conference in Vancouver, WA. http://www.naturalarea.org/09conference/ I get to go along and have fun too!
I am having foot surgery on September 28th. With two weeks on crutches after that – SIGH!
I do not know how much I will be able to can or garden.
I will try to keep up the blogging.
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8/18/09 - The garden keeps going and going. We haven't even picked the BIG lower garden!!! We finally have some rain. We were going to have to water if it didn't come soon. The tomatoes are coming in fast.
Since I have all this good produce, it looks like a good day for Salsa making. Also, maybe some pepper jelly. I can already smell the salsa and jam cooking!
8/16/09 - ARGH! Below you can see the new threat to our garden! While I was on the phone, they ate the carrots down to the ground! There was a mother for the twins. But, we think she is gone. They hang around the empty lot where they were raised. But, we have seen them on the highway. They may get hit by a truck. You can walk right up to them. I wonder if they can be relocated.
On the garden side - We picked a peck of beets and pickled them. The couple pieces left over tasted great. A half-dozen jars of bread & butter pickles were processed. Also zucchini was shredded and frozen for Mitch's favourite cake. It is a recipe from his sister, Vanessa. It is a chocolate Zucchini cake. The strawberries are still producing. I love walking out there and eating my way through the garden! The golden raspberries are producing a second crop. They are so sweet and delicious! There were a ton, well, okay; it seemed like a ton, of jalapeno peppers. We processed those into "poppers". We discovered that we can make them and then freeze them. They reheat nicely in the microwave. I hope they last a week or two. We are finally getting tomatoes. We think some of the Cherokee Purple crop has blossom end rot. The smaller variety seems to be okay and producing golf-ball sized fruit. Quite tasty! The sunflowers follow the suns path all across the lawn. It had been two weeks since the lawn was cut. I think we need a hay rake for it. The lawn looks good. Otherwise, we are taking it easy this evening. We are both exhausted and ready for an early night!
8/10/09 - Jane is back from Missouri. She helped to paint, move and unpack with Bryon and Michelle. She saw some of the sights – saving some for the next visit. A highlight was the Market in Kansas City. (There are a few photos below in a slide show). We got some new front porch furniture. It looks great!
The garden is still producing fast. Mitch picked while Jane was gone. He put up many ears of corn. He enjoyed some jalapeno poppers.
Last night a wheel-barrow load of corn was picked. In the photo below is a small portion that was canned. We also enjoyed sautéed yellow squash and zucchini for dinner last night. There was a peck of green beans from the kitchen garden. We tried some fried field corn supplied by a neighbor. And we had our first cantaloupes come in – they were good for breakfast.
There are a few tomatoes coming in. There are many cukes in the kitchen garden. And that sounds like a Greek Tomato and Cucumber Salad!
This morning’s “pickins” are peppers. These are to be dehydrated and made into poppers. All this work makes the days go by fast.
MISSOURI TRIP HIGHLIGHTS!
7/29/09 - The garden goes on and on and on! Jane helped Mitch pick everything in the BIG garden before she headed to Missouri. She picked the kitchen garden earlier. There was a bushel of peppers too! We were able to send a ton of produce to Michelle and Bryon. And the neighbors enjoyed some of the harvest too!
7-21-2009 We are still working away!! We are giving produce to friends and neighbors. There is too much for us to take care of ourselves. Once all is picked, then we have to do something with the 'pickins"!
Cukes, cukes and more cukes. We have canned another couple batches of pickles. We made cucumber salad with red onions, cider vinegar, sour cream, dill and a dash of hot sauce.
Fourteen more quarts of beans were canned. Jane picked the pole beans from her kitchen garden. They were blanched and frozen. Just a couple quarts. The bumblebees were working on the blossoms while she was picking.
We dehydrated a bunch of chopped peppers. These are good added to chili. It will take up the excess moisture and add wonderful flavor. The jalapenos are being used to make a wonderful snack. We slice them, soak them in ice water, stuff them with cream cheese, wrap them in a half strip of bacon and bake them. They are wonderful! We make these when we can. Mitch likes them hot or cold!
The zucchini went into a zucchini pickle that Jane makes. Mitch said he was impressed last year. So, another good use for the zucchini. The zucchini also gets grated and frozen in batches for a Chocolate Zucchini cake recipe that was give to us by Mitch’s sister, Vanessa. It is one of Mitch’s favorites!
The yellow squash was used in a stuffed squash dish. The recipe for that came to us from a friend. We can prepare two or three batches and freeze them. All we have to do is thaw and bake. We made a couple of those for days when we need “fast food”.
Our basil made some yummy pesto for pasta, pizza and just snacking with crusty French bread! Jane experimented and found that you can freeze pesto. She puts it into an ice cube tray and puts it into the freezer. Once frozen, she puts it into zip-topped freezer bags. When she wants to add some to a pizza, she pulls out one or two cubes to thaw. Then she adds them to the sauce. Mmm-mmm!
The hives were full. The frames were put into the extractor and the golden nectar flowed out! The honey is a little darker this year. It still tasted yummy! We are bottling it.
In between canning and picking (it should be picking and canning) we got our bread baked. We like to make our own hamburger and hot dog buns when we make bread. And sometimes there is a batch of cinnamon rolls that comes out when there is time.
The yard, the gardens and regular day-to-day living keep us very busy. And people wonder what we do with ourselves if we do not watch TV!!!
PS - we have joined Recorded Books Unlimited program. Listening to a book while you snap a bushel of beans or cut up cucumbers for pickles makes the time go faster and you can learn all kinds of things!
7-21-2009 We are still working away. The landscape bushes needed attention too! It took a couple days of trimming, weeding and pruning. There were mountains of trimmings to cart away. In the meantime, Mitch took off some supers of honey, picked beans and tilled. The blueberries and thornless blackberries continue to produce. We get a couple handfuls of berries every couple days. Jane cut up her little pineapple and mixed it with some blueberries - it was good!
7-14-09 - Not bad for a day's work - eh? 
We removed Michelle's metal fish sculpture by Jack Wheeler from our garden. So we can take it to them in Missouri. We replaced it with my sundial.
And below is a slideshow of the work and weeding that has been done this week!
(still a work in progress - I haven't captioned the photos yet.)
I am working on some before and after groupings like...
It is amazing what a little trimming can do!
ONTO THE SLIDESHOW.....
7-13-09 - Just when we thought we were caught up....more comes in. The carrots and beets needed thinning and more beans came along. This picking is just from one side of the bean row! Now we know why they had MANY kids in families back then!
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7-12-09 We have been inundated by our lawn and garden! Going away does that! We were in Michigan and Indiand for 12 days! Things go on without you. And if you are not there to keep them up – too bad! We had over two bushels of usable cukes (about a bushel more of ones that were too bag), a bushel of green beans, a peck of peppers (no jokes about Peter Piper!), berries and beets that needed attention. That equals: fourteen (+) quarts of beans, 7 pints of dill relish, 6 pints of sweet relish, 14 pints of dill sandwich slices, 6 pints of bread and butter, several trays of dehydrated peppers. And all that has been done since Tuesday along with unpacking, laundry, doctor’s appointments and the hay field that was our lawn. And the weeds partied while we were gone. We have been pulling and pulling and pulling weeds!
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6-20-09
Picked this morning! 6-20-09 (minus a few handfuls!)
BLACKBERRIES ARE RIPENING! Blueberries are coming in! Golden Raspberries!
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We now have three gardens:
ONE - (kitchen garden 20'x 30')
The kitchen garden has the aspargus, onions, garlic, cucumbers, peppers, Cherokee purple tomatoes, basil, spinach, carrots, fennel, pole beans, coriander, peas (already done), zinnias and cosmos.
Along side are several smaller gardens and raised beds - squash & zucchini, strawberry & rhubarb, lettuce, chard & spinach.
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TWO - (Shop garden 25' x 40')
The shop garden has the sweet potaoes, regualr potatoes, bush beans, cabbage and
tobacco (a few plants used to smoke the bees).
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THREE - (BIG garden 50' x 150' approximately 1/3 acre)
The BIG garden has everything else. More bush beans, cucumbers, yellow squash, zuchinni, watermelon, cantalope, broom corn, several types of corn.
FRUITS -
blueberries, red raspberries, blackberries, apricot, apples, pears, grapes, nectarines, cherries, plums and peaches.
Strawberry beds! Before and after!