Growing Right Along

While most people's gardens are winding down, ours has barely just gotten going. Since we had standing water in the garden areas for so long (like until the middle of June!) and we had to wait for all that to dry out enough to plant, it made for a very late start. I'm sure that many people wouldn't have even bothered at that point. But, being the optimist that I am, I knew that I'd have enough time for at least a small harvest.


I've got green beans in the freezer, canned a few pints and cooked them up right out of the garden! Look how big some of them have been!!

Today we picked 30+ lbs of roma tomatoes. I've been making cultured salsa and also canning them up as diced tomatoes. I've made some spaghetti sauce as well.

I've been drying the surplus sweet peppers in my dehydrator to use this winter. It's wonderful to have garden veggies when it's cold and wintery out. I just add a little water to reconstitute and in a couple of hours I have fresh diced peppers ready to use.

We've harvested several cantaloups from the seeds that I planted last year. Yes, last year. With the drought they just didn't do well. They went from immature to mush in no time flat and the ones we thought were good tasted like mold. Nasty. But the mushy ones sat in the garden and then replanted themselves. So we had volunteer cantaloups that have been heavenly! I can't remember how many varieties I originally planted but at least 4 different kinds have grown. We're loving that!!

Our little pet turtle Squirtle (a Red Eared Slider) has been doing some growing as well.
Here's a picture from last year after we found him. 

And here he is now.  It's been a little over a year now. Quite a difference, huh? :-)

I really have enjoyed having Squirtle as a pet. I'm the one personally responsible for his care. A baby turtle raised in captivity shouldn't be returned to "the wild" as they don't know how to fend for themselves. Since he may live up to 30 years it's quite the commitment!! :-)

He stays in the house with us at this point in a clear plastic bucket with a "pool" of water. I'm planning to set up an outdoor area for him in the future with a nice pond for him to use. He should grow to about 10 inches wide so he will definitely need larger accomodations before long.

This Year's Seedlings...

I've been having fun this year raising my seedlings. I'm still trying to use up my old seeds that I bought in 2008, 2009, and 2010.  Surprisingly many of them are coming up.

Check out these Sumter Cucumber seedlings.  I've never seen cucumber seedlings do this long legged thing before.  Too funny.  They are getting plenty of light so go figure.  They are just starting to work on their first set of true leaves.  :-)

These are my tomatoes and peppers and some herbs.  My sweet peppers were old and they have been very slow to germinate.  The tomatoes did well.  Some of them were new seeds so I expected them to do well.

We used old Christmas lights to keep them warm (an idea I saw on Pinterest)--especially at night when the temps had been dropping down into the 30s and 20s outside and in front of the window got quite chilly.  I think that helped those seeds out a lot.  And now that we're having warmer weather and strong sunlight they're really taking off. 

What do you think of my little toilet paper roll seedling starter pots?  I had a lot of fun making them.  :-)  They're potted in plastic Christmas containers.  My attempts at frugal seed starting.  :-)  I have some seeds planted in the tp roll pots inside milk cartons too.  I have some old herb seeds planted in them and hope that they will come up too.  If the seeds come up I'll post some pictures of them too.

I can't wait to get everything into the ground!

Onion Seedlings

Tonight, I sit here mentally bracing myself for Winter Storm Q to arrive tomorrow morning.  I'm not sure how hard we will be hit, but perhaps it will miss us completely.  From the looks of the forecast maps we are on the edge of where the storm will hit.  So there IS hope of missing out on all of that wintery stuff altogether.  (fingers crossed)

When did I stop liking winter?  When did I start wishing for the heat of summer as opposed to the cold, snow and ice of winter?  Just a couple of years ago I remember vividly hating the hot weather.  I remember boasting of how easy it was to get warm in winter compared to trying to stay cool in the summer.  Sheesh!  I think I'm getting old!!  :-)

I long to enjoy all of the seasons with their own benefits and charms.  But I'm just not feeling it for winter this year.  I long to be outdoors, puttering around in the gardens and feeling warm for a change! 

When the cabin fever sets in it helps to plant the garden seeds that need to be started indoors.  I love the planning stages of gardening--the perfect garden in my mind where there are no pests or weeds and no ripe veggie is missed and all is handled in due time with tender loving care.

This year I got an early start by planting the Yellow Sweet Spanish Onions that I ordered. 

I didn't count the seeds but there were supposed to be 200. I planted them on February 2nd.

By February 9th they had pushed up a good ways through the seed starter soil.

Most of them were just about an inch+ tall

A few days later they had literally had a growth explosion!! 
 

Funny little plants.

They remind me of sunflowers in the way that they follow the sun.

See how they are all leaning to the right?

I had just turned them around so that they could reach to the other side for the sunshine--and by the end of the day they will all be leaning to the left where the sun shines in through the window.

I am exercising them.  :-)

Tomorrow I plan to start potting them up into their own little pots to grow happily until it's time to set them out into the garden this spring.     This is my first year to have my onion seeds actually sprout.  Normally I buy the seeds and then don't get around to planting them.  I always think, "I'll just plant them next year when I'm more prepared".  Ha!  As if!!  But this year I set my mind to do it, ordered the seeds, and here we are.  Yay!!    In another week and a half I'll be starting my broccoli, cauliflower and cabbages.    Little by little I am making it through this winter.  One dream at a time.

Untitled (I just couldn't think of a good title for this post!) :-)

Yesterday I was on Pinterest and saw the most gorgeous olive colored chicken eggs (for which I aim to obtain someday soon!) .  I went to the blog site of one of the pictures.  Nice blog.  Great pictures and interesting reading.  But the author hadn't updated in months.  From blogging very regularly to nothing.  No explanations.  Just nothing.  It's not the first blog that I've visited that's been that way.  I always wonder what happened to cause that person to not post anymore.  A death in the family?  Too busy?  Tired of blogging?  Did they not post for so long that they just don't know how to start again?

Busted!!  Guilt!!

There I sat, thinking about how many times I've done the same thing.  I don't go months without posting but I've gone quite a few weeks too many times.  I confess that many of those times I've just been in such a funk about our circumstances that it's hard to think of anything "worthy" to post.  You know, "if you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all"?  And so it's been these past few months. 

I dwell upon (in no particular order of importance)...
Our financial circumstances continues to deteriorate.  We've went from almost nothing (very little income) to almost nothing-er.  Things are so tight that I've cut my last two convenience/luxury expenses of paper towels and paper plates out of our budget.  We do continue to count toilet paper as a necessity though.  ;-)

The weather has been cold and gloomy and that affects my mood more this winter than it has in previous years.  I long for spring but fear another horribly hot and deathly dry summer.

Our renovations to our ancient, tiny mobile home are going much slower than we had anticipated.  It's hard for DH to get much accomplished with his back always hurting and I'm certainly not skilled enough to do much of it.  We have gotten our new kitchen cabinets stained and the first clear coat on.  DH works on sanding them so that we can apply another clear coat.  They are beautiful and I cannot wait to get them installed!!  Oh, I'm so impatient!!

Our little ancient car has been giving us a lot of trouble and has broken down several times.  Today it broke down when I went to the bank and is, in fact, still sitting in the bank's parking lot.  DH has to tow it home tomorrow (it was just too cold to do anything with it today).  We have access to DH's father's van but I hope that our car can be fixed quickly and cheaply. 

Stuck on the side of the road in December about an hour from home!!

Daughter #2 thinks everything is a photo op!

I still can't find my camera and I fear that it is truly gone.  I just cannot remember for sure what happened to it that last day that we used it--Halloween when our little Dachshund Uno had an allergic reaction and we took pictures of his poor swollen little face and body.  Did we take it with us and leave it in the car and it got stolen?  Did it somehow get thrown away?  It certainly wouldn't be the first time that something valuable ended up in the trash!  Did it get stuffed in some little hidey-hole somewhere that I haven't searched?  I feel lost without it!!  And I certainly can't afford to buy a new one!!  I borrow Daughter #2's camera but it isn't as good as mine is and the pictures end up disappointing me.  :-(

Is it just me or is does it seem like the world is going a bit crazy?  I really like a calm, stable, loving environment and all the crazy stuff going on in the world gets to me sometimes.  Crazy weather, earthquakes/volcanic eruptions, government corruption/debt, little children being sexually abused or shot and killed in school...  And the list goes on!!  Jeepers!! 

In a nutshell, I'm a bit worn down by the cares of this world right now and don't feel that I have very much to offer. 

On the bright side...
One of my New Year's Resolutions this year was to craft/create more.  I've been crocheting most evenings and have a few projects that need just a bit more attention to be finished.  I'll try to post some pictures when they're complete.

We've been getting a fair amount of schoolwork done for a change.  Daughters #2 and 4 recently enrolled in the Penn Foster High School program (Daughter #2 is a bit late but has firmly decided that she wants a diploma--not a GED--and worked a housekeeping job at a resort last summer to be able to afford to enroll).  Both girls finished their first unit and received 100% on their first test.  Yay!!

I'm perusing garden catalogs/webistes and planning this year's garden.  I hope that the weather is much more cooperative and not so hot and dry.  I have lots of ideas and there are tons of seeds I'd love to buy.  So far I've ordered...

Amish Paste Tomatoes

Yellow Sweet Spanish Onions

I have a few simple projects planned for this spring.  One of them I am working on now.  I'm saving my yarn scraps to put in a suet feeder to hang on the fence for the birds to build their nests.  You can read about it over at Juniper Moon Farm...

I have a few other things on my mind as well but I'll save those ideas for another post.

I hope that I can post more frequently again.  I do enjoy blogging.  :-)

Until next time...

Miscellany Around the Homestead

Wow...  Where does the time go?  I think I must be in some secret time warp or something.  I realize that being busy has that effect on a person but this does seem excessive.  :-)

So what have I been up to?  We're still working on cleaning up the garden spaces since we kept everything going until the last minute.  It was much more easy/pleasurable to clean up the tomato cages when the plants were dead and brittle than when heavy and still green.  One advantage to procrastination, maybe. 

I've been working things out in my head as to what our garden placement will be next year.  I like to rotate everything and this year I am working toward more companion planting. 

Already I have moved my tea roses where they get more sun than in the spot we hurriedly shoved them into last year when we moved.  I've planted a semi-circle of chives around them (dividing them up and getting them out of the pot that they had grown in for the past 4 or 5 years) to help deter the pests.  I'm eager to see how it looks this summer.

I've got a couple crazy garden ideas in mind, such as... 

1) We are saving all of our empty toilet paper rolls and paper towel rolls to make our own seed starters this year.  I got the idea from Whole Larder Love...  (One of my very favorite homesteading blogs!!)

Then I found some simple directions on how to do it at SimplyForties.  It's a neat little tutorial.  :-) 

What an awesomely inexpensive and green project.  If this turns out to be as nice as the Jiffy Peat Pellets that I use I will be very happy because the cost will be about half of what I pay for the pellets.

2) I am saving all of my 2 liter bottles and will hopefully have enough to sink halfway into the ground to make a border for a raised bed for my pepper plant next year.  I plan to plant carrot seeds in the soda bottles.  There's a lot of garden projects using 2 liter bottles but so far I haven't seen my idea done.  There may be a good reason for that, right?  Ha Ha!!  But we'll see.  The hardest part will be getting DH to part with the cash needed to get some really good top soil to fill in the bed and bottles.  :-)

Some of my indoor projects have been decluttering and organizing.  I've also resumed my kombucha culturing and have begun a batch of soda culture to make some Ginger Beer (not alcoholic).  It's been a while since I've made any and I've been hankering for some.  It's so delicious. 

I am STILL canning tomatoes as they ripen.  My table is still covered in ripening tomatoes!!!  One day I thought, "How crazy!!  Who else in Missouri is canning tomatoes in November?"  But I had been complaining about not making my quota what with the drought and extreme heat that we had this summer.  When most gardeners were calling it quits we were really just getting hammered with overabundance.  The nice thing is that I have lots of green tomatoes to share with family!  :-)

When I have spare time I'm usually on Pinterest or researching herbs and natural healing.  It is my dream to someday soon open an herb store.  :-)

This Thanksgiving week will be a busy one for us with a get-together with my family and also a big dinner here at our little homestead with Son #1 and his family and also Son #3 coming in for that. 

My camera is STILL missing and I am getting worried.  The last time that we used it was Halloween day when we took pictures of our little Dachshund Uno had an allergic reaction (probably to a pecan that got dropped on the floor!) and we took pictures of how swollen up he was before we took him to the vet.  It was a mixed up and stressful day and who knows where that camera's final landing spot was.  It certainly wasn't in any of it's usual spots!  I'd really like to have my camera for the holiday!!

Feeling Over-Blessed!!

Knowing that we would have a hard frost last night, and that we have more chilly nights in store these next few days, I sent the children out with grocery bags yesterday to strip the tomato vines.  I knew that there were a lot of tomatoes on them but I confess that I'm a bit overwhelmed.  OK, a LOT overwhelmed!!

My 3'x6' table.

Totally loaded!!!

These are just from the vines in the front garden.  There are still 10 or so vines beside our mobile home that we decided to put tarps over because the poor table just can't hold anymore and we don't know where else to put them. 

As fate would have it, I woke up this morning with a migraine and ended up going back to bed after I had made lunch for the family.  Amazingly, I slept all day.  I knew I needed to be busy doing something--anything--with my "overabundance" but I think the burden of it all really got to me.  I realize that I've just gotta suck it up and deal with it--but WOW!!  The green ones will hold out for a while but the red ones need to be dealt with right away.  I have two other bags of ripe ones that isn't pictured that need to be processed too.  I'll give it my best shot and we'll see how it goes.  :-)

This and That

It's been quiet around the homestead lately.  In between storms we've been working outside to get all the odds and ends wrapped up.  Cleaning up the remodeling debris is the worst. 

I've also been working on planting my order from Northern Trading Co. that I got earlier than I expected.  So far I've gotten everything planted that they've sent (all but my apple tree)--so that's a load off my mind.  They sent a Robin Hood rose and some hyacinth and crocus bulbs as free gifts.  Everything looks fantastic!!!  I can hardly wait for spring now to see it all grow!

Another project I have coming up is to pull up the poison ivy along the fence line to plant daffodils and the hyacinth/crocus bulbs.  The last time I attempted such a feat (in 2004) I was laid up in bed for 2 weeks afterwards with poison ivy on my face and chest (I was breastfeeding Son #6 at the time and I didn't know that I was covered in the oil when I nursed him.  He proceeded to help spread it on me though he didn't have any reaction himself--Praise God!!).  Sadly, I didn't realize that all those stringy roots I pulled up was poison ivy until after the fact because the leaves had fallen off already.

This was BEFORE it got really bad!!!

The best memory from the whole ordeal was when Son #4 said to Son #5...

"Don't kiss Mommy or you'll get poison ivy and you'll

be UGLY too!"  It still makes me laugh. 

The children constantly told me how much I looked like Gothmog

on Return of the King (Lord of the Rings)

Honestly, they were just about right!!!

It really was horrible!

They almost admitted me to the hospital but I was allowed to agonize at home on my own with the help of lots of Benedryl and some serious steriods! 

This time I'll pull the ivy while I know what and where they are and I will be prepared by wearing rubber gloves, jersy gloves, long sleeves, and pants with all of it coming off as soon as I'm done and being thrown into the washer immediatly.  Then I'll wash up with Dermoplast Poison Ivy Treatment/Wash.

I will never be without this most excellent product again!!!

It truly is miraculous!!!

I must do this dreaded job myself as I don't want anyone else to suffer if it goes badly.  I've got lots of experience in how to avoid it now while working in/around it.  I ignored pulling it up last year and it went forth and multiplied.  I cannot ignore it any longer. 

And now, on to happier thoughts.  :-)

A well camouflaged grey tree frog on our weathered window sill.

He's so cute!

Our chickens are moulting.  We've kept chickens for almost 15 years and I've never seen any look this pathetic!!  I'm giving them hard boiled eggs (crushed up, shell and all) for extra protein as well as their regular feed and scratch. 

From left to right...

Wellsummer, Americauna, Gold Laced Wyandott.

The Wyandott doesn't really appear to be moulting (the fuzz

on her tail is from the other hens pulling at her feathers.  Brutes!)

I still get an egg from her almost every day. 

But the other two are terrible--feathers missing, they're not laying

and they've lost weight.

I'll be glad when they're new feathers come in and they look

whole and healthy once again!

Just look at all those pinfeathers!!

I'm so excited about this little thrift shop find!  Dh had a pretty good day last week and we went shopping.  One of our stops was at our local Goodwill where I found this tiny little desk...

Toddler size!

As I looked closer I realized that I knew that little clown face in the

center of the upper part of the desk.

And those little red knobs.

The neurons in my brain were firing furiously.

Revelation...

I realized that I had a desk very similar when I was little.

Very little.

My most vivid memories of my desk are of wiping chalk

dust off of the inside groove where the chalkboard top rests

when it's closed.

When you erase the chalk marks some of the dust gets

caught underneath.

I can also remember the way the pegboard smelled when you

lifted the lid.

$12 for a little piece of my past.

I'm working to replace a few little things that I've lost through the

years (to our many moves as a child and getting flooded a

couple of times in my married life).

Funny how I didn't even remember this little piece of my life until

I saw it sitting there--waiting for me to come and take it home.

Now to get it cleaned up and find it a comfy spot in our home.

 I'm so happy to have this little jewel (back) in my life!

What I don't remember though is the little attatched seat.  Perhaps my desk didn't have a seat.  I'll have to see if my mom can remember.  :-)  It boggles my mind that this desk could be 40+ years old and in such wonderful shape.

It's the little things in life that give me so much pleasure.  :-)

Belated Garlic Harvest (and other garden news)

Perhaps I should rename my blog--something along the lines of "Adventures in Procrastination". Or some such name along that theme.

I've spent the last couple of days FINALLY getting the rest of my garlic out of the ground. DH had mowed over them thinking they were weeds but they quickly grew back. Sigh. They should have been harvested months ago since it is now time to replant. So I've replanted the best of what I dug up into a new, sunnier spot.

A good haul...

but embarassing!

You're SUPPOSED to harvest before it gets all that green stuff!!

The ones in the top right corner were havested earlier--a tad late...

last August.

But my procrastination was still hard at work.

I never washed them and they still have a layer of mud/dirt

caked onto them.

I'm working on mincing them all up a little at a time as I have a few spare minutes.  I'm just going to can them in small jars for prepared minced garlic.  It's all hardneck garlic and it'll be just as easy to store them canned as any other way--just a little more work initially.  :-)

I've ordered some softneck garlic.  My favorite kind...  Chet's Italian.  It's beautiful, tasty, and makes a wonderful braid.  Can't wait for it to come in.

We had a pretty hard freeze on Sunday night and I did my best to cover everything up.  There was a bit of frost damage but it was minimal.  I still have a lot of stuff waiting to ripen up and we have some beautiful weather yet ahead of us (according to the weather forecast). 

Down the road a bit there's a garden that I've been watching all year.  It was nice and tidy all summer long but I saw a few weeks ago that the owners had cleared it completely out.  They even mowed down their big line of ornamental grass (which looks best, in my opinion, in the winter!!) along their driveway.  Seems kinda weird to me.  My tomato plants are still huge and going strong.  We still have peppers and cucumbers growing.  Our squash and gourds are still on the vines.  I'm just not ready to give up summer until I HAVE to.  Sure it's a little work to cover everything up but it's worth it to me!!  Working in the garden in the fall is just about my favorite thing to do anyway.

Just look at the size of those monsters!  7-8 Feet tall

The brown is the frost damage.

Poor foolish tomato blooms that will never see a fruitful harvest.

And there's still so many blooms.  :-(

Still so many tomatoes left to ripen.

Baby cucumber

Birdhouse gourds still on the vine.

The Virginia Creeper leaves "littering" our driveway.

Beautiful fall color!!

Needless to say, I have a to-do list a mile long of all the things I have to get finished before the cold weather is here to stay.  Thankfully, we have a lot of nice days still to come.  And so off I go--back into the fray  :-)

Have a great week!!!

Fall Is Around The Corner

Happy September everybody!! 

We've been having some rain lately.  Our tally from Isaac was almost 3 inches.  So that was nice.  And not a single gully washer!!  ;-)  There's talk of more rain in the forceast tonight and tomorrow.  Yay!

Everything is greening up nicely again.  Seems odd that normally, at this time of year, everything is turning brown and getting ready for fall.  What's "normal" anymore anyway?  :-P

For DH's birthday and our 31st anniversary this past week we were gifted with some money from DH's parents--and I have gleefully already spent my share of the booty!!  I was wanting to put in some fruits and ornamentals in a few of the limited spots that need some TLC around our place.  We miss our blackberries, raspberries, apples and peaches from the old place and wanted to try to stuff a few things in here at the new place.  I was searching for a small, disease resistant apple tree and discovered a new source of admiration and desire!!...

I bought (pictures are all from their website)...

Liberty Apple Tree

Small tree

Disease resistant

Crisp, sweet and tart.

Self pollinating!!

Perfect!

Elderberry Combo

2 different types for pollination.

Not only are the berries my heart's desire but

the leaves can be dried and crushed to put on

squash plants to repel Squash Bugs!  Yippee!!

Ours at the old place would have bore properly this year.

Dwarf Sand Cherry

Interesting history: A treat for the Westward

Pioneer as they crossed the Prairies.

Pink Rosa Rugosa

I've been wanting some of these for a long time

for those large, edible hips.  :-)

Mixed Butterfly Bush

Sadly, the one that Son #3 bought me for Mother's

Day a few years ago died after I dug it up when we

moved.  :-(

Chinese Wisteria

I've been wanting one of these vines for awhile but

have been afraid of how they can run wild.

I'll have to give it a go and hopefully it'll be

spectacular!

The prices were fantastic!!!  I'm going to go bonkers waiting for them to ship in November though!  :-)  My order qualified for 2 free trees so I'm hoping we'll get something wonderful!!  We shall see.  I'm excited!

Aside from this I am trying to figure out where to plant my fall garden and WHAT to plant.  I saw a neat idea on Pinterest for using an old trampoline frame for a garden coldframe/greenhouse.

The tutorial was at HowDoesShe but I didn't have any luck

getting to it.  I'm surethat DH can figure out how to design it 

easily--It's what he does.  :-)

(when he's having a good

day and isn't doing something else!)

But isn't this cool?!?!

If we decide to do this I will certainly post about it!

Fall is my most absolute favorite time of year!!  So much to do!  How about you?  Do you have any fall dreams or projects in mind?

Some Visitors

We've had some visitors lately...

Guess who's come to dinner...

Newly hatched squash bugs on a pumpkin plant.

Those guys are just creepy no matter what stage they're in!

I've been using Pyola once or twice a week and

still having a terrible time keeping up! 

"By the sweat of your brow" is taking on a new meaning!!

And a welcome visitor...

Mourning Cloak Butterfly

Doesn't it look quite weary and tattered?

Amazingly, it was able to fly away without any apparent trouble.

Son #1 brought his family for a visit last weekend.  We're always so happy to see them. 

Grandson #1 was excited to be able to play in the swimming pool

and the littler ones (and mommy and daddy) were content

to play on the teeter totter.

Daughter in law sent me this picture today...

Precious!

From Left to Right: 

Grandson #3 1 year old next month

Grandson #2 3 years old

Grandson #1 4 years old

This holiday weekend we will be gifted with a visit of the remnants of Isaac.  They're forcasting 2 to 4 inches of rain for our area and I will be happy to see it!!  Hopefully it's not the "gully-washer" kind and comes steady and gentle to moderate.  Hey, I can dream, can't I?  :-) 

Have a blessed and wonderful Labor Day Weekend!!!  :-)

P.S. As of Thursday morning they've updated our rain forcast to be 6-12 inches. Joy. NOT!

Catching Up

Sorry I haven't posted more often.  Busy, busy, busy!!!  :-)

Aside from normal everyday stuff, I am working to preserve the veggies that have survived the horrible, killing heat.  I recently canned 15 pints of the best salsa I ever tasted!!  You can find out how to do it here.  And my latest project was "gummy worms" made from zucchini which you can learn about here.  None of my own pictures since I've just been too rushed. 

Our tomato plants are in a lull.  There are a few tomatoes that we have left to ripen and we have many new blooms but the tsunami of tomatoes is over for now.  I'm hoping for another go around in a few weeks or so.  I still haven't come close to meeting my quota of diced tomatoes that I had hoped for (100 pints and 50 quarts).  I managed, give or take, 25 quarts and 15 pints so far.  We eat them sliced for meals or for mid-day snacks too (and we do share with extended family and friends).  Plus there was the salsa mentioned above.  Not too bad, all things considered.  Sadly, I let a big batch get away from me when I couldn't find the time to process them and they ended up in the compost pile.  :-(  Ripe vegetables wait for no man (or woman!).

I've replanted cucumber seeds since the heat killed the others.  I did put up about 5 gallons of pickles and 30 smaller jars of relish.  I'm hoping to be able to process many more jars of pickles to get us through the winter--the ones that I made are already pretty much gone  The relish is from my all time favorite recipe found here.  I LOVE it!!

I bought some new green bean seeds to replant as well since I only ended up getting a meal's worth from ours (the heat burned the bush beans up and my pole beans got a mosaic virus so I pulled them up).  Gonna try to get those planted today.  Unless something weird happens weather-wise I should get a nice harvest before the cold weather truly hits.  I'm hoping for the best but considering how this year has went so far, I'm not holding my breath.  :-) 

My garlic harvest was disappointing.  The heads/cloves all turned out pretty small but I guess that I should be thankful that they survived at all.

It's time to be getting ready for a winter garden.  I'm hoping to make some coldframes like we did here.  I'd love to try winter cabbage and carrots especially.

And like most gardeners, I am already thinking about next year's garden and how to improve things.  We would really love to have all of the garden area close by and since our front yard was decimated by the chickens last fall/winter we're thinking about building a bunch of raised beds there for everything.  Thankfully we don't have neighbors or any home owners associations to throw a fit and we are rural enough that we don't have to worry about any city officials coming to demand we tear it all out since "front yards are for grass only".  Didn't you know?  Grrrrrrr!!

(click on the picture to read about the "war on gardens"!)

I mean honestly, this is an enviable work of art!!!

The other day I was walking around outside and saw this enormous wasp kind of thing buzzing clumsily about and wondered what in the world it was.  I had seen them before but never could keep it close long enough to identify it.  Then yesterday the kiddos skimmed this creature out of our pool...

Can you see the size of that stinger?  Ouch!

I finally got a chance to identify it at my leisure and discovered that it is a Cicada Killer.  I know that Cicadas do a lot of damage to the trees and such but I do love their buzzing in the dry days of summer.  In fact I can even tell you when I heard my first one this year... June 20th.  :-)  We have a lot of fun finding the empty Cicada shells (exoskeletons that they outgrow) and "playing" with them (putting them on our clothes or in our hair--the brave children put them on their faces.  :-P)

Son #3 in 2000 while we were in Michigan for the

birth of Son #5 (who was diagnosed with Hypoplastic

Left Heart Syndrome but was healed in the womb).

Excuse the bad exposure of this scanned photo!  ;-)

Daughter #1 with her Cicada "skins". 

Apparently she doesn't like them on her face like her

brother did!  :-)

I hope that everyone is enjoying their last few days of summer before Memorial Day hits and we have to truly start thinking about fall.  :-)