ALL COMES TO A FULL CIRCLE

Well things are starting to wind down now. The pumpkins & squash are ready to harvest and be put to bed for the season. The beans & tomatoes are still producing but are starting to slow also. We just pulled up the last of our carrots. It's sad but also gives promise to the new season coming and using the lessons we learned from this season.

My niece has been helping me in the garden for the past few weeks. We are learning together and hopefully she will help me plan next years garden and be more active in it. I have really enjoyed seeing her work in the garden.

Here you can see my niece Larissa harvesting some green beans. These beans are actually growing out of the back of the compost. We never planted these beans. There is a weird shaped tomato plant growing out of the side of the other bin. As I was saying she is learning to garden and last week I was showing her how to deadhead some flowers and what it means to do that and that the flowers will actually grow back better. So, I gave her a pair of clippers and set her to work on some mums that are in the front window boxes. I was working around the corner. I could hear her clipping away and then she said to me "boy aunt Shari there were a lot of dead flowers on these". As I rounded the corner and looked to see what was going on I had to laugh because all that was left of the mums in the window boxes was green stems and some buds. They have been completely DEADHEADED AL RIGHT!!!!!!!

So I'll end this blog for now. I'll add some pictures on the end but please take a look at the slide show it is a log in it self on how the summer went this year.

The beautiful bounty and hot, hot weather

It is August and everything is fruiting. I can't keep up with the harvest. It is a lot of fun watching everything grow. We have been trying to either freeze, dry or can the extras so we can have our home grown veggies during the winter. Here are some pictures of the bountiful harvest.



The new hot, humid weather has been a god sent but also a menace causing some issues with powdery mildew. Giving the squash a good trimming (leaves with the mildew) to help with air circulation and a mixture of milk and water sprayed on the rest should help clear things up in a jiffy. Things look a little raggedy during the hot day but they get a little more perky with the coolness of the evening. I did lose one tomatoe to late blight but I'm keeping a close eye on the rest and so far so good. The mystery plant growing in the carrots we figured out to be a very large spagetti squash. It is pictured above the big white sqaush. It suddenly started to grow out of the row of carrots. Must have been a seed in the compost.
The herbs are taking off now. I have been drying most in them but have thrown some of it in the freezer. The dehydrator helps a lot to get alot of the herbs dried at once. I have found that it is best to dry only one type at a time though. It smells so good in the house when we are drying them.

The flowers are loving this hot, humid weather. Some of the sunflowers are taking off. I will leave off her with a few more pictures of the garden. Please check the slide presentation for 2009 garden and see all the various pictures of the garden. It is a lot of hard work but done with love.