Happy Fall..Y'all

I have been working at getting the garden ready for winter.  Pulling out the things that are dead or I am tired of (peppers), working compost in and covering with straw.  We finally found a use for the cylinders.  As you can see in the photo they look great as pumpkins.  I've painted up about 20,  if you'd like one,  just let me know.  They are guaranteed not to blow over in the wind.  I wonder how they will look as snowmen.  Any other ideas of how to paint them?   Please post!!!!

Weekend Warriors Wet

We got some good work done on Saturday clearing what we affectionatly call Junkyard Alley.  We had some trees fall in the spring,  and got them all cleaned up.  We also came across a sizeable deer bed area.  lots of matted grass and scat.  Good signs for hunting season!

Sunday started off with rain so we just hung out a home and enjoyed some family time.

Waiting for Fall

Things have been pretty hectic lately. School has started, Chris' grandmother passed away and everyone got sick. Now that we are all home and healthy here is what has been going on.

We have stacked over 3 cords of wood to heat our house this winter. Chris has built up our small trailer with sides so that I can haul mulch and get both our home and the garden at the property mulched.

I am still sporadically getting tomatos in the garden. I am trying to clean up the beds that are done, but my eggplants and cantalops seem to be fruiting again!

Hopefully in the coming weeks the weather will cooperate and we can work on clearing some trails to the stream. Chris wants to make sure he has things ready for deer season.

 



New Fava bean plants.
Lima Beans in Bkgrnd.



Marigolds in the Tomato beds. 
Looks like fall to me



Sweeeeeet Potato!

We have been so busy lately.  We have been working hard to get our wood stacked up to heat the house for the winter.  So far we have almost a full cord and if the weather holds, tomorrow we should bring home our 2nd cord.

Today the boys and I harvested sweet potatos.  It was a little early, but something ate all the foilage from the plants so I was worried the tubers would rot.  We still got a nice harvest and a couple of really big ones! 

We also harvested any pumpkins or gourds whose vines had died.  We still have some vines producing so we should have some fresh ones for halloween.  The ones we got today we are going to dry in the sun for a day then root cellar them.  All my research says they should keep for up to 4 months,  luckily we just want them to last for 2 months until halloween. 

Waiting for our next big batch of tomatos.

Doing the Can-can

We are getting lots of tomatos , peppers, eggplants, cantalope and rhubarb.  It sure is keeping us busy because what we can't eat, we have been canning.  We've "put up"  rhubarb, veggie sauce, tomato sauce, salsa and loads of pickles. 

While we have been keeping busy, we are looking forward to cooler weather so we can get out there and clean out that house.

Ant or Grasshopper??

It seems I am at the garden about every other day harvesting.  That means that every other day I am chopping, canning, freezing, cooking and dehydrating.  I hope that come winter all this work will pay off and we will be more like the ant than like the grasshopper.  We dehydrated a ton of peppers now I am looking for some pepper recipies.  Today we harvested our first eggplants.  mmmmm

Summer time harvesting

After being gone for nearly 3 weeks,  the garden looks fantastic.  We stopped by on our way home before we even went to our house.  There was almost no weeds and the veggies are out of control.

We are getting a steady harvest of zucchini, squash, cukes, and beans.  I have made both dill and sweet pickles and can't wait to taste them.  The pumpkins and gourds are taking over.  I pruned them back as soon as we got back in town,  but they are ready for another pruning.

I am very impressed by the grapes.  Most are now tall enough to reach their trellis.  Two more years and we'll have a crop.  The tomatoes are suffering badly from blossom end rot.  I have got to get some calcium into the soil to remedy that.  Only the romas seem to be affected.  The big slicers seem to be thriving well.  There are a few eggplants showing up,  the fruits are about 4-5in long already.

Photos below are wild raspberries, Grape vines and general garden view.

This week we also did some general cleanup of the yard.  We cut down a bunch of trees and started a firewood pile.  We have a long way to go to be prepared for winter.  We also tried to repair more of the driveway, but got our 3rd flat tire on the tractor.  Uugh