Canning Update...

My garden is tiny this year.  In fact, so tiny that I'm sure the local tour guides who pass by in cars with tourists, use it as yet another way to distinguish an "English" garden from an "Amish" one.  Years ago when my garden was big (by my standards) it was regarded as small by said local tour guides, so I can't imagine how it's regarded now!  (yes, it ticked me off a little bit when I found out, can you tell?!  :)  Oh well...)

It's also very overgrown with grass right now, and I will be the first to admit that an Amish garden would NOT look like mine in this regard.  In my defense, the 10" + of rain that we had in the past month did nothing to help with weed control!

Regardless...I'm happy with the results of my canning efforts this summer!

First came the pickles... 

I only got two batches of banana pickles processed before my cucumber plants wilted, but these will hold us over for a while!  The  pear butter on the top shelf is from last fall...

Next came jellies...

Raspberry jelly, blackberry jelly and white grape jelly.  I like to give these as gifts, and we'll still have plenty leftover for ourselves...

Then came tomatoes...

I have four tomato plants this year, and they were doing great until the monsoon season hit.  Now they're suffering from blight, although there are still enough tomatoes out there for a small batch of sauce now and then. 

I made two batches of salsa so far this year...eleven jars each, and I still hae several jars left from last year.  I'd like to do another batch if I get enough tomatoes at once, because I like to gift these jars as well.  We eat a lot of salsa ourselves, so I want to have plenty!

This year's salsa is on the top shelf, the second shelf is several batches each of pasta and pizza sauce.  I use Mrs. Wage's mix for those sauces.  It's quick, easy, and we like the flavor!  My go to Sunday lunch lately has been french bread pizza.  Just slice a loaf of french bread horizontally, spread some sauce, cheese and toppings of your choice, bake it in the oven for about 15 minutes at 400*, and you have a quick lunch!  Bake it on a stone, and the bottom even gets a little crispy.  Mmmm...

Our white grape vine overachieved this year, and I got what I feel like is a huge amount of grape juice on top of the jelly that I made!  I have sixteen quarts of juice on the bottom shelf that I made "the old way", and twelve quarts of juice concentrate on the middle shelf that I made using my friend's steamer.  THAT, friends, is a nifty way to make grape juice! 

The other things on the shelves are things from last year that I need to use up!  I don't have any canned beans, and that disappoints me, but it's my own fault!  We won't be starving anyway this winter, that's for sure!

What kind of canning/preserving do you do?

More Gardening...

Yesterday afternoon my Mom and I went on a local garden tour.  It was a beautiful afternoon, although by the time we were finished, it was quite hot, and we were both ready for a nap!  I only took photos at this one place...and this was only the area directly behind the house and around the pool!  We didn't even venture further into the back yard here, as we had just done a lot of walking at the last place...

We both liked the flowers in the bird bath...

And I love the vibrant colors of the yarrow and day lilies by the garage...

So...today I was inspired to get to work in my own gardens.  I pulled weeds, sprayed weeds, and trimmed with the weed eater where I hadn't had time on Saturday after mowing.

I was a bit a lot appalled at how bad the weeds had begun creeping into the row of shrubs by my garden.  I knew that I wanted to mulch with bark chips rather than regular mulch here, since the chips last so much longer.  And...the golf course across the road has been chipping up tree limbs, fence posts, and all matter of wood scraps over the past few weeks, so...

I drove down and asked if they would be willing to let me come and get some scoops with the skid loader for my shrubs.

I offered to pay, but the guy in charge said that I could have all I wanted for free, and here's the kicker...he offered to deliver as much as I wanted this afternoon!!  Yes!

He brought me three truck loads of wood chips, which was about the equivalent of twelve skid loader scoops, and put them on a pile behind the barn...

Jim offered to help by running the skid loader...

...and in about forty five minutes we were finished!  He dumped, and I spread the wood chips out thickly with my sturdy metal rake.  There are still a couple of scoops left, so as it settles, I can fill in the low spots.

My butterfly bush is a little straggly looking here...it barely survived the winter for some reason...

Now all I have to do is tidy up my edges (tomorrow??) and it will be another project complete!

Oh...and did I mention that it was another fabulous, gorgeous, almost perfect weather kind of day today?!  Icing on the cake!

Overzealous Tomatoes...

For the past twenty two years, I have struggled to grow tomatoes in my garden!

What?!  Who can't grow tomatoes?  Apparently I can't couldn't.

Why?  Maybe partly because there's blight in my soil?  Maybe because when I would sucker them, I was damaging the stem and allowing disease in?  Who know why.

I make a lot of salsa, and I can a lot of pasta sauce, pizza sauce, and plain tomatoes for cooking.  I was determined this year to "do it right" and by the looks of things, I've finally succeeded.  I'm 5' 5", and this one is up to my nose, and just about as big around...

I found a couple of ripening ones this morning...

This is the cherry tomato on steroids.  I'm almost certain it grows a foot each day lately...

There are tons of baby cherry tomatoes hanging on the vine...

So...what did I do differently?

*Last fall I talked to an Amish neighbor who has a green house.  He sold me something to sprinkle on my soil.  Unfortunately, I don't remember what it was called!  It was a 40 lb bag of something that resembled lime in color and texture, but it wasn't lime.

*When I planted this year, I immediately sprayed the leaves with Liquid Copper, which helps to prevent early blight among other diseases.  I'm not an "organic" grower, but for those of you who are, it's an organic approved treatment.

*I also mulched heavily with straw, which prevents the soil from splashing up onto the leaves when it rains, which is how blight spreads to the tomato plant.

*Last, I didn't sucker the plants, but just put the cages around them and left them be.

The results seem to be positive...

All in all, it's a lesson for me to "never give up"!

What's Growing...Or Not...

There are a lot of things growing here this time of year...

My garden is much smaller this summer, and I'm trying something that I've wanted to for a while  now.  Last fall's leaves were piled thickly on the garden, and I just left them lay without rototilling them in this spring.  They're helping to keep moisture in the soil, and weeds at bay...or at least that's the idea.  Our Amish neighbor brought me a couple of wagon loads of horse manure which was spread on top of the leaves a few weeks ago. I'm hoping the extra layer will not only fertilize my garden, but will also help with weed control.  I've heard this referred to as lasagna gardening.  I'll probably add some grass clippings this summer and more leaves in the fall.  While I'm not following the instructions to a T, I'm using the basic concept.  Tilling the soil dries it out and turns over weed seeds.  It's also more work.  We'll see how it works this summer!

We'll be eating fresh zucchini in just a few days!  Beware, kids!

Jim put in a grape arbor this spring.  The large vine in the foreground is one that we transplanted from a neighbor who didn't want it any more...

I'd say it's quite happy here...

The perennials that I transplanted from my big bed to my small one are finally taking off.

This cone flower is one of my favorites...

The number of round bales is growing too.  Jim baled spring seeded alfalfa on Saturday, adding to the row.  The NS on the bales stands for "new seeding"...

These little twins were born last night in the outside pen.  There's a bull and a heifer, so they'll both go to market later this week.  (when one of the twins is a bull and one a heifer, the heifer is often sterile)...

And as for what's not growing...

My big, old perennial bed is well on it's way into a distant memory.  It's been sprayed, mowed off, and in a week or so a skid loader will pull out the old root balls, level off some fill dirt, and we'll seed grass up to the edge of the shrubs.  I'm eager to have it finished!

It was sad to make the decision to get rid of the big perennial bed, but now that it's gone, I don't miss it!  All that work...and I'm also enjoying the smaller vegetable garden.  I'm finding that I have the energy (both physically and mentally) to take care of my smaller beds much better, now that the work load has diminished!  Hind sight is always 20/20, right?

We could still use some more rain!  Last night we were at the very edge of a thunderstorm that dumped almost an inch of rain just a mile or so south of us.  We got about .10", which settled the dust, but we could sure use more!

April Showers...

April showers...bring May flowers, right?

I hope they also help bring up the seeds I just planted this morning!

I'm trying again this year, to plant some things in the pallets along the edge of the garden.  I've planted a few things that are hard to hoe around...and things that I don't like the dirt splashing up on, in between the slats of the pallets.

In the front is lettuce, and those small plants you can hardly see in the farther pallet are kale.  In the rows in between, I planted radishes and beets...

The chickens have now officially been banned from the garden, because I'm sure they would make short work of my plants!

They're NOT happy!

I've not yet found the ideal place to plant my herbs.  They need to be some place close to the house, so I can easily get to them, so I'm trying again in the pig trough on the porch.  Last year I tried a raised bed, but the cats wouldn't leave them alone.  Cats and herbs are not an appealing combination!

It's still too cool for most herbs, but the parsley and rosemary should be fine...

I think the rest of the herbs will go in pots in the pump trough, when it warms up some more.  The cats ought to leave them alone in these two spots!

We also had the big maple tree in front of the porch trimmed back really hard this spring, so there should be plenty of sun on the porch this year, both for the herbs and for keeping my hanging baskets of petunias blooming!

Aren't they pretty?  I can't take credit for growing them...they came from Jim's cousin's greenhouse...

I was hoping to plant my potatoes this afternoon too...after all, it's already mid April. :)   My Amish neighbors probably have potato plants who knows how high  (but who's comparing?!)  The rain came a little earlier than I was expecting, so here they sit...cut and ready to plant in a day or so...

They're Norland Reds.  I can hardly wait to bite into a new potato with it's thin skin...covered in browned butter, of course!

Here's hoping the cold winter killed the potato beetles!  Wishful thinking perhaps?

What's growing in your garden doing right now?

Garden Scavengers...

What do you do when you plant something in the garden that you thought was something that it wasn't?

You could...

1. Use it anyway...
2. Share it with friends...
3. Put it out along the road in hopes that someone will stop to buy it...

Or...you could let it get overgrown...

...and toss it into the chicken pen...

Our chickens are eating well these days!  Overgrown, unwanted cucumbers, watermelon rinds, soft tomatoes...we have it...they devour it!

I call them my garden scavengers!

Random Five Friday

Here is a smattering of what has been happening here this week...

1.  I hate bats.  I really, really hate bats.  Yesterday morning when I came in from the barn, Eric had left a note taped to the window, pointing out a bat that he had trapped between the screen and the glass.  First one of the summer, inside the house.  Did I mention that I hate bats?!

But...I was nice to it, although it took everything in me.

2.  We have two adorable kitties right now, that are spoiled rotten.  This one, Lulu, has a really persistent meow, and she's taken to climbing up either my mop or the rain spout, and hanging on the screen, begging to be left inside...

Did I mention that she's spoiled rotten?!

3.  We caught three ground hogs beside the soy bean field.  Yesterday, the end of the field was replanted...the critters ate almost half an acre!!

4.  Jim's been thinking ahead...we have at least three more hay cuttings to go, and we need more room for round bales, so he started stacking a few of them.  We've been seeing quite a lot of this...

5.  A garden update...I've been picking green beans, a few cucumbers, zucchini, digging some new potatoes, pulling red beets, and a second planting of radishes is doing well.  The weeds are growing... "like weeds!"... as we've had several inches of rain in the past week, and the heat and humidity are rising.

Happy Friday!

Linking up with Random Five Friday

A Walk In the Rain...

I just couldn't help it.

It started raining mid-afternoon today.  The mowing and trimming were finished just in time, and I was "stuck" inside, looking at the flowers out the kitchen window through a light drizzle.  Did you ever notice how the flowers have a brighter, more vibrant color during a light rain?  Everything looked so happy, getting a bath.  (Everything except for the kitties, that is.  They found their way inside...with a little help from ??... and curled up in a box on top of a warm, fuzzy blanket.)

Anyway...tonight after supper as I made my way through the rain to the compost pile with a bowl full of scraps, I took my camera along for the walk. Here are a few of my favorites...

Dr. Ruppel Clematis

Hydrangea...almost blooming!

Red Hot Poker

What kind of flower is this?

I know...that last one is a bit of a stretch.  Surely, not a flower, but they looked happy too!

Have you taken a walk lately in the rain?

Revisiting an Old Idea...

Some years back, I tried something different in my garden...

 A friend had very successfully launched a "pick your own flowers" business in her garden.  She lived along a pretty major thoroughfare, and sold tons of flowers...mostly zinnias and sunflowers.  Her beautiful flowers advertised themselves well.  When her family moved out of the immediate area, she gave me her sign...and her blessing...to give it a whirl in my own garden.

Well...it didn't go so well.  We live on a corner, with a busy road on one side, and a not so busy road on the other.  But...my garden is just over the hill and out of sight from the busier of the two roads, and thus, the flowers were hidden from view.  I was disappointed, to say the least.

Round two...

I had a little extra room in the garden after my veggies were planted, so this morning I went to my favorite green house, and did a little shopping.  I planted two varieties of zinnias...State Fair, and Cut and Come Again, Blue Bedder Salvia, Indian Summer Rudbeckia, Liberty Classic Snapdragons and Blue Horizon Ageratum.  It doesn't look like much now, but hopefully in a few weeks, the flowers will be big and beautiful!

This time, I'm looking at it with a different attitude.  I'm not doing this to make a lot of money.  I love meeting people, and having something to offer that makes someone else happy.  So, every dozen I sell will be a bonus...and every flower that stays in the garden will just sit there and look pretty.  No problem!

As for the rest of the garden...the tomatoes, potatoes and beans survived the cold nights we had last week and are pushing out new growth...

I planted my lima beans this morning....

...and the Iris opened this week!  I think I post a picture of this every year, but it thrills me every spring, when all of a sudden there they are, blooming like they have nothing better to do than to make me smile.  And they smell so good...

What's growing or blooming in your garden?

Frost Warning...

Brrrr...it's getting chilly out there tonight, and there's a chance of frost for the early morning tomorrow!

Before you say, "You should have known better..." let me ask you if you were tempted to get out there in your garden the past week or so, with the beautiful weather we've been having?  I thought so....   :)

I tried to be good, really I did, but I just couldn't help it.  The onions, potatoes, lettuce, radishes, and other cold weather plants have been doing great.  The rest of the garden looked so lonely, so after sitting my tomato plants out on the porch for a week or so, I decided to risk it, and plant them in the garden.  Last week, I dug out my sturdy, square tomato cages, and got my hands in the dirt.

A few days ago, I was at my favorite greenhouse, and we got to talking about how we might have frost this weekend.  I came home with some plastic bags that originally held some potter's mix.  I cut off the bottoms, and they slipped perfectly over my cages...a nice snug fit...

I then slipped another bag over the top, making a tent to protect my tomatoes and my over-eager gardening!   Tomorrow morning, I'll remove the bags, and save them in case I need to use them again.  (Thanks Jack!)

My green beans are up about two inches, but there's really nothing I can do to protect them.  If they freeze, I'll just have to replant.  I have plenty of leftover seeds, and they come up quickly, so while it might be disappointing, it won't be a tragedy.

On another note...

Gato found a new place to sleep...

Right in the middle of my new herb garden, on top of the garlic.  Of all the places he could have chosen.

Maybe he likes the smell?

Random Five Friday...

It's been a busy week...lots is happening at home and on the farm.  With the beautiful...gorgeous...perfect weather we've been having, there just aren't enough daylight hours in each day!

1. Peanut's kitties are growing fast, and getting so playful!  She moved them from the fodder mow, outside to the shed.  They live underneath, play in the weeds behind it, and come running bouncing when we call "here kitty, kitty, kitty".  This is the home she chose for them, and they seem quite healthy and happy!  There are four males and two females.  We've told the kids we will keep two, and the rest are going to a good home next week...

2.  Today is the day Jim will bale his rye grass.  It was mowed on Tuesday afternoon, he's finishing up raking right now, and the round baler will begin anytime!  I wonder how many bales it will make?

3.  My garden is slowly taking shape for the season.  The onions, radishes and potatoes are up...and on the far left lies the string been packet, at the end of the first row I planted a few days ago...

The strawberry blossoms are showing off!  I sure hope we don't get a freeze...this will be the first year picking off of this new patch, and I'm hoping for a bumper crop...

4.  The dogs are in their glory this time of year...they follow me everywhere, and lay at my feet no matter what I'm doing.  If I'm planting in the garden, they lay in the rows... if I'm feeding calves, they lay beside the calf hutches...if I'm mulching, they lay in the flowers.  Here's Snickers, enjoying the sunshine as I fed calves this morning...

5.  My perennials are coming to life!  I have been given small pieces of many different plants over the years, and have had fun sharing with others as well.  (That's what I like so much about perennials!)  I think of my friends when they bloom.

The early blooming Iris came from Brenda...the Fern Leaf Peony came from Edith...

The Forget Me Nots came from Betty, the Lamium came from Carolyn, and I don't remember where the Bleeding Heart came from...

This isn't blooming yet, but the Lily Of the Valley growing fast.  It can become invasive, but I'll forgive it, because I love it's story so much!  This particular plant came to me at the end of a long family trail.  It originally came from my Great Grandma Herr...to my Grandma Herr...to my Aunt Alice from Colorado... to my Mom... and then to me!

What fun!

I hope you're enjoying your Friday!

I'm joining up with Random Five Friday again this week.