Fall wrap up

Time to tear down the garden.

Weekly roundup - August 13

This weekend was rough. H was gone all night Friday and all day Saturday and Sunday. This meant all of the yard work was going to fall on me.

So, to get a jump on things, Friday night I went out and harvested our garden. At night. In my PJs. H got home a few minutes before I finished and snapped this photo of me with the massive zucchini I found.

This is over 12 lbs of produce. The zucchini counts for 4 of those.

I ended up making a batch of zucchini bread and another 5 jars of pickles (2 of bread and butter spears and 3 more dill). Two more zucchini got sliced up and a lb of beans sauteed for dinners this weekend. I'm thinking a lot of fajitas and stuffed peppers are in our future though. It's also a good thing G loves raw bell peppers now.

Our coneflowers continue to be a pollinator heaven. I snapped this photo of a lovely female eastern tiger swallowtail with one of many honeybees.

Sunday photos

Some more photos from today.

Sunflower about to bloom

Overall view of the veggie garden.

Phlox, coneflower and black-eyed susans.

A particularly fun phlox with the miscanthus.

Pretty sure this guy is a red-spotted purple.

Saturday harvest

Photos from around the yard today.

Pumpkin blossom

Lots of sunflowers, some of which are confused as to where the sun is

Lots of veggies

I weighed them all. Notes are in a paper journal, but I had enough cucumbers to put up 3 jars of pickles and still have plenty of leftovers.

Happy hounds in their favorite shady spot

Lucky dog is a sleepy dog

Memorial Weekend - Sunday and Monday

Sunday morning we were at it again bright and early. Went to our local garden store for veggies and perennials - in a downpour. It rained all morning. 

We went up to my folks house with the intention of planting their garden, but the rain meant that wasn't possible. We had planned to stay the night, so the next morning - out in the garden by 8am. There were still some pockets of standing water so it was a good thing I brought my wellies.

They're growing 11 tomato plants, 6 pepper, 6 squash, a variety of beans, radishes, carrots, beets, kohlrabi, broccoli, cucumber, and probably more that I'm forgetting.

Then we went home to cover and plant our own garden. We ended up scaling back a little bit this year and did mostly transplants. We have 4 tomato plants, 3 eggplant, 4 pepper, 2 jalapeno, 2 poblano, 1 zucchini, 1 yellow squash, 2 cukes, 2 beans, 2 peas, onions, dill. Then some oregano, basil and lettuce that I'm going to put in pots on our deck. I still have to plant seeds for carrots, radishes, sweet corn, and pumpkin.

The first rose of the season bloomed either late Sunday or early Monday. 

Finally, some new additions to our patio - umbrella and chairs - to compliment our existing set. I'm loving the combination of blue and red.

The new blue chairs also nicely match our bench.  

Cherokee Trail of Tears beans

Yesterday I harvested about a third of the beans. Some I just didn't get to, some aren't ready. But what a lovely sight, all those glossy black beans. My chili is going to be awesome this fall.

West Fence Bed and Randoms

It's amazing what a few years growth can do

A closeup of some phlox with coneflower and brown-eyed susans in the background.

Rosehips! I have 9 bushes equally laden.

From the veggie garden, we have homegrown cukes and dill.

Which, of course, means pickles! Plus some beans that I flash-steamed for freezing.

Orange and purple carrots similarly steamed. I'm in love with these Purple Haze carrots.

Remember a few weeks ago when I made my first batch of dilly beans? We cracked open our first jar and they were PERFECT! I'm so happy! We finished the jar within two days. The liquid was so pretty I ended up saving it for the next time I make brined chicken.

Garden photos

Black-eyed Susans and native coneflower. 

Shasta daisies, daylilies, roses and dogwood

More daisies, daylilies, roses and grasses

The galliarda are finally blooming.

Behind the chicken wire, protected from the dogs, the switchgrass is finally taking hold.

Purple coneflower

The transplanted phlox is really taking off 

New fireplace bed is looking good.

Veggie garden is really productive this year.

Cherokee Trail of Tears beans on my trellis

Lots of purple things blooming. Russian Sage, Liatris.

Processing the harvest

And so it begins.

I turned about a pound of beans into dilly beans. I have been repeatedly warned against doing water-bath canning on my glass-top stove, so I just do lots of refrigerator pickles. Fortunately C and G adore them. I used my mom's recipe, which came from her Aunt. This is one of those wonderful family recipes that gets handed down and it's not your typical format. It started off with 2 lbs of beans; the amount of brine specified was for 3 pints; a final note indicated that 3 lbs of beans makes 9 pints. You do the math! And woe be unto the person who didn't read it all the way thru.

The color looks different because I was using my Royalty Purple and Dragon Tongue beans and the hot brine "cooked" away the purple! You can see the smaller jar on the right the purple beans still in place. I think that brine was cooler when I poured it in. We'll see how these turn out in a week or so.

For the first time ever, I have a surplus of yellow squash and a dearth of zucchini. So I made several batches of large and mini muffins using that instead. G loves the mini muffins in his lunch.