Around the Place

baby lettuce mix

I thought today I'd just give you a few pictures of things happening around here.  The baby lettuces are taking off. Botanical Interests has many varieties of organic lettuce seed for you to try; I love all the colors, flavors and textures available!

Bleushokker Soup Peas

The Bleushokkers were the first peas to go in this year and are doing well. I grew them for the first time a few years ago. You can read a review of them and 5 other peas varieties that I wrote over on Associated Content.  I'm really looking forward to pea season this year with the Bleushokkers, snow peas and green and purple snap peas.

Along the south side of the house

I whacked down some of the weed trees along the south side of the house. I would like to get the greenhouse finished along there but I don't know if that is going to happen before it gets cold this year. Still so many things to do!

Heavenly Blue Morning Glories

The morning glories are still going strong; can you see the white gourd blossoms mingled in with them?

Gourd blossom peeks out from under the morning glories

potatoes growing in a pot

My potatoes growing in pots are doing ok but not the best. The ones I planted in the garden beds basically croaked while I was on vacation, there was a 100+ heat wave while I was gone and they just didn't get enough water. Better luck next year!

planting bed

 







I divided this bed up into sections for planting. In it I planted Bloomsdale longstanding spinach, Golden Globe yellow turnips, Easter Egg radishes, Western Front kale, mixed lettuces, mache, mizuna and chard. The turnips and radishes are planted in the dividing lines. After watering I covered  it with a row cover to keep out the birds.

stone steps in the creek

Last weekend I also worked down in the creek. I'm on the down stream side of the culverts. The July 4th storm washed a lot of dirt out of this area.  Since part of it was washed out anyway and a very steep drop to the bottom I decided to make some steps to make it easier to get up and down. I'm also working on the walls around the culverts.

stone walls in the creek

Clean up, Spruce up

dawn through my bedroom window

I love fall, with the weather cooling off, the crispness of the early morning air. The fact that dawn is no longer right in my eyes because the sun has shifted a bit.

I also love that this is when the Heavenly Blue Morning Glories are at their most outrageous. I grow them because they remind me of my Granny, who loved them.

So sorry not to have been posting; came home from vacation and jumped right back into work along with trying to unpack and tidy up.

But the past few days I've been working out in the yard a bit. A lot of things didn't make it through my vacation, but the beans managed to survive and if you look closely at this pic you will see a nice little bowl gourd hiding among the Morning Glories. Most of the beets and carrots made it and I replanted some of the spots where they didn't.

I've been busy planting lettuce and peas. The peas are just practically jumping out of the ground. Bleushokers and Sugar Snaps so far, along with a few sweet peas in the front yard because I'm addicted to their scent. Can't wait for the lettuce to be big enough to eat, probably 2-3 more weeks yet.  I'm slowly getting weeds, debris and trash cleared out and thinking about what else I want to plant.

The volunteer tomato plant turned out to be a Yellow Marble

Violas in the tub, planted sweet peas on the little tower

 

culverts, downstream side

This week I also began on the downstream side of the culverts. Yeah, the one in the middle is bent, my son straightened it out as good as he could this evening. Neither of us were here when the culverts were installed or we could have fixed it and had the bent part installed at the top. You can see that the culverts are uncovered by about 3 feet; that happened during the storm July 4th. This area will take a lot more work than the upstream side did.  In the meantime I blew the motor on the mixer and had to mix the last two batches in the wheel barrow. My son replaced the motor with a used one that he had, so we'll see how long it lasts.

The front steps, with assorted herbs & flowers in pots

east side of the house

Yesterday I started working on cleaning up the east side of the house, so here's the before pic, tho I forgot to take an after pic, so you'll have to wait till tomorrow!

It’s a Jungle Out There September 6, 2009

It’s a Jungle Out There

September 6, 2009 at 3:48 pm

Well, here’s a few pics from around the yard to catch up since I missed so much of August.
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover an arch by the front gate.
The small sunflowers are still blooming. They attract a lot of butterflies and bees of all kinds.
One of the surviving Heritage raspberries has put on a few fruits.
The Moon & Stars watermelon is going strong, tho no fruit yet.
Elephant Ears & Canna lily
The Jicama are going strong, just hope they are making nice big roots!
Can’t hardly walk beside the house for all the plants out there.
Delicata squash almost ready to pick.
The eggplants in pots on the patio are doing very well.
A couple of Rio Grande pepper plants loaded with fruit.
The back garden. The two empy beds in the middle are for carrots and parsnips.
Kentucky Wonder green beans cover a 5′ wire cage. So far it’s been so hot they haven’t set any beans, but I found one yesterday so we should have lots of them soon.
Apache Purple pod beans cover part of the greenhouse. They are just beginning to bloom.
Cucumbers & beans. I don’t think we’ll get many more cukes tho, they are severly infested with aphids. I think I should probably just pull them out.
Four o’clocks bloom by the front gate.
16 baby artichoke plants in their pots. Just not sure where I’m going to plant them!
The 11′ Lima beans, which still have yeilded no beans.

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Tally HO!

September 5, 2009 at 4:05 pm (corn, cucumber, food, freedom, gardening, grow your own food, self sufficiency) · Edit

All right, I’ve gotten a bit behind posting here, just soooo much going on in Aug! The grand kids went back to school and so did their mom, so we have children 7 days a week now. But the numbers are in for August; 100 eggs and 79.5 pounds of produce.
Heavenly Blue morning glories cover part of the greenhouse. You can just see one of the Kabocha squash in the leaves at the lower left.
Here  you can see that corner of the greenhouse on the right, then the baby corn, the row of paste tomatoes and on the left some cucumbers and an apple tree still in it’s pot.
Yesterday and again today it is raining. Actually when I took this pic through the front door it was also hailing. We got .4″ of rain yesterday and it is very dark and rainy again today. We were going to go to the lizard walk at the arboretum today, but don’t think that is going to happen. This rain looks like it might hang out all day. It is 9 AM and it is as dark outside as if the sun were nearly down! And I’m loving it and so it the garden.