Has it been three weeks???

I am heartbroken to show you the sad pictures of the tomatoes. I personally harvested two ripe tomatoes. That is horrible since I planted a row and a half. Mother got more tomatoes, but she planted her plants earlier than I so they had more time to produce. As I drive by other folks gardens to see the same, it just frustrates me. It would seem that a nice wet summer would be wonderful, but it goes to show that even though hot dry summers are sometimes miserable to endure, there are good things that come of it.



I was so proud of myself. This year I actually canned something. My husband and I had a great time doing this together, too. I felt like a true gardener. Sure it's fun to plant and harvest the fruit, but to preserve it and use it during non-summer months is exciting. I canned the False Alarm Hybrid Jalapenos. My husband says they aren't hot at all. I was hoping for a slight bit of heat, but non at all? So, I canned a hot jalapeno in each of the jars in hopes of adding some spice. We'll see. They should be just about ready to try.


So I as so excited about preserving my peppers, I wanted to get a start on my pumpkins. BAD idea. Although they looked like they were ready, they were not. I am eager to try and can some of the pumpkins for pies and muffins. Looks like I need to hold off until at least the end of August early September. We'll see.







Though my orange pumpkins weren't ready, my Baby Boos were ready. Lesson learned, DONT plant these until mid-to-late June. I now have all those adorable pumpkins sitting in a shoe box on my table. Hopefully they'll hold out until fall so I can decorate with them.


This is my volunteer gourd/pumpkin/squash mystery plant. It decided to grow right up onto our porch. It is thriving, hopefully the yard guy won't hit the plant with his weed-eater tomorrow. I don't know where this came from, but I am going with it. Who knows what we'll do with these oddities.

Rain Rain Go Away...

Check out this article on the Late Blight Crisis affecting our tomatoes. The main cause is all the rain and humidity. Our crop has never fully dried out. We have hardly watered the garden at all. This is very unusual for mid-July!

Blight

Our poor tomatoes have blight. Last year our garden was perfect. So perfect that we canned a ton of tomatoes and even gave bushels away. This year, we don't know what happened. Mother says that she didn't try so hard last year and maybe there is something to that. This year she stepped it up and fertilized and spent more time on them. I on the other hand stuck my tomatoes in the ground and hoped they'd make it. Both ways, the tomatoes are dying. HUGE BUMMER! It rained a lot this year, I don't know if they plays into it or not, but either way we're just hoping the tomato plants we have will live long enough to allow the fruit to ripen.

On the other hand our blackberries and pumpkins are growing very well!

My children and their buddies picking blackberries!

And here are the pumpkins:

Pollination in its true form.

Cinderella Pumpkins hanging from the trellis.

Pretty little fancy gourd!


We also have loads of green beans. Mother and Granny have canned over 100 jars of beans.

This is my tiger lily. I bought a box full of plants from a yard sale for $5. I think I got my money's worth for this shot alone.

Bringing the Abundance to Friends

I picked 32oz of blackberries last night. We have so many left over from last year that I brought them in to work. In addition to the blackberries, mother picked loads of squash, zucchini and cucumbers. My father and I both took the extras to our office to share.

Mother and Granny have canned over 50 cans of green beans....and that was from the last count a week ago. I saw at least six jars sitting on her counter freshly canned yesterday. Mother had an enormous basket yet to be canned and four more rows to pick. It seems like a lot of cans for one year, but we go through the green beans.



The pumpkins are taking over. I have to go a few times a week and move the vines away from the peppers and tomatoes. I have also trellised them. I am always amazed by how big the pumpkins plants get.




The peppers I am growing at my house in pots are bearing fruit now. These are the false alarm hybrids. I can't wait to taste them!

It Just Keeps Getting Bigger and Bigger!

"That's a Baby Boo"

My son is taking his over-ripe squash to school for show-and-tell.



These pumpkin plants (above and below) are volunteer pumpkins. The above plant is growing in our flower garden. I am not expecting too much from that plant because it is in a mostly shaded area. The growth has been minimal.

The below plant is growing beside my porch railing. The sun is just right. There is poison ivy growing beside it, so the weed killer may get it.



A couple of the first ripe tomatoes!



We found a ripe one!


Look how tall the tomato plants are! They have barely begun producing. We're going to have tomatoes coming out of our ears!


The pumpkin patch continues to grow. Mother and I were talking and agree that they are probably going to double or triple yet!


Here is a gourd. This one looks different than the last couple we've seen! It'll be fun checking out the different varieties we planted.



This is my Cinderella Pumpkin. It's growing on a trellis in hopes of saving the peppers and tomatoes from suffocation!

Here is our Cinderella Pumpkin. We have some others but this one is currently changing colors, so I featured it. It was a cream color and is now quite golden. This pumpkin will turn dark orange, almost red when ripe.



Here is our first Sweet Sugar Pie pumpkin. We hope to can these and use them for muffins and pies.



Our sunflowers are in full swing. Isn't the above sunflower lovely and unique?



My son is picking and eating blackberries. Next week we're going to have more than we can eat!

Zucchini-Squash Casserole

Every month at church we have a pot-luck. For all of my southern friends, this is the norm for church fellowship....perhaps this is the norm all over the country, but it is especially prevalent in the south. So our church always has the same people bring the same type of food For example, because my last name starts with 'A' I get to bring vegetables. To be clear this does not include salad nor does it include potatoes. Usually I have difficulty coming up with a vegetable, but not during the summer.

So, since squash and zucchini are in season, I am going to make a squash and zucchini casserole. I asked my mother and granny what they do to create a great Squash/Zucchini casserole (because to be honest, I don't make a lot of Squash and Zucchini). They gave me some good southern cooking ideas, and I am adding some of my favorite casserole dish techniques to spice it up a little. I tried to be ingenious and come up with a clever recipe name, but since it's for a church pot-luck it would be wrong to call it something other than Zucchini-Squash Casserole (though I'd rename it if I were in MN to Zucchini-Squash Hotdish). One day maybe it'll be Mrs. Ask's famous Zucchini-Squash Casserole, but for now it is simply an attempt to make an excellent casserole.

ZUCCHINI-SQUASH CASSEROLE
From Lisa Ask's Kitchen
with secrets from Mom & Granny

Preheat over to 350 degrees.

Chop 3 Zucchini, 3 Squash into one inch cubes. Finely chop small onion.

Saute Vegetables in 1/2 Stick Butter until soft but not mushy.

Season vegetables to taste with the following ingredients:
Sugar
Garlic Salt
Black Pepper

Pour sauteed vegetables into a 9x13" casserole. Add a cup of shredded cheese and combine. I use Colby/Jack.

Combine one stick of melted butter, one sleeve crushed Ritz Cracker and 1/2-1 cup Italian Bread Crumbs (enough to top the casserole)

Bake 20 minutes or until bubbly!

Salad Day at Pre-school and More.

My son took cucumber and squash to his school today for "salad day." He was proud to say that he picked them from his garden. My favorite kid interpretation is calling Zucchini a Bikini.


I have mentioned how our peppers aren't our best crop? I am serious. These peppers have been in the ground for a LONG time. AND now finally we see some jalapenos. The plants are nearly three feet tall. They are beautiful plants, but I wish they'd spend their beauty on the peppers.



These are my small, fancy gourds. I have been training them on the trellis this week. I am hoping this will allow more garden space, but also, I am hoping that the fruit will be nice and round since they are off the ground.


Here are a couple, beautiful gourds. So far, so round.



This is my tallest sunflower. I like how this sunflower is about six inches in diameter rather than twenty inches. This year I am growing it for beauty rather than for the seeds. You can see a little sunflower underneath. It's even smaller.



My Baby Boos are doing so well. They are growing quickly. I wonder when I will have to harvest them. They are only supposed to be about three inches. I will have to do more research on this. I also trained the Baby Boos to grow on a trellis. This made a huge difference. See below.



And this is the largest of my Cinderella Pumpkins to date. I can't wait to see what they turn into. I built a make-shift trellis to prevent them from growing over the tomatoes and peppers, but I am concerned that the tellis will fall with the weight if pumpkins grow on my trellis creation.



A couple weeks ago I thought my garden was looking bare. I was thinking that maybe I over spaced them. By my memory of last years pumpkins proved accurate. This plant has more than tripled in size in the last couple weeks. I am now starting to think about pruning.


This is our guard dog, Caleb. We keep him chained in the garden at night (with food, water and shelter, of course) to scare off the deer. So far it is really working!



Change of location. We're at my house checking out my False Alarm Hybrid Peppers. They are growing well in the pots...this pot particularly well as it holds water the best. I think I even see the beginnings of some pepper buds. Please disregard the awful weeds. It's on my to do list.


This is also an experiment. I am growing birdhouse gourds in a whiskey barrel. I bet by the time summer is over my whole house will be covered in vines!



These are the squash. Fabulous, huh?

And the harvesting has begun!

Here are the first of the squash! My son is excited to take his squash to school for salad day. I know, right, salad day? Well, that's the plan. We anticipate a couple weeks or so of plenty of squash. I'll get some recipes up next blog.

GOURDS & PUMPKINS

I am quite excited about this little guy. This is a picture of my "small, fancy" gourd. It took everything for my son to not pull it off the vine.


And check out this little pumpkin. This is a miniature Lumina pumpkin. It'll get around 3 inches and will be white. I think it'll be fun to play with these things come fall. But at the rate it is growing now, we might be enjoying them early!

SUNFLOWERS

I was way off in thinking that the sunflower was about as tall as my daughter. It towers over her! Isn't she cute? Oh, right, the sunflowers, yes...I was excited to see that some of the stalks have several buds for flowers. I am so excited to see how these turn out.

GREEN BEANS

Green beans are so much fun. My granny is sitting in her chair breaking green beans. I remember as a wee lassie breaking beans with my Granny. But the process only starts here. She will can all of these beans. I THINK we got about fifty cans last year...and the deer ate half the crop. Who knows how many we'll get this year. Good thing we are all green bean fans. And Granny makes the BEST southern style green beans. These beans are Italian green beans. They are different because they are flat. My family prefers these, but Granny likes the round ones....If she makes them I eat those, too.