Food from the garden and bugs

While we would still probably starve if we were depending on the garden, we finally harvested some actual food this week!  Other than the many salads we've harvested, we have now enjoyed two zucchini, two one ball squash, 16 green beans and five little strawberries.  The strawberries were a fun surprise.  I had forgotten about them completely.  I was walking into the house with a squash when I noticed some red in that pot.  We enjoyed them on our ice cream after dinner.

 There is a lemon cucumber almost ready and one little tomato that is turning red.

 That one is on the heirloom plant called Stupice.  It beat the early girl plants by a long way and they had a huge head start.  I would write this down in my garden journal, but I can't find it.  If you could see my desk, you would know why.  My desk looks like this because I have an 18 month old monster that can now reach on top of tables and desks, pulling anything and everything down onto her silly little head.  So we've had a few desk avalanches and the result is not pretty. 

For fun and because I had a packet for some reason, I planted buttercup squash.  I know nothing about them except that the seed packet said to let them climb up a tomato trellis.  They are up and out of the tomato trellis and fighting the tomatoes for their trellis.  Those vines crack me up, how they twist around anything and coil up so tight. 

The one ball squash are making a comeback.  This one will be ready to eat in the next few days.  These squash seem to be attacking the tomatoes too.  Instead of hanging out from the garden box like I thought they would, they are leaning back into the tomatoes and making quite a jungle.  Their prickly leaves have helped keep the little monster from getting too friendly, so I guess the jungle is a good thing.

 Here's that buttercup squash that is trying to take over the world.  You can't see the cucumbers next to them.  The bees have really loved these flowers, so maybe I have this plant to thank for my one ball and zucchini finally coming around.

 My neighbor found a horn worm on one of her tomatoes, so we're now on high alert.  I informed my kids that I will pay a penny for every caterpillar and grasshopper that they kill and bring to me.  That resulted in a bull-like six year old tearing through my plants and breaking a few things.  Maybe I'll take the horn worms over the six year old...

 I did find a grasshopper tonight and I squished it with my bare hands.  It was gross, but I didn't want it to get away.  I have given my son two chances to catch grasshoppers I found and he's 0 for 2, so I did it myself.  And then I found two earwigs hanging out on my lemon cucumber plant.  Even though I hate them with all my being, they are way too creepy to squish with my bare hands.  I moved one to the sidewalk, where I stepped on him and the other one got away.  Yuck.  Earwigs give me the shivers.

We are having a problem with the sprinklers.  These big beautiful blossoms catch so much water and then can't be pollinated.  I went out this morning to drain the blossoms and found a dead bee in one.  I need those bees, darn it!  We don't have control over the sprinklers, but we did try to figure out how to change the schedule.  The little timer thing says they are all off, so that's a little confusing.  I'll keep my husband on that one.  Maybe if we get the sprinklers to come on earlier, the blossoms won't be open yet.  Worth a try, I guess.

I'm linking up with the barn hop!

The view from my window

I think I've mentioned before that I live in a basement, without many windows.  The one big window we have is in my bedroom and it looks out to the patio in back.  This morning, as I was trying to wake up fully, my husband zipped open the blinds and, um, blinded me.  As soon as my eyes adjusted, this is what I saw.  I had to go outside for a picture, what with the screen and window being in the way.

I've decided I like pole beans, even though these ones haven't even put out a single blossom.  I like how the leaves are heart shaped and fill the space.  I like how daring the vine is, seeking out for something to climb and how it twists around things so quickly.  I've tried pole beans before, but didn't have any success.  Actually, the twigs I put in the ground for them to climb did better than the beans did. 

In other areas of the garden, there is one zucchini almost ready to pick and a one ball squash that is getting close.  Now I've got to decide what I'm going to fix with our first zucchini.  Should I fry it as a side dish?  Chop it into a casserole?  Mix up a pasta salad?  Maybe grill it next to some burgers?  I know I'll have plenty of opportunities to do all of the above many times over in the next month, but what to do right now? 

I've been discouraged by the summer squash this year.  The plants are big and healthy and there are plenty of blossoms, but the fruit are not growing.  They just rot right there on the vine.  We should have had at least ten of the one ball squash by now, but we're finally getting one.  I've been taking matters into my own hands lately, carrying a paintbrush out with me to make sure those flowers get a chance to produce.  It's a good thing we aren't dependent on our garden to feed us, because the lettuce is giving up, only one pea plant survived, and the radishes and turnips didn't do well at all.  I'm hoping all those green tomatoes will ripen someday soon.  I'm getting anxious for a tomato!

Bum lambs and zucchini

We got a bit of a frost this last week. The squash are a bit down about it, although you can see a bit of pumpkin peeking out, already turning orange. Amazingly, the corn is unaffected. I keep finding big zucchinis because my mom doesn't like to look too far among the spiny leaves. We've had zucchini casserole, stuffed, fried, pasta, steamed, sauteed, even in tacos. I still want to try a recipe I found for zucchini parmesan. I'm not sick of it yet. The stuffed zucchini was surprisingly good.


It rained during the night last night and most of the day today. We don't often get a rainstorm that sticks around like that. We usually have quick mountain squalls, so it was kind of nice to have some rain actually penetrate the ground. It felt like a lovely day to sit inside and get things done. Then I heard a sheep bleating outside in the yard. Lovely, the lambs escaped, so I head out into the rain to get them back in. They had been breaking out of their pen and visiting the neighbors, so I moved them to greener pastures yesterday. Problem is, they consider the other pasture home and will do anything to get there. A rattle of pellets convinced them to reconsider though.
Dang soggy lambs, crowding around my legs, like three enormous sponges. I am still missing one and I suspect he's in the neighbors property. They don't graze it at all, so it's like a wonderland for lambs. I tried little Bo Peep's philosophy, but he hasn't come home, even though I left him alone. The time has come for them to be turned out with the herd. My kids raised them because they were orphaned, but now they're big and fat and pretty independent. They don't even like the beet greens I gave them... ungrateful little balls of wool. I tell them there are goats that would be grateful for what I give them, but they just step on my feet with their pointy toes and wait for me to give them a treat.

Happy harvesting

I almost had one of those days where I get so much done and it all works out great... almost. I actually got up early today! That's hard for me, but today I did it and I headed out to the garden to do some much needed weeding. I came home with more than I expected. It was such a fun morning in the garden. The peas that I gave up on actually had some pea pods ready to pick. Those wonderful 'one ball' squash had two more for me, I picked a head of lettuce and all my beets --nine total. Not a good beet year. One and a half pints of pickled beets is all I got. We use the greens too. Surprise! One of my mystery squashes is an acorn squash. I don't know much about them. I think it was ready to pick. Do they store well? Guess I'll be doing a little research. I also accidentally broke off some green cherry tomatoes. I doubt they'll ripen, but we'll see.

Garden tended, two loads of laundry, canning, cookies, bread, dishes, dinner started... of course something had to go wrong. Somewhere in there, I killed the bread. It started out so great, but it ended up two ugly, stubby loaves. Not my greatest baking moment.

Watching the garden grow

Well, we ended up being gone for two weeks, and it turns out that the garden survived just fine without me. Of course it helped that my mom hauled water while I was gone. She wasn't supposed to do that, but she did. I guess that was her way of paying for all the cute squashes that she got. Here's the before and after. Some of the squashes are taking over and I already see several pumpkins starting to swell. I was picking those cute 'one ball' squash, and noticed a big zucchini too. Those were so good to eat after eating road food for two weeks. Ugh, I hate traveling. I also picked a cute little cucumber and more turnip thinnings. I forgot to take a picture, but there will be more squash in my future, I'm sure.

First Harvest and oven blues

Technically, my first harvest was a few days ago, when I ate the turnip thinnings and one radish, but this was the first thing that I could actually fix for dinner. Two, 'One Ball' squash. I have lots of these coming, which is wonderful, since my yellow crookneck plants don't even have any blossoms yet, and my son's zucchini are still very small. These are the first summer squash I've ever grown and harvested. I sauteed them with some onion and Cajun seasoning. Yum! Except my mommy brain struck again (just like today, when I burned the cookies and left the lid open on the washer) and I cooked them longer than I wanted to. I thought I turned the burner off, but I guess I just thought about it and didn't do it. So, they were a little overcooked, but they still tasted good. My husband humored me and tried a bite.

Here's the garden a few days ago. The corn is more impressive now and growing fast. Hope it makes it before the frost! I'm going to take a picture this week again, because we're going on a week long trip and I want to see how much it grows while I'm gone, or if it just can't possibly grow with me not being there to look at every single plant and blossom.

I think I identified the mystery squash. Judging by the size and shape of the little green squashes, I'm guessing it's a pumpkin, which will make life a little difficult as it smashes the other squashes in that row and takes over the pathway. I need to figure out some ways to protect the other plants around it. The poor cucumber plant behind it is struggling as it is, poor thing. I'm just not good at cucumbers or beans yet. One thing at a time, I guess. Hopefully, when I get back, I'll have some cherry tomatoes waiting for me!

On another note, my mom's new oven has stopped working properly. I say properly, because it sucks you in by preheating normally, so you think all is well, but then it never kicks on again, so you put your cookies in, for example, at 350 and watch as the butter melts and runs out of them and they slowly flatten out, but never cook. Then you open the oven, which still says it's at 350, and notice that it just feels a little warm, not enough to actually cook anything. Luckily, or unluckily, I'm not sure which, mom still has an old stove in the basement that she uses for canning. So I preheat and take the already melty, runny cookies downstairs and put them in to bake. Then, my baby wakes up and needs attention. Sometime later, I remember that I'm baking, or shall I say, burning cookies downstairs. They probably would have been a failure anyway, but the extra baking time sure didn't help.
On to the bread catastrophe! Once again, it preheats wonderfully, so I pop five loaves of bread in. 30 minutes later, I notice that they haven't baked, but have now risen five inches. Downstairs we go again, unfortunately, they crashed, since they were partly baked, but mostly dough. I have a timer set this time, so even though the bread will look terrible, at least it won't taste burned. I hope.
I really have a hard enough time surviving day to day as a homemaker when everything goes smoothly. I don't need the appliances to sabotage me just for fun.