It's Autumn-time . . .

I think I may have used that title before, but since it is 2012, I thought it was perfectly appropriate to use it (again). After such a hot, dry summer, we have cooled down and gotten some rain. I've been pulling down the veggies and preparing the gardening bed for winter (and trying to kill the bind weed that still lingers). I've been trying to eradicate the raspberries and blackberries from the netting that I put on to protect the fruit from the birds (and neglected to take off or loosen). Hopefully the brambles will survive. I've also tried to freeze or preserve whatever remains from the summer harvest.

The past week I've been inundated with green tomatoes. We had four plants, and the summer heat/dry weather meant that we didn't get a lot of fruit. But the plants were fairly hearty, especially the Roma which took over the side of the house and tried killing the lawn. With frost threatening, I pulled the plants out. I was amazed at the root systems. I had never seen tomatoes with such extensive root systems. Even though I threw many a green tomato into the compost pile, we had oodles of green tomatoes. So I canned.

Green tomato salsa.

Green tomato chutney.

Green tomato bread.

Red tomatoes in juice.

Dehydrated red tomatoes in oil.

I couldn't bring myself to try green tomato cake or pie or anything that tried treating tomatoes like apples. (Call me a purist.) I'm glad it is almost done so that I can put everything away and start enjoying the cooler weather.

And the harvest begins

S wants to make sure you notice the cheese balls in the background. I want you to ignore the mess on the counter. Pretend you only see the radishes.

WAR

War has been declared. A victor has yet to be determined, though dedication and perseverance would suggest who might prevail.

Japanese Beetles have arrived in my garden

To be honest, the beetles have been here since early June (maybe even late May), but they have hit their peek and their focus seems to be the destruction of my pole beans. Yes, these shiny terrorists swarm en masse on my beans, eating, conversing, and propagating. I go out with my yellow bucket of death (read soapy water) and knock the little bugs into the depths of death. Sometimes, and I won't show pictures, I send some of the little boy bugs on their way to the next life very happy.

So while my neighbor's tree across the cul-de-sac show much signs of beetle damage, my beans are holey but strong. I will pick my first beans tonight or tomorrow. (Probably tomorrow because I have a yellow squash and the last of the peas waiting to be eaten.)

But the war will not cease until I have driven these pest into the ground to lay their eggs that will eat my grass and grow into the beetles that I will battle next year. So the war is far from over, but I might just win this year's battle and be better prepared for next year's.

Growing Green THings

So our garden(s) is growing. This is the raised bed in the backyard. You see pea and bean trellises, kohlrabi, lettuce, tomaotes, three carrots, 25 strawberries, one cilantro, and too many bindweed sprouts. Yes, bindweed is trying to take over the garden, but I am giving it a good run for its money. If you have any suggestions for getting rid of it, I would love to hear them. The plan right now is to use chemicals (eek) on the garden after the final harvest.

But the point is that the gardens are growing, despite rabbits, weeds, and inexperience.

Raised Beds

Everything cool weather is in, though I do plan on doing a few more rows or peas and lettuce. Once the frost-free date comes, everything else will go in too. I hope this works!

When you are in the service of your fellow beings . . .

The boys and I went to the church community garden today to put in some veggies. I was frustrated because the plot that I thought was ours--the one I worked on last week--had been plowed and planted. Which means that that plot wasn't ours. I thought I had read the very badly written map correctly, but when I called my dear husband this morning and asked him to look up the map on my email and it took us a few minutes to get it figured out, I found out that I had been reading it 90 degrees off.

I headed over to the new plot and started working, but A--didn't nap long in his car seat and didn't like sitting in the pack-n-play. So I had to stop working the ground with two hands and a shovel, put A-- in the Baby Bjorn and start working the plot with just one hand. After about 40 feet, a nice older gentleman that I didn't recognize from the ward showed up to plant beets and carrots. He was nice and introduced himself. Then we all got to work. I let the boys play in the car to try and keep them occupied because by that point we had been there too long, as far as they were concerned. 40 feet later, Mr. Miller had finished his rows and came over and asked me how much longer I was planning on being there. You see, he had a small tiller at his house, and since he had finished what he was planning to do today, he would run home and get his tiller and then come back and till the plot for me. I almost started to cry I was so grateful.

When he got back, he told me to relax for a few minutes while he tilled. I had been working hard and needed a break.

After he had finished, I asked him if there was anything we could do to show our thanks. He said something very profound: Serving others is why were are here on the earth. I thought King Benjamin would whole-heartedly agree with him.

Mr. Miller is 92. He lives in the Mennonite community next to the LDS church building. His wife, who had needed some pretty constant care for the past three years at least, died two months ago. He is grateful to be able to garden in the church's community garden. He is praying for rain for his eight rows of corn. He is my little miracle.

A Bug's Life

Yesterday S-- and I planted our apple trees. The spots we had chosen, however, had some ants, and the ants were not very happy about being disturbed. S-- had just turned to me, telling me about his new ant friend Addy, when he started screaming. I hadn't realized Addy was on his finger and when she bit, she bit hard and fast. S-- started screaming. I knocked the ant (and all others clinging to his fingers) off and hurried him inside for some cool water on his hand to ease the sting. "She wasn't very nice," he said. But he was quick to forgive. Just a little later, he was outside "feeding" the ants grass.

A little later, S-- had disappeared inside the house, when I heard faint screaming. I didn't know where it was coming from because I had left the screen door open and would have heard the screaming if it had been coming from my house. Yet, with a mother's instinct, I ran to the sliding glass door, and S-- was standing on a chair, screaming bloody murder. "A spider!" But since the door was locked and S-- wasn't getting off his chair to open it, I had to run all the way around the house to the garage door. When I got inside I saw the spider, disposed of him, and then comforted the poor boy.

All in all bugs and S-- didn't get along so well today.

On another note, my boys have talent. They can poke at a fire pit with sticks and start a fire. (Of course, it takes some lazy boy scouts who didn't properly put out a fire the night before, for it to work.) Yesterday, we were at the church digging over our dirt to plant peas before it rained today. The boys were running around on the grass and went over to the fire pit. I didn't worry because of course the boys had put it out all the way Wednesday night. The S-- yells "We made a campfire!" I looked over, and sure enough, there were flames coming out of the supposedly 20-hour-dead fire. I took the precious water I had lugged to the garden to water my seeds (which hadn't been planted) and ran to the fire pit. I put out the fire, made sure that it was out, and the coals were cool/wet, and then hurried home to call the YM president and let him know that someone messed up somewhere.

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

(tomato starts in old yogurt containers)

Well, I don't know about Mary, but mine has taken a lot of work lately. My dear husband built some raised beds for our vegetable and strawberry gardens, and we had some dirt and compost delivered for said beds, so last week was spent moving the dirt. Of course, they delivered the dirt the day before a huge rainstorm, so we had to do our best to keep the dirt dry.




Moving the dirt allowed for a great science lesson about "garden soup": the best combination of ingredients for garden soil. It also made for mud footprints across the carpet. We finished filling the beds on Saturday, and have enough leftover compost for the trees and bushes that should be delivered soon. We also have enough dirt to fill some holes and start reversing the negative grade against the house. (As if we didn't have enough projects started already.)

I want to promise my neighbors that our yard won't always look this pot-marked. I'm planning on redeeming the grass this fall when I can do something major about the weeds. Until then, we'll look a little white trash.

While it was raining, we started some tomato plants inside. We spent so much money on dirt and wood, that I couldn't justify buying real grow lamps, so we're making do with this. We had three under-counter lamps (that plugged into the wall), so I pulled them out (I didn't like them taking plug and other space) and stacked them on top of jars. The bulbs are only 15 watts each, but my little tomatoes seem to be happy so far.

I'm planning on planting peas, lettuce, carrots, radishes, and kohlrabi in the backyard on Monday morning. We've also got a larger plot behind the church, so we'll be planting other veggies there--things that need space like watermelons, cucumbers, squash, pumpkins, and more of the regular veggies.

I promise pictures as we go.