How does your garden grow?

Corn on July 15

Corn on July 4

So how does my garden grow?

Pretty well it seems.  So the corn that was eye high a week and a half ago is taller than me today.  The pumpkins that were growing in the box have taken over the plot.  I managed to get some of my green beans, but I don't think I'll get in there again judging from my pumpkin overflow. My zucchini is growing and I'm starting to actually harvest stuff.

Chives,  Swiss chard,  beets, and garlic onions.  Not to mention the herbs I've been harvesting from the garden annex.

First  Harvest

Today I  also saw a bunch of skimmers flying around the garden and pollinating.  They landed on my husband and flitted and played all over the place.  My cucumbers are starting to grow.  So far two of my pickling cucumbers have been harvested and I will be slicing them up and pickling them in the next day or so.

 My San Marzanos are not only growing past the trellis but are finally coming in.  It won't be long before I'll be canning them for future use.  My beets have been growing bigger and bigger but I think I lost the eggplant to pests.  😢 I think I'm going to have a ton of squash this year.  So knowing what I know now, which is barely more than I did a few months ago, I can plan better next year.  Until then, I guess I better find some pumpkin pie recipes because... yeah... I'm gonna have a lot before I know it!

She hears her sisters

This garden keeps going!  But what blew me away yesterday was how, after a couple of days of not visiting my garden because after a couple of days of being here there and everywhere, I  was shocked at how things just exploded!   My squash just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger.  The corn grew a few more inches. 

I'm wondering how big this squash is going to be in the end.  So, granted, I haven't grown squash before and the only real experience I have had is the time my mother swept a rotted pumpkin off the patio and into where she normally planted some marigolds or other annuals. 

The next year we got pumpkins.  They were little bitty pumpkins and were adorable,  but the leaves looked like, well leaves.   They didn't have this large fan-like leaves that grew two more inches over a couple of days.

The tomatoes seem to see the trellis as a bar to climb and keep growing.  I suspect it won't be long before I'm adding another bit of height to that trellis to accommodate their height. 

I am so out of my league here.

But that's not the only part of the garden that is blowing up.   Over in my other part of the garden, you know the one that I have everything else? Things just decided to pop up over there as well.   Exhibit A would be my beets!

I have been excited about my beets but a little nervous as well. Yes, I grew them from  seed and was all "woo hoo I have beets!" but he leaves have been kind of the same size for a while and I was trying to figure out how they would be ready to harvest in  the next week or so (according to the package) when I walked in yesterday and BOOM, just like that they quadrupled in size and I know pretty  soon,  I will  have  beets to harvest.

It was surprising and shocking to see how big they are.  Also the DE  I used to get rid of some of the pests that were eating my eggplant worked.  It's not a  great picture, but that is actually a blossom on one of my eggplants.  That means at some point I will have eggplant and be able to make some parmigiana with the tomatoes trying to raise the bar over next to the three sister garden.

All of my other plants are doing stuff.  My little sugar pie pumpkin that made me squeal is climbing up its tower.  I need to build a new trellis for the oopsie-doopsie planting of putting the squash in instead of eggplant next to my peppers.   Those guys are starting to really assert themselves in spite of the squash pushing a bit. 

Overall,  the garden is growing beyond my wildest dreams.  I'm pretty sure that I'll be harvesting stuff soon.  No matter what, this has already exceeded my wildest dreams. 

A wall of ... tomatoes?

My new trellis at 3' high

So I thought I was going to have some tomato plants.  You know, some San Marzanos and Romas.  No big deal. I started them from seeds and didn't think they'd do much.  In fact, I gave a lot of plants I started to other people as they began to get true leaves to spread my happys.

I planted the last few in my 2 x 4 box not expecting the plants that have been showing up this week!  So right now

That meant time to start building a trellis.  I had the smaller CPVC pipes as poles for the beans on the other side of the box wall, so it was time to think through what to do for my tomatoes.  Right now I've got a basic trellis built that I can add onto as they grow larger.  I wove the plants through the poles for now.  Like everything, it's up for modification and redesign as I go along.

Humungous Jarrahdale leaves

Since my focus was on the three sisters/tomato box today, I went to check on the 3 sisters side of things.  Remember that little bitty Jarrahdale pumpkin seedling given to me a couple of weeks ago?  The leaves are 8" long right now and getting bigger!  Holy Shamoley!!!  I was pretty excited about that when I saw them.

Then, of course,  I began to wonder about just how big do these leaves get?  I know the fruit is supposed to get that large, but the leaves?  It makes me wonder how our garden at the school is doing.  I'll have to go into school this week and see how it's doing and post some photos for them in our electronic classroom.  If my garden is any indicator, it's rolling gangbusters too.

I hope.

After the severe weather passes, I'll spend a lot of time this week trying to figure out how better to drain my tomatoes in buckets on the deck.  I drilled drainage holes, which have been fine but we had a couple of severe storms roll through this weekend and some more predicted for today (friends on the other side of the city are reporting cool electrical storms and posting rainbow photos).  Right now I have a tarp over them because the soil is saturated!  My herbs are OK because there's a couple of inches space at the bottom of the pot for drainage and overflow.  I'm not sure if I can repot them right now, but I may need to pick up an upsadaisy to create that space and overflow reservoir to keep that from happening again.  It may just be a note I need to take for next year.  We'll see.  We'll see.

Good fences make good neighbors?

Before with wooden gate

After, with PVC gate

Having replaced one fence, it was time to start moving across the lot and replace the next one.  So today I replaced the gate of, what has become, my main plot.  

It doesn't seem like a lot; however, it makes a difference in so many ways.  The wooden gate was in bad shape and needed to be replaced.  This one now swings fully and easily and is actually somewhat lighter.  I may stop there for now as the last bit of fencing is pretty solid.  

But it was running into the person who has the plot next time mine today.  She has been MIA this season and I thought maybe she was gone, but it turns out her husband had surgery and she's been caring for him.  I helped her attack some of the weeds and lent her my rake to make it easier on her.  I told her that I was going to start weeding her plot next week because some of the mint is now large enough to be shading my plants.  I will make sure to hit up some of her plot when I'm down there working going forward.

I think about how my garden failed last year because of being on the road for three weeks.  It feels good to give someone a hand.  I love my garden, it has become such a place of joy for me.  I hope others feel the same about their gardens.

Speaking of surprises, this was a good one.  I went in to water my corn and squash and found beans and some lovely blossoms on my bean plants.  I'm not just growing food here, I'm growing confidence and love.

❤️ 

Squash Blossoms!

Squash and cukes

Squash flowers

So I looked at my garden today and couldn't feel anything but happiness.  On March 29th, three months ago, I started my garden. Today there was nothing but green and growing plants everywhere.  I'm happy and excited and amazed.  I have corn that's hip high (what's the old saying?  Knee high by the fourth of July?).  

My tomato plants are strong and healthy and need to be trellised.  I have carrots, radishes, beets, peppers, and pumpkins I grew from seed along with the tomatoes and corn.

Three Sister Garden

And the garlic! The garlic is going strong and making more garlic while all the varieties of squash are flowering. 

Garlic Bulbs

Oh, my squash!  It made me dance and sing and jump around (a lot easier now that I'm down to a brace from Das Boot).  I even did a little watercolor sketch of my first squash blossoms.  I'm already dreaming of how to pick them, stuff and cook them into a tasty treat right after I'm sure the female blossoms are pollinated. 

I can't believe how my plants are growing and thriving.  It's really exciting. 

Now some stuff isn't so exciting.  For example, the other day I rebuilt the gate I rolled through by building a new one using PVC pipes.  I figured out that a 1" PVC pipe fits nicely over a piece of half-inch pipe to make a pivot for the gate to open in and out. 

My new PVC gate ❤️

I zip tied the mesh to the frame and used some zip ties looped together to make a latch to hold the gate closed.  I cut the piece to replace my other gate and will frame the other pieces in my garden to replace the weakened wood with PVC.  I'm kind of feeling ... I don't know, badass?

Yeah, badass

I know I still need to make some adjustments and such, but I keep surprising myself with what I am capable of doing with this little piece of land. I'm already planning on what will go in for a fall crop when I harvest the beets in the next week or two (if they follow the schedule the seed company says between planting and harvesting; however, they still look like little bitties to me).   I see the tops of my carrots, parsnips and Parisian carrots all getting bigger each day and know that they will start being close to harvest before I know it.

March 29, 2019

June 27, 2019

If you had asked me three months ago what I expected out of my garden,  I would have shrugged and told you what I hoped for but I wouldn't have believed that it would turn out better than my dreams.

Three Sisters

The three sister garden is the 4x4 sections of the 4x6x12" box.  The smaller section has my tomatoes and I planted some carrots and parsnips in there as well.

I started the tomatoes a while back as seeds and now they are starting to really grow.

❤️❤️

It makes me excited to think that they got this far.  As I've said before, I've never really grown things from seed like this before and it's truly exciting to see things growing!

See how pretty it looks!   It won't be long before there are lovely tomatoes starting to blossom and grow for me to cook up into a sauce or something wonderful to eat.

I noticed some of the carrots I planted a couple of weeks ago starting to poke through the soil.  They aren't really there yet,  but they will be there soon enough.  When that happens, you can be sure I'll be jumping up and down and squealing like a crazy lady. 

Then there's the corn in the big box.   It's really starting to shoot up and the beans are starting to poke through a little.   One thing I know about beans is that once they start going, they really get going.  But the exciting thing was seeing my pumpkin leaves.  When I planted the single seed in the other box to see what would happen, it took a couple of weeks.   These ones were, "Dude, where's the sun at?" and popped up so quickly.   I'm going to have to do some more thought and research, but the idea of the three sister garden is truly exciting.  If it all works out, then this will be a fun late summer/early fall feast.

The Plant Annex

Tomato #1

It's not just my garden plot where things are popping up and growing.  I have expanded to the deck outside the kitchen as well.

I planted some lettuce last week in a window box that is hanging on my deck railing.  They're popping up like anything!

Lettuce!

Today I planted my first container tomatoes for the deck.  I picked up a couple of seedlings at the local strawberry festival yesterday.  I'll have to pick up some soil down at my garden to fill my other bucket so I can plant the other one.  I am setting up a ceramic planter that was left behind by the previous occupant here at the house for some herbs - basil, oregano, thyme, and such.  This way I can just grab what I need from the deck when I'm cooking and need fresh herbs.

The woman at the festival also gave me a Jarrahdale Pumpkin seedling.  Jarrahdales produce a blue-skinned pumpkin with orange fruit.  They are originally from Australia and are a cross between a blue hubbard squash and Cinderella pumpkin.  I planted it in my three sister garden today along with some sugar pie pumpkin and some bean seeds.  It should be cool to have some odd stuff popping up.  I hope that I get some good fruit so I can save the seeds for next year.