Vegetable Garden

Last summer, Brian built a six by four foot garden, using the plan from The Square Foot Gardner. Initially he planted tomatoes, squash and peppers, but since we moved to the area in June, we were really too late and none of the plants produced.  In the fall, we tried carrots, lettuce and broccoli, which fared better, but not great. So this spring, we were very excited to try again.

Our spring planting included 6 kinds of heirloom tomatoes (Mr. Stripey and Green Zebra had the best names), sweet peas, peppers, and more lettuce. The peas and lettuce did well and the tomatoes and peppers had a good start, then the temperatures climbed over 100 degrees and no rain appeared. Sigh. We've harvested 3 tomatoes that were edible, and another 4 that either split or had a gross tomato worm. We had 1 very lovely sweet pepper. That is it. There are 2 green tomatoes on the vine now and one red one that is deformed, but probably edible.

So, why am I talking about the vegetable garden? Well, our vegetable garden is reinforcing the title of this blog. Every day I water, pull weeds, look out for bugs, and generally ensure the garden is well cared for.  What do I get for it? Very little, I assure you.  There is a rogue plant that looks like some sort of squash, which has come up in an area of the bed where no squash has gone before, so that is a pleasant surprise, but otherwise, blah!

We're about to plant lettuce and carrots again and I can only hope they do well.  Perhaps we'll add a layer of compost from our gorgeous compost pile to help encourage food production.  Sort of a... if you do well, you won't end up here... kind of thing.  Although, the seeds could see it as threatening and simply refuse to grow... like everything else in our vegetable garden!

On the plus side, the 20 strawberry plants we put out this spring have more than doubled. They are still putting out a few berries now and then. So that is pretty exciting.  My blueberry bushes did very well this spring, so the food production hasn't been a total wash.

Ah well.  Wish us luck as we plant our fall crop. We will certainly need it!

Mushrooms and Random Thoughts

Mushrooms keep popping up in my yard and flower pots... outta nowhere. Where do they come from? I am reminded of Little Shop of Horrors when looking at some of the crazy shapes of the really big ones. Once again, I tossed them all before thinking to take a picture of them to post. Sorry!

So, only 20 more days 'til my birthday. I'll be 45 this year. That's pretty exciting, I think.  I saw a preview for the new Judd Apatow movie, This is 40, and it made me sad that they were so upset about getting older. It is SO COOL to get older.  Why is it that some folks seem to think life ends at a certain age: no more risk taking, no more fun, no more adventure? No way! But we were talking about mushrooms.

I think I'm out of mushroom conversation. They are more interesting than the weeds lately, which are the same old, same old, and really not worth mentioning.

One interesting fact, though... the ubiquitious "they" make Snuggies for dogs. Brian saw one today while working at the foodbank. It is pretty cool that the foodbank carries dog food, toys, kitty litter, etc., along with all of the people food. Pets can really help a person who is having a hard time, so I'm happy to see they are covered.

Thanks for putting up with my random thoughts today. Linda