Today's Haul

I think this was our best harvest yet!

I can't believe it, since it's so late in the season.

I did have Jacob pull up all the rest of the carrots. According to the weather man we may still have a couple more weeks until frost, but I don't think 2 more weeks will make much difference for the carrots.

A handful of beans, one green bell pepper, a few good-sized cucumbers ('Bush Pickle'--still none from the Lemon plant), and look at all those tomatoes!

There are some of each variety planted in that bowl. One roma finally got ripe, a few Early Girls and Golden Nuggets, and the rest are Cougar Reds.

I still have a whole bunch of green ones out there. I hope they keep on ripening like this!

Now I have to figure out what to do with them. I could freeze some more, or maybe try to can a few.We'll see. I think the zukes may go to a neighbor. We still have some in our fridge (which doesn't even count the 5 I gave away last week!)

I may need to buy some lettuce for a big, yummy salad bar!

Tomatoes, tomatoes

After such a late start to summer, it has been a blessing that fall has been so lovely.

I had already given up on tomatoes, and bought some to make salsa with. I supplemented that box with some from the garden, but it was mostly purchased.

Now look at what's coming my way!

 Tomatoes with noses. Hee hee.

More and more!

I didn't get pictures of all them. We'd eat a few here and there, and replace them with new ripe ones from the garden. I finally got a small batch blanched, skinned, chopped, and frozen. Only enough for 2 quart-size bags, but at least they didn't go to waste.

Sunflowers blooming, plus more tomatoes

These sunflowers have been adding a nice spot of color in the garden.

I still haven't decided yet if I like the 'Teddy Bear' variety (on the right, all yellow), or the 'Waa-ooh' with their black centers. I do like that they both stopped growing right at the top of the wall. :)

This lemon cucumber plant has been growing like crazy, taking down my peppers plants and twining around the beans. But I have YET to see even one cucumber on it!! Not sure what the deal is. I've seen two or three developing, but when I go looking, I can't even find those.

Some hope for ripe tomatoes in our future.

A few at a time--we'll take it!

A Few More Beans...plus BLACKBERRIES!

Harvest from Sept. 09

More beans and carrots.

Of course, another zucchini, and our first bell pepper.

It had been on the vine so long that it was a bit tough. 

Harvest from Sept. 12

I think Jacob picked most of these zukes.

Some tomatoes, finally!

And a small bowl-ful of blackberries, from the vine at the very tippy-top of the slope.

There were several more red ones, that we'll have to go back for in a few weeks.

Hot, dry weather has been holding out. We may get some tomatoes harvested yet!

This week's harvest

Jacob picked the squash and zucchini without being asked.

He's becoming quite the good little garden helper.

There were more beans than I realized--enough for a meal, hooray!

I just pulled up one carrot to see how it was doing.

As you can see, pretty scrawny. Flavor was ok. We each got one little bite.

We're supposed to have one more week of hot weather. I'm really hoping it's enough to ripen up my tomatoes. We've got one more ready to pick out there.

Garden Update

 More zucchini!

 Monster zucchini! plus a few huge straight-neck squash.

I had never seen yellow squash get this big, so I wasn't expecting it.

These have had a really mild flavor, and even on the huge ones the skin hasn't been too thick.

Jason made zucchini bread, we froze some (grated) to make more bread later, and have been putting squash in everything we can think of.

I plan to give some away this week to friends.

The whole garden: almost completely filled in.

 My beans have finally started producing.

I plan to pick some this week for dinner.

 Sunflowers oh-so-close to blooming.

Looks like in addition to the main flower head, each one will also have several surrounding smaller flowers as well. Should be pretty, if they make it before frost!

 More beans and sunflowers.

 This one should bloom by the end of the week.

 Finally! Our first ripe tomato!

It was a Cougar Red.

I did snip all the tops/ends off these tomato plants, and have been rewarded with a few starting to ripen.

The kids and I ate this one for lunch. It was delicious!

 The other side of the tomato terrace, looking down from top terrace.

Tomato cages a MUST next year!

 Mini-pumpkins taking off down the slope.

 My one little nasturtium plant is also finally blooming!

It looks pretty and the color is so vivid it stand out, even from the back deck.

 I especially like the bright orange contrasting with the squash flowers.

All the different leaf shapes are pretty, too.

Today and yesterday's harvest (minus one cucumber that we already ate--same size as these.)

First Harvest and Garden Update

This hawk is a frequent visitor to our back yard.

First harvest: zucchini and squash--what did we expect?

 

The whole garden, looking big and bushy.

I had one small tomato cage that I put a few of the branches through that were covering the walkway on the right-hand side. Next year I need to get cages and use them early on! The tomato plants are so thick that they are kind of holding each other up, but I don't think the tomatoes themselves are going to get ripe as well under all that bushiness.

I need to go through and pinch off the tops so that they have a chance of ripening before frost, at least.

 

Tiny cucumbers.

These would be a good candidate to start from seed here. They grew so fast in Missouri, usually producing and dying off by beginning of August, that I thought nothing of just planting small starts in June.

We may get a few cucumbers before frost, but it could be a close thing.

 

Sunflowers are looking healthy and beautiful, except no blossoms yet.

Bottom terrace, left side.

Cucumber is starting to fill up some space to the front.

Peppers are really struggling. Still just the one plant has any coming on it.

Bottom terrace, middle

Lemon cucumber is filling up the middle back space and coming all the way forward.

I've seen several blossoms on it, but no fruit yet either.

 Mini pumpkin plant is producing several of these cute little numbers.

All off-white, which would make them the "Baby Boo" variety, I believe.

I'll have to double check, but I think these are the ones that made good eating, too.

 This picture was to show how much the squash plants and pumpkin are taking over all available space on the top terrace. I always knew zucchini was a space hog. I'll have to get another picture to prove it, but it has almost taken up the empty space next to it (that would be a half a terrace!)

 More yellow squash coming.

  A little out of order: caged tomatoes, still green!

zukes blossoming freely