Yesterday I spent the morning out in the garden weeding and harvesting the last of the Spring vegetables. The Amish snap peas were pretty much finished (the recent hot spell did them in) so Damian and I harvested all that remained and ripped the plants out. I was really pleased with this variety and have ripe partly dry pods hanging up in my kitchen to save the seeds from. I have read that snap peas can be a Autumn crop but I am not sure when the plant them… Does anyone know? We harvested 12 ounces of snap peas in our final harvest yesterday, probably a little more since I had toddler help.

We also harvested almost two pounds of Forellenschuss lettuce leaving one to bolt so that we can save the seeds from that as well. I was also really pleased with this romaine variety, it faired very well with the heat. I am saving the seeds but I am not sure if I will continue to dedicate space in the raised beds to lettuce since we receive enough in our Bountiful Basket every week.

My Red Russian kale turned out to be a decent producer considering it survived being ripped out by Damian three times this Spring. It is still going but I have decided to leave it for the rest of the season (I’m a little tired of kale anyhow.) I am considering overwintering it just because I want to see how it flowers. Speaking of flowers my miniature rose is blooms. I have a tremendous soft spot for all kinds of roses and I adore this one’s cheery yellow blooms.

I ripped out all my purple top turnips, for some reason they never started to size up and it has been five months, far past their maturity date. They were my Spring failure as was Bloomsdale spinach which all died off as soon as it sprouted. I may try turnips again for Autumn planting since I really love them but I think I will try another kind of spinach.

After harvesting and ripping out the remainder of the Spring crops that only left one kale, one lettuce, a row of St Valery carrots and three PA Dutch Crookneck Squash in Bed A (the one with the trellis.) I fertilized everything that needed it in all the beds and then planted Empress Beans in most of the void space left in Bed A. I tried this bush bean last year and it didn’t do very well but I also did not expect our elm to shade the area where I planted them as much as it did, I didn’t inoculate them and I think I planted them far too densely. We will see how they do this year in a much better location with inoculant and more spacing. I hope they provide enough green beans to last us through the Winter as they are suppose to be a heavy producer. If nothing else they will work as a nitrogen fixing cover crop I guess.

I also planted a few Purple Podded Pole Beans by the trellis as Damian ripped out all the ones I planted a month ago. I might be cutting it a little close on their maturity date and the first frost but I really want to see how they look and taste. The risk is worth it.

In Bed B my tomatoes plants are amazingly huge but they have yet to set very many fruit. With as cold as the weather has been until recently I am not surprised, but now with this recent hot spell they finally seem to be doing their stuff. Lots of little one on the Beams’ Yellow Pear and a few on the Italian, but none of the Black Krim yet. I harvested about a half a cup of Genovese Basil which I have planted around the tomatoes. I made some bruschetta using Bountiful Basket tomatoes with it and tossed it with rainbow rotini, fresh corn, peas and mozzarella today. The flavors meld as we speak. Yum. I should marinate some chicken to grill with it, but I think I have filled my burn quota risk for the day. (If you follow me on Facebook you know what I am talking about, if not, don’t worry I will survive.)

My Black Beauty Zucchini is looking beautiful and starting to produce squash, I can’t wait. I am one of those sick people who can eat zucchini at every meal and not tire of it and there is always zucchini relish to be made. I planted six cucumbers in Bed B and every single one of them died, or so I though (I just have really bad luck with cucumbers it seems) but it seems I have one growing right beside my zucchini. I think Damian pinched the seed and planted it while I was planting since I don’t remember planting one there (maybe he will plant all the cukes next year.) I do not know if it is a Double Yield or a True Lemon but it is both healthy and flowering so at this point I don’t really care!

As mentioned earlier Damian ripped out all the Purple Podded Pole Beans and the cucumbers failed so I have void space in Bed B too. I sowed Empress Beans in some of it. No such thing as too many green beans and they are only a 55 day crop too. I am thinking about sowing more St Valery Carrots in that bed too, they play nicely with tomatoes.

Damian’s cucumber growing super powers apparently extend to his garden too. The Sugar Pie pumpkin vines started off slowly but seem to have quadrupled in size since the warm weather hit, no flowers yet though, and I swear the corn and beans grow six inches every night. The sunflowers are now officially taller then him. Damian loves going out every morning and watering his bed. He is also in charge of watering the raspberries I transplanted in June as well as the tipee garden. He checks the raspberry plants closely every day, I think he is waiting for them to fruit like Shannon’s are. Next summer sweetie.

That is about it for the moment. The tipee garden has rallied since I weeded and mulched it a couple weeks back. I didn’t think my Toad Lilies made it but I noticed them poking through last week, my German chamomile is going to seed and my moonflowers and morning glories are starting to climb. My pink “Double Delight” coneflowers (echinacea) have begun to bloom as have my mint and oregano. I have seen so many mason and bumblebees around that garden. Damian adores seeing the “buzzybeeeeees”, I couldn’t agree more.

Not to toot my own horn, but I simply love this photo I took in my friend’s yard yesterday. So much so that I broke from my square format that I use on almost all of my artistic photographs. This flower is a Dicentra spectabilis, commonly know as a Bleeding Heart. It is one of my favorite flowers for a shade garden.

These are the other recent additions to my photography site, Graceful Symmetry. I especially love the kitten (also photographed in my friend’s yard!) There are lots of violets and pinks blooming this time of year, enough so that I added a pink category to the site. I also added a multicolored category, admittedly just a fancy name for my miscellaneous shots that are neither predominately one color or the full rainbow spectrum, but pretty nonetheless.

I spotted this pretty little web blowing gentle in the morning breeze under our picnic table while we were camping this weekend. Andrea snapped the photo as I was making breakfast. I think she got a fantastic shot!

I keep seeing these around but I am not sure what they are. The bees seem to love them.

“That we find a crystal or a poppy beautiful means that we are less alone, that we are more deeply inserted into existence than the course of a single life would lead us to believe.”
- John Berger

Can you tell I have a favorite flower?

Ground cherries are a ½ to ¾ inch fruit encased in a papery husk, kind of like a tomatillo. They are ripe when the husk dries and falls from the plant, inside of which is the fruit ranging from a pale green to deep golden color. While ground cherries are in the nightshade family, they are not as susceptible to diseases found in other nightshades (tomatoes, potatoes, eggplants, etc.) They also grow well in poor soils and in containers.

I am growing two varieties of ground cherry this year, Aunt Molly’s Ground Cherry, a Polish heirloom and a mystery variety a friend gave me. They are both in the unamended brick bed (you can see the Aunt Molly’s in the corner here.) I started harvesting that one this week and I have to say it is… interesting.

The fruit smells a bit like a pineapple and has kind of a refreshingly acidic flavor. Apparently they store for 3-4 weeks in the husk so may try collect enough to make a small tart which apparently enhances their flavor. I think that this is one of those fruits that you either like or you don’t and I’m honestly not overwhelmingly impressed with them. They aren’t awful by any stretch of the imagination, they just taste too… clean? for me. They look gorgeous though and I might stick them in the dehydrator to dry up the fruit and use them for decorating.

It’s official, as of today I like Frank Sinatra even more then before.

“Orange is the happiest color.”
– - Frank Sinatra

“Who loves a garden still his Eden keeps,
Perennial pleasures plants, and wholesome harvest reaps.”
- – Amos Bronson Alcott

What is a weed but a plant whose virtues have not yet been discovered.

“And we who listen to the stars, or walk the dusty grade
Or break the very atoms down to see how they are made,
Or study cells, or living things, seek truth with open hand.
The profoundest act of worship is to try to understand.”

– “The Word of God” by Catherine Faber

“To mature is in part to realize that while complete intimacy and omniscience and power cannot be had, self-transcendence, growth, and closeness to others are nevertheless within one’s reach.”
- – Sissela Bok

Little Fly,
Thy summer’s play
My thoughtless hand
Has brushed away.

Am not I
A fly like thee?
Or art not thou
A man like me?

For I dance
And drink, and sing,
Till some blind hand
Shall brush my wing.

If thought is life
And strength and breath
And the want
Of thought is death;

Then am I
A happy fly,
If I live,
Or if I die.

- by William Blake

My handmade mala beads, stained yellow with turmeric and individually polished with beeswax. A labor of love which I use everyday.

I love finding star shapes in nature.

He demands your allegiance.

A juniper berry is the female seed cone produced by the various species of junipers. It is not a true berry but a cone with merged scales giving it a berry-like appearance.

(With the changing seasons flowers are not in abundance anymore, but their fruits are. Perhaps I should have fruit or foliage Fridays, in keeping with the alliteration.)

Just a simple glass stone, blessed by me with strength and healing, I have them in all my houseplant pots. Just maybe they will give my plants a little extra juju to get through another Winter. (Especially this Indian rubber tree, he is not fond of the cold.)

I don’t know what these are but I love how they are turning into star shaped seedpods.

unknown subspecies

I never thought my pitiful stunted hail bitten morning glory would bloom but when I woke up this morning it has a beautiful flower smiling victoriously at me.