Babies!

New Kale!  And soon, new Swiss Chard (I hope!).  It turns out empty water bottles serve a purpose after all.  Good thing, too, because I'm practically swimming in them.

I planted six bottles of each, and each bottle has a few seeds in them.  Naturally, I will be thinning them in a few weeks.  I planted them on June 21, and the Kale germinated so fast!  I also put new summer squash seeds out in the flower bed (same day).  Seemed like a shame to waste all that space.  We'll see what comes of it.

Also, where am I going to park these, once it's time to transplant them?  It's a mystery.  But I'm sure something will work out.  I'm reluctant to use the foot locker because mushrooms keep growing in it.  No idea what that's all about, but they need to get lost!

The end.

Wait for it...

Happy first day of summer!  Here's how my garden is doing, now that summer is here.  ...Okay, to be fair, I took these pictures on Thursday, so technically it was still spring.  But close enough.

My herbs.  I think these might be my favorite thing this year.  I'm enjoying adding a little more each year, and now that they are potted, I can move them wherever I want, which is nice.  Plus it frees up the flower bed.  Not sure what I plan to do with said flower bed yet... I'm thinking about adding a couple of squash seeds to see if I can get a bumper crop.  I thought about greens, but that's really the hottest place in my yard, so I don't think that's the thing to do.

The spearmint that blocks out the sun.

Summer squash, green beans, chard, and broccoli.

The broccoli on this plant started floofing out, so I cut it.  It was only about 2 or 3" across, but it was going to bloom.  It tasted great!  Now here's hoping we get some of those side shoots I hear about so often.

Getting awfully darn tall!

Pretty.  Finally starting to fill out a little.

The strawberry sage bed.  I actually pruned the sage back around the berry plants, and I pruned the berry plants as well, since they had quite a bit of dead foliage and stems from the rough transplant.  So they look better now.  Unfortunately, I accidentally deleted the pretty pictures, so you get the before version.  Hey, the pictures are free, no complaining allowed!

Spaghetti squash seems to be bouncing back!  It's got some new growth, and I pruned off the worst of the leaves so that it could focus its energy on the healthy part of the plant.  I hope it produces!

Looking forward to some color here pretty soon.

Slugs have been in my garden lately.  I need to do something about that.

So, interesting thing about the peas.  They stopped producing, which is more or less normal.  But oddly enough, they are staying green.  Then I went out on Thursday and discovered new buds on the vines.  Are they going to produce a surprise second crop?  Only time will tell.

Okay, they're staying green except for these ones.  And the peas on this vine didn't grow right.  They are all stunted, and then they got fat really fast, so I think it's sort of like the pea's death throes, trying to chuck out some offspring before it dies.

The kale has slowed down quite a bit.  I think I need to plant some new kale and chard.  Trying to decide how I plan to do that, since I'm running out of space.  It would make the most sense to start them indoors, but I need containers and soil.  I have a bunch of empty water bottles, I'm thinking of using those.  And I think I might have some soil left over, but I don't remember for sure.  Anyway, ramble ramble, blah blah blah.

The stalled broccoli started growing again last week.  We had a few days of cool, rainy weather.  I'm not really sure what to expect from these now.  But the heads are growing, surprisingly enough.  We'll see what happens.

One of the heads on the weaker plants.

Surprise lettuce in the flower pad.  The kids ate it.  ...Yikes, I need to weed.  I am such a slacker when it comes to weeding!

The end.

Okay, so here's the deal...

I've been busy.  And by busy, I mean... well, I mean that I haven't bothered with blogging in a while.  It never really seemed to be the right time.  But the right time is now, so here I am.  And, consequently, so are you.  You have only yourself to blame.  And myself.  But enough finger pointing.

Like I said, I have had difficulty finding enough time to sit down and dedicate a little extra attention to the internet.  I took a number of pictures about a month or so ago.  I'm actually pulling that time frame out of the air; I'm not entirely sure just how long it's been.  But, even though I don't really have anything to say about those old photos, I thought I'd share them anyway.  So, here are some pictures that I took a while back, but never actually uploaded.  Think of them as highlights.  Enjoy!

I just can't get over how beautiful mint is.

We have been enjoying many kale-chard-pea salads this spring!

Iced mint green tea.

It looks pretty, but we actually decided it would be better to make it without the tea bags, and make it by the glass instead of by the pitcher (or tea jar, as it were).

Lots of cilantro!  Man this stuff grows fast!

Of course, you know an overabundance of cilantro means only one thing in this house... fish tacos.  Oh baby.

Anyway, I took these pictures yesterday.  Things are looking good, more or less.  By more, I mean the squash, herbs, and the broccoli in the yellow pot.  By less, I mean the other broccoli, and the fading peas.  Overall, I have to say the peas have done a lot better than I'd hoped, all things considered.  The broccoli was doing great, but for some reason three of them just stopped growing.  One of them began to yellow significantly, so I pulled it to check the roots.  As far as I could tell, the roots looked fine, but I did find two wire worms (the bane of my garden), so maybe they were stressing it out.  The other two aren't yellowing much, but they are not growing either, and no real heads are forming.  Anyway, I lost my train of thought, so more pictures.  Woo!

Herbs.  Love 'em.

I used fresh sage and rosemary on some pasta last night.  So yummy.

Strawberries are still pretty leggy, but hanging in there.  I think they will look better next year.

This is where I pulled out the broccoli.  I also pulled the beans.  They were not growing anyway, and I found a mushroom growing in the dirt, so I'm just thinking it was a pretty lousy environment.  Ugh.  Say no to Sta-Green!  (That's right, I'm blaming all my problems on dirt.)

I can't tell if this is going to make it or not.  Jury's still out.  I don't think I mentioned it before, but it's a spaghetti squash baby that a friend of mine gave me.  I hope it comes around!

Supposedly these will become flowers at some point.

A little peek at the broccoli head that is forming!

Closeup.  I hope it stays cool so that it doesn't bolt before its time.

Seems to be doing well!

This is one of the broccoli plants that has stopped growing.

The squashes are getting huge!  The one in the middle is pretty small, but I think that is the patty pan, which I think doesn't get as big as the others that I have (according to the package).

This stuff grows so fast!  I only have four of them, but I am out here every other day cutting salad greens.  The chard is the same way, though it grows less quickly.  Plus I only have two of them.

What's going on with the peas.  This one met an early death.  The others are still green, but production is slowing, and the baby peas aren't growing very well, so I think they're pretty much on their way out.

Garlic is insane!  My curiosity got the better of me (shocker), and I pulled one.  They are pretty interesting to look at!  Like a tiny onion or something.  But it looked to be in good health, so hopefully this is an indication of the state of the rest of them.

Hrm, yes, that spinach kinda got away from me...

Ooh, that reminds me, I should probably stir the compost...

And tonight, with our leftover pasta of delicious-fresh-herbness, we will be eating these.  I believe congratulations are in order.

I can taste it now...

Product placement!  Do you think WinCo will pay me for my little advertisement?  ...Yeah, probably not.  And no, we're not having peanut butter with dinner.  Just to clarify.

The end.