Thursday, April 22, 2010

Earth Day

I thought in honor of it being Earth Day I would write a post documenting our garden thus far.

Now I must be honest in saying that every year in the early spring Jason and I get very ambitious with our garden plans. We make a list of everything we want to plant and I make the promise that I will make sure it gets weeded and watered while Jason is working his long hours. Then some time around the 1st of August when it is hot and humid my enthusiasm weans and the weeds start taking over. I also have visions of me freezing, canning and preserving our “harvest”. I really do have these visions of myself making homemade spaghetti sauce from our tomatoes and having my pantry filled with mason jars of food I have canned from the garden. Now to give myself some credit I did manage to make some pesto sauce and freeze a few jars. I give those women who actually do all of that a ton of credit. I hope one day have a freezer and pantry that would make Ma Ingalls proud.

Anyway this year again I promised Jason the weeding would get done and if he planted snap beans I would learn how to freeze them and I wouldn’t let all of the potatoes rot. So this year we have planted broccoli, which I hope does well this year. The last two years the weather got too warm too quick and ruined all the plants. We also have potatoes, onions, beans, carrots (first year with these…we’ll see), and basil already planted. Jason just started the seeds for the tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers. I would love to plant zucchini and squash but they take up a lot of room and we are already extending the garden this year. I am really hoping we get a great harvest this year and I am looking forward to the first garden fresh vegetables because there is really nothing like them!

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Lettuce

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Potato Plant

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Broccoli

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Beans

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Onions

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A blossom from our apple tree.

5 comments:

  1. Girl the garden is looking good so far.. I want to taste some of your pesto sauce.. yummmm.. Just give me a call when you need a little kick in the butt to do that weeding.. lol Love the garden pics can't wait to see it all grow..

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  2. Great post on your garden! Everything looks great. We start off every year w/good intentions, but we're over it by July! You've inspired me to press on and do a better job w/our garden this year. Thank you for the advice on the banner how-to. I would love to take the credit, but Erin actually did it~she's really the technological person behind the blog. We'd love to have you join us for berry picking. I'm thinking we'll go either next Tuesday (5/11) or Wed. (5/12). We went to Brookdale farms on Mt. Pleasant near Bergey's Breadbasket last time, but if you know of another farm, just let me know. Beth

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  3. Hey, Jul....I don't know if you remember but I used to be like a pioneer mother when you were young. I canned tomatoes, peaches (from Milburn's), made homemade applesauce that I canned, made zucchini pickle--canned also. Picked and froze strawberries, corn, broccoli, beans. Also made jars and jars of strawberry and peach preserves and made homemade cranberry sauce. When we had no money I gave jars of jam and cookies or bread in a basket to relatives for Christmas gifts. I still have the large canning pot and all the utensils you need for canning in the basement. You can have them and I wouldn't mind teaching you how come harvest time. The tomatoes make really good spaghetti sauce. YUM!! I am sure you can do it!!

    I have just started a blog too, but I have to learn how to make mine look as nice as yours.

    Love,
    Mom

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  4. nice garden. I love the chickens.

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  5. Jules,
    We too have expanded our garden this year. Jim even made some beautiful wooden garden boxes. Jim has made spaghetti sauce in the past with tomatoes from our garden and hopefully we will have the time to do the same this summer. It is quite a time consuming process though.
    We have much of the same stuff planted but we also have the squash and zucchini in our garden that you wanted. Maybe you can make a trip north come harvest time.
    We also have corn planted which turned out rather well last year!
    THe only set back that we often face is making sure Molsen and the rabbits stay out of the garden. Any ideas?

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