July 2010 Garden Update

Yesterday I was feeling sick, achy and tired. Hence the new background to my blog. I was awake during J's nap, but totally unproductive. I'm not feeling bad- just wanting to give an explaination.

Growing up my Dad seemed to often start the spring with high hopes of a large garden. The freshly tilled soil inspired him to plant corn, peppers, beans, pumpkins etc. But somehow it always seemed that by August it looked like crap. Overtaken with weeds, our little seedlings didn't usually make it too far, I suppose coaching 2 little league softball teams and assistant coaching another 2 baseball teams didn't leave a lot of time for combating dandelions and ragweed.

Last August our garden looked better than any garden of my childhood, but this year's I am downright proud of! We've harvested numerous salads, a couple pounds of potatoes, a lot of basil, and things are growing really well. The pole beans are coming to their own, more potatoes are growing still, squash is spreading like wildfire, and the green tomatoes I think will be ripe by the time I get back from adventures next week, and our cucumbers might lead to all of our friends and family getting pickles for Christmas. Our lettuce bolted last week and I pulled it out today and sadly the grasses along the fence continue to hold their own, but for the most part hoeing around things once or twice a week has kept things pretty subdued.

One of my goals for the week is to start planning for crops to put in over-winter. . .