Harvest Time is Here!

 As a kid/teenage I can't really remember an August that wasn't spent canning.  We had a huge garden and lots of fruit trees so there was a lot to do.  I remember a hot sticky kitchen and making a huge mess to fill the food storage room in the garage.  Amazingly enough, they are good memories of time spent with my mom and sisters in the kitchen.

Since then I haven't canned a thing!  I may buy some extra something and freeze it but that has been it.  I was always too busy with school/work or didn't really have room for food storage.  I started getting more serious about food storage when I bought my house in Aurora, but it was just me and I worked to much to can anything so I would just buy extra groceries and store then on a shelf in the basement.

Last summer was our first attempt at a garden.  It did produce well, but I had a baby at the end of July so I didn't really do much with it besides freeze some of the vegetables.  But this year I was gonna get serious.  So last week I got started and here is what I did.

1 batch pickles (cucumbers from my garden)

1 batch pesto (basil from my garden)

6 dozen ears of corn (from a local farmer)

36 pound of pears (were on sale at a local store)

1 batch beets (from my garden, aren't they pretty?)

1/4 bushel peaches (from a local store)

There was also some rhubarb jam with rhubarb from the garden, it is yummy stuff.  I need to do more this week.

And right when I thought I was done Eric suggested we go out to the garden and this is what we came in with.  Bell pepper, jalepeno peppers, chili Peppers, cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, pear tomatoes, roma tomatoes, and Italian tomates.   

So I guess I am doing salsa and pickles this week.

Pulling Carrots

We finally went out yesterday to pull the carrots and the rest of the onions from our garden.  I have to admit that I really slacked on the garden this year and really didn't do as much as I should have done and did not utilize what we grew as well as I should have.  I am using the "I had a baby in July" excuse for my neglect.

Anyway, in case you are wondering what the outcome of not thinning out your carrots can be, take a look at the picture below:

I pulled these two out last night, well they came out together.  They are serving as a good reminder that I need to be more proactive in my gardening attempts next year.

Our garden is growing!

We moved into our house almost a year ago and have had non stop projects ever since. I have to admit I had no idea how much work a brand new house would be. Last year we started our landscaping and put in our fence and this year we have continued to add to our landscaping, put in a paver patio and got our garden boxes put together just in time to plant them.

I haven't had a garden since I lived at home and worked in my parent's garden. Which was a long time ago and means I have never been the one responsible to decide what to plant and where. So this was quite the experiment this year. We built 6 boxes and also planted some blackberries, raspberries, and rhubarb in the ground next to the house. The boxes are filled with peppers, tomatoes, carrots, onions, zucchini, cucumbers, beans, and strawberries.

So far we have only gotten a couple of raspberries, but it is early and things are well on their way. Things have done much better than I expected and I have already learned a lot about what I will do different next year. It is funny to me that with all of my horticulture/landscaping background that a vegetable garden is so foreign to me. You would think that they would have a lot in common, but I am discovering they are two very different beasts. Hopefully in my retirement from professional landscaping I will learn more about home vegetable gardening.