Rule #22: Summer can be hot, water slides are a great investment!

This is especially true when you have two children with summer-ish birthdays.  Since we like to have birthday parties at our home a water slide was a great option when having a bunch of kids over.  We can't believe our little Larkyn is four!!!  Four just seems so big.  She is just amazing and so much fun! She has been saying the funniest things.  Like when I ask her to help with clean up sometimes she says, "I'm on it, mommy" or "sure thing".  I just love that. She continues to do really well with Mckinley.  She just loves her and all little babies/toddlers for that matter.  Sometimes I do hear, "Mommy Mckinley is in my room and I don't want her to be." Ah, I think I will be hearing that a lot from both of them in the future.  Hopefully it will be more of the sharing and playing that they have begun to do.  It is so nice to see them playing with the little people or care bears together.  Mckinley has also taken to looking through books with Larkyn.  What makes us laugh the most is when they play in the castle tent.  Mckinley just launches herself up and through the window to peek out.  She thinks it is just so funny. Larkyn's Peppa Pig Party was a success and I think everyone had fun on the water slide and little slide pool.  I am also including some Fourth of July pictures.  Ah what a fun 5 days!  This was the last day (we didn't know that at the time) of our power being out since the big storm rolled through and left it's mark on our neighborhood. Luckily it was a great chance to see all the neighbors that were still around and how they were doing! I started this post before my trip to NC to see my brother's family and some neighbors that moved.  We had so much fun.  I will have to post those pictures soon, but wanted to add that when we came home Mckinley just took off with walking.  She took a few steps between us on the first, but now she is really practicing her new skill and letting go of things and just walking.

Father's Day 2012

Father's Day Breakfast

Father's Day Dinner

Four!

Playing

Swing time!

Going down

Peppa Pig Party

Lunch with Pig Ears

Going up

Coming Down

Mckinley's Turn

The Cake!

Fourth of July: Navy Girls

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Headed to the Parade

Rule #21: Watch your garden closely...Pests show their ugly faces around NOW (July)

So after loosing power for 5 days in conjunction with a heat wave, the garden was not a super happy place.  On a positive note, the tomatoes seem to be doing well.  After the "Deracho" storm our neighborhood was a huge mess.  Huge trees down on cars and houses and wrapped around electrical poles.  So we feel lucky with the minimal damage to the garden. Some peppers and parts of the tomatoes had to be propped back up, but all of the plants survived. We did have the generator going, but it was working hard to pump in some a/c for parts of the day so we didn't water as the water pump would need to be powered as well.
I am guessing the lack of water and my absence in the garden contributed to the webbing spider mites taking over the green beans.  My mature round of green beans were totally destroyed and my newer round were starting to go as well.  I yanked all the old ones and spayed some insecticidal soap on the young ones.  I need to get more though and really spray the undersides. Before the storm I was doing really well keeping an eye on the pests and crushing those little yellow caterpillars and eggs that usually get my green beans. Webbing spider mites are a new pest to me and I have read that if the plants also have less water they can be more susceptible to damage from the mites.  Boo. Hopefully my new round will survive.
The dreaded squash vine boror struck again this year.  I knew it was there, but I just didn't have time to deal with it until the past two nights. One of my four was beyond repair and totally wilted to I yanked that one. The other two got emergency surgery last night after the girls went to bed. One of the romanesca zucs is huge and I really wanted to save it.  I found 3 buggers in that one and four in the other romanesca that is smaller. There were 2 in the last crookneck. I then buried the stem under some good dirt and am hoping for the best. I would have taken pictures but I was just lucky to get out there and do something in the garden that I just didn't have the time or heart to get the camera out and document the process. In the past weeks I have been keeping an eye on the leaves and getting rid of any squash bug eggs that I find so they haven't been a problem yet. Saw a big guy on there last night though and will be spraying with a dish soap/ water combo tonight.

I don't know what this is but he didn't seem to be causing any real damage so I left him alone.

He was a wild looking thing!

Pre-Storm Haul

Funny when this happens

I also got to freeze my first ever Borlotti Beans!

Here are my babies. Let's hope this wasn't the last of them.

So there we have the two vegetables that were my focus this year devastated.  They have done better this year and I guess time will tell if they are truly destroyed. I even got to freeze a round of green beans! The zucs actually look good this morning. Fingers crossed.
On a more positive note I am looking forward to the lower temps this week to start my radicchio and endive for the winter garden (*smiles*).  I also roasted my beets and am going to pickle them tonight.  I did not get a chance to plant another round of them so I will try to do that this week also.  Good luck gardeners...it's a battlefield out there!

OK....so I am adding some post-mortem pics of the Zuc!

Yucky Frass.

The remaining Zucs...16 hours Post-Op!

De-Bugged (Hopefully) and covered up

Another Post-Op

Last Post-Op

Boo

Pickling the Beets

Rule #20: You don't need to plant a lot of swiss chard for big results!

The swiss chard is just going crazy. I would say I planted about 10- 15 plants with only about 4 or five inches between them so they really don't take up that much room in the garden.  A few spots are growing 2 or 3 plants, but I didn't thin it and it seems to be working out just fine.  I finally got a yellow on from my silver beet collection of colored chard....so that is pretty cool. I think I have found great spots for my swiss chard, green beans and most other veggies this year. My garden gets varied lighting depending on the bed and I think all the veggies seem happy with their spots this year.  The flowers are also in full bloom. As you can probably tell I love the purples and blues with orange! I am joining Daphne's Dandelions again to share my harvest and see harvests around the world.

Father's day haul.  We thinned the carrots and had roasted baby carrots and beets for dinner.

Beets and baby carrots

Beans and Chard

My little gardener

Butterfly bush and lilies

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On of my favorites...Calla Lily from mother's day last year.

On of this weeks harvests!

Yesterday's swiss chard extravaganza.  Green beans are in the bottom of the bowl too.

Rule #19: Create a whole bed dedicated to green beans!

So the green beans are finally here and looking healthy.  I planted supermarconi, marconi, provider, and vanguard.  I just planted another round so that I don't run out and I am hoping that I will actually be able to freeze some this year.  We eat a ton of green beans when we have them, so one of my main goals this year was to increase my bean production because we have been having some bad years with it in the past. Hence the large bed dedicated to beans! We had a great bunch of peas and it looks like we might get another good round in before the plants burn up this year.  I picked the rest of the Tatsoi that was slowly being eaten by caterpillars as well as the kale that seemed like it was bolting.  It's my first time with this Tuscan Kale so I left a few in to see what they do.  The caterpillars liked them too.  Luckily my swiss chard remains pest free for the most part.  I also picked up some lettuce, squash blossoms and 2 baby zucchini that stalled out in the growth department.  My dad always says that you have to knock off a few of the first ones, because they just don't develop right.  most everything else in the garden is looking good. I planted some more fennel and will do more beets and carrots for succession planting.  Really trying to work on that as you can see.  I am really looking forward to starting the radicchio in a few weeks.  Check out some other harvests around the world at Daphne's Dandelions in my links!

From Last weeks Harvest

Swiss Chard

Last weeks Harvest....last of the strawberries for now.

Shelling peas and first of the green beans

More green beans, blossoms and zucs

Kale and Tatsoi

Lettuce

Rule #18: Better Late than Never! (Harvest "Monday")

So this week we are still getting decent strawberries.  Less than before but the overbearing are putting on new flowers.  The new harvest this week was the Tatsoi and Peas. I have decided that shelling peas are good but not enough of a harvest for the space they take up.  I would now prefer snow or snap peas, but I am going to use up all the seeds I have first.  Larkyn and now Mckinley both love peas so that is why I originally started growing them.  I decided to pick them young so that we could eat them like a snow pea. This worked out for most of them, but a couple of them were a touch to big and tough.  I will let the rest mature to peas and we will make a nice risotto out of it.  The first Tatsoi was good. I have had to be diligent about getting eggs and caterpillars off of them though!  We had some steamed on a salad with other steamed veggies and them I made a stir fry with them also.  Both ways were tasty.  I look forward to  a good fall crop and perhaps trying different asian greens in the future.  I have a few more in the garden still to harvest in the coming week or two.

Tatsoi

Tatsoi

Peas!

Rule #17: When you can't harvest much, sprout! (Harvest Monday)

So... I was so jealous seeing a neighbor's garden the other day.  She had almost ready zucchini, tons of decent size lettuces and spinach, radishes, and beets.  She planted weeks earlier than me and it proved to be successful.  Her tomatoes already have flowers and baby tomatoes!  Luckily I got some of the radishes!  My garden is really doing pretty good and my transplants better than I though after they were damaged by aphids early in the season while "hardening off." The tomatoes are really taking off and peppers are doing well. The eggplants were devastated by the flea beetle so I will have to buy some.  Luckily, I gave some to my neighbors and theirs are doing well so I will be able to see how the Diamond Eggplant ( Seed Savers Exchange) does.  On to this weeks harvest for Daphne's Dandelions Harvest Monday.  So we are still getting some strawberries, but they seem so be much smaller than when the season started.  Also I got more overwintered swiss chard that I mixed with garlic and oil, some baby beet greens from thinning, celery  and romaine lettuce leaves, some left over spinach mom brought over, basil, and some of my fennel fronds.  Added a splash of lemon at the end.  So yummy....thank you Jaime Oliver. Second time using his recipe in the Jaime's Italy book.  This time I used basil instead of parsley.  Both times were so good.  I always did sauté the swiss chard with garlic and oil, but didn't think adding so many flavors would be good.  I am so glad I tried it.  I especially like the celery leaves added.  Too bad my celery seedlings didn't make it.  I have the hardest time with them and parsley from seed. Any suggestions???? So I went ahead a sprouted my french garden mix and micro greens.  After seeing Mark from Marks Veg Plot sprout peas on wet paper towels a few couple weeks ago, I decided to give it a try with a micro greens packet my mom gave me last year for mother's day!  It worked out, but I haven't seen any more growth from them in a few days so I will use them today.  Thanks Mark!

The micro greens

French Garden Sprouts (still in Sprouter form) and lett over of last nights Swiss Chard Saute

Close up of Swiss Chard Saute