Summer Slowdown

We've had some hot hot weather this summer. First, it got super hot (105) in mid to late June. Then it cooled down for a bit, even tried to rain a little, then went back up to the 90s. With this sort of heat, it's hard to do much. In fact, this is when I'm reminding myself that you don't really garden in July and August. All you can do is water and harvest. The crops at the farm are doing well. My crops at home are struggling more.

One surprising crop was the buckwheat. It grows super fast and doesn't mind the heat at all. We are using it for green manure/chicken food, and we had to move fast to get the chickens to it in time! We built more frame pieces so they can eat half a row at a time. I will plant more soon, because I can get another whole round before the fall crops go in the ground. But this time, I'll stagger planting so they don't all come ripe at once. Speaking of ripe, here's a lovely big harvest of tomatoes.

The tomatoes were in sector 3, and got some shade. They seemed to prefer this. The peppers in 2 are ok but could use more shade. For next year, I plan to plant flowers again, but farther from the crops, and on the west side to shade them more. These Indigo Roses look like jewels.

I baked them with pesto and parmesan and served them on pita chips. They went fast! I also made plum cobblers that were well received.

Jae's mom is in town, and they visited the farm. I guess they don't get this kind of variety and flavor of tomatoes in Sweden.

We went to La Salles for the Thursday Happy Hour music. Apparently this is where all the old folks go to get their groove on. This lady in yellow was having a blast. She was even dancing with the poles by the stage. Rick said, "If those fishnets come off, we're leaving!" It was pretty hilarious.

Other People's Gardens

I wanted to do a special shout out to other folks' gardens. Catherine planted sunflowers along the side of her house. These are all supposed to be under 5 feet tall! It's gotta be the RickyC compost. We hear that Rick's corn is ginormous.

My dad gardens in a condo by the beach. He only has a small patio, but he still manages to grow quite a lot! He's got tomatoes, lettuces, herbs, and cucumbers in pots.

The cucumber produced even in this small space.

It's amazing how little space you need to grow delicious food.

June 30th

Ok so these were the pix I pulled out two weeks ago to post and ... well I've been busy. The main focus of late June was PLUMS! We had a bumper crop this year.

Did I mention plums? This bucket went home to get frozen.

My freezer is stuffed with plums.

We shared as many as we could. Ann and Ed were good for two buckets.

 Late June was a great time for tomatoes also. I love the variety! Black Icicle, Blue Beauty, Cosmonaut Volkov, Indigo Rose, Indigo Apple, Indigo Blueberry, Pink Berkeley Tie Dye, Caiman, Momotaro, Tangerine, and of course, Sungold.

We had a Somebody Push X reunion for Keith's birthday.

Why is this woman laughing? Well it was a great time for civil rights. Marriage freedom and Obamacare saved, both in one week.

We had an anniversary also, our 30th. Hard to believe so much time has passed.

We went to the Red Tavern (bar #34) for brunch, and I had the best Bloody Mary in a long time.

Went to hear Old Spice at Shenanigans. As always they were fun.

The Spicettes were rocking out.

I got a new rug for the kitchen, in exactly the right colors.

It's Summer Now!

I guess it's time for my monthly post... sigh. Lots has been going on. We got a bit of rain early in the month, but really just sprinkles. Still any moisture is welcomed. We're all in full drought mode, with unirrigated lawns, short showers, and timed garden water. We even put a bucket in the shower. I wrote a poem about my lawn, and taped it to the fence.

And we saw this sign around town.

Despite a few thundershowers, it's been super hot. We already had a day that got to 108 degrees. One good thing about that heat is it makes 98 degrees not seem so bad. All that heat is ripening our summer produce. I got the first borgs from the backyard on 5-27. Tomatoes in May!

They made for a delicious pizza.

By late May we were getting apricots. Not a particularly good apricot year. The branch on the plum/apricot ripened later than the old apricot.

Before it got too hot, we walked downtown to the market. It's a fun community event, with lots of food trucks as well as produce and other vendors.

While we were downtown, we got a sneak peek at the new Burgers and Brew. It's going to be a nice space. We still haven't had a drink there yet, but we will soon. However, we did add a few more bars to the list last weekend: #31: Pour House and #32: End Zone,

I got my beans planted at home, and finally got the last of the beans planted at the farm.

By mid June, the plums started coming ripe. I've been cutting and freezing them daily. I thought I had thinned a lot, but I could have done a LOT more. Next time remember: take off 2/3 of the fruit, not just half!

Tomatoes are ripening at the farm also. The Sungolds make for good snacking.

Bill and Laura came down for Bill's 64th birthday. We sang him a verse from "When I'm 64".

Notice all those ripening plums behind the ladies.

And I caught Rick being silly for the camera. We were lucky that it was one of the overcast days, before it got so deathly hot.

Spring-Summer

Memorial Day has passed (no rain on the fair) and it's starting to feel like summer. We are still having highs in the low 80s, but it's predicted to be in the 90s in a few days. Everything is growing like crazy, and many things are ripening up, but more on that in a minute. The big news is that we got that nasty corner cleaned up. We'd been "encouraged" to do so by our insurance company, but it was long overdue anyway. We hired Neacail to haul all the junk. They started with the motor.

This shows most of what we were facing. We had already made a few runs the weekend before.

All the metal is gone.

Now we're working on privet and stumps.

It looks soo much better now!

Almost looks like a real house!

Yay for us! Rick and Catherine toast in their lovely shiny mugs.

Ok, so in the meantime, we still had farming to do. We harvested the garlic. This is only part of one row.

Rick harvested his also, and brought one over to show how nice and big they were. That's my Spanish Roja on the left, Rick's Early California White on the right.

We also pulled the last of the lettuce. We had some lovely heads.

Lovely stuff, and so very delicious. I'm glad I learned how to make great homemade blue cheese dressing (the secret is homemade mayo and lots of lemon juice).

The chard is still performing, although I expect it to bolt soon.

The tomatoes have grown into a forest in sector 3.

And as of yesterday, one has topped the cage. The six-foot-high cage... This is an Indigo Blueberry from my saved seeds, and I have high hopes for it.

All the tomatoes are setting fruit.The blueberries are so very blue.

The peppers always look hot and tired, but they are setting lots of fruit. And just in time! I'm almost out of both hot sauce and fermented peppers.

The volunteer sunflower is blooming.

And we're getting a few marigolds

I just finished pruning the plums yesterday. They are starting to color up. And there are a zillion!

The old apricot is ripening up also. That tree just won't die.

Here's what we harvested two days ago. Chard, lettuce, basil, and eggs.

Delina and Jae share in some of the bounty.

At home, I picked my onions. Didn't really get a good crop at either location. They all bolted before making much of a bulb. These yellow ones did the best.

My backyard tomatoes aren't as big as the ones at the farm, but they are producing!

In fact, I have a ripe borg now. Here it is on 5-16, just starting to color up.

And that baby is ripe by 5-22.

I pruned all the fruit trees. Here the peach/ nectarine in the backyard is looking nice and tidy.

And the apple tree has lots of apples.

I planted a few rows of beans in the backyard. I put zipper beans down row 3 and saved cranberry beans (flambo) in row 6.

The zipper beans came up well. I'm using tomato cages as trellis for them.

And this is just here so I can remember this phone number in case I need a mason.