Part I. Garden.
Whew. Where does the time go?
School. Garden. Playing chauffeur. Sleeping. Sickness. Cooking. Preserving. Living.
The time all goes somewhere.
The garden is dormant again. Already! The year flew by. We didn't have the record breaking heat/drought challenge this year. Halfway through the season we added a hose reel that significantly improved the water situation. We're near the end of installing a micro-irrigation water system, paid for by a grant we won back in April. [Thanks, St. Louis Earth Day!] There's a nutshell.
More expansively:
The weather was exceedingly kind in many ways. There were few blistering days and due to regular rain (in spite of an area drought in August) we were able to water from the hose a lot less. However, we struggled with too much rain in the Spring and a slow warm up, stunting the peppers and encouraging wilt growth on the tomatoes. Radishes were hit and miss. The watermelon grew and grew but never really got anywhere. Tomatoes took over the whole place this year, with squash lost to disease and a lot of seed sprout failure. I tried a DYI "tape strip" for small seeds and the seeds just never did anything. It was a lengthy involved process that I will not be repeating. The broccoli went from unripe to bolting overnight, while the cauliflower never seemed to ripen at all. The kale, on the other hand, was an overwhelming success. Many families were fed from the four kale plants before cabbage beetles set in and took over.
I don't feel like we did as much food preservation this year as usual, but the shelf in the basement is pleasantly full. I stuck with much favored foods, skipping some of the more exotic recipes. We're stocked with canned peaches, applesauce, and marinara for winter. Definitely my top three items. We weren't able to build a storage room in the basement (root cellar) as I had hoped. Our attentions went elsewhere and I'm still hoping we'll get a chance next summer. I also brushed the dust off the food dehydrator and made apple rings and banana chips. More of those are in the works. Sadly, little of the food on our preservation shelf came out of my own garden. I just wasn't intense enough in our 64 sq ft of space to feed us adequately and preserve for winter. Plus, I don't have peaches or bananas growing around here.
We did eat some great stuff, though. Peas right out of the pod, standing next to the trellis. Next year, more peas are going in the ground. Beans straight off the plant. Radishes and lettuces trimmed and then tossed with dressing for dinner. Tomatoes were stewed into sauce, marinated with mozzarella and olive oil, eaten by the handful at snack time. It was a good year.
Notes for next year: Don't let Winter fly by - Spring is coming and it's never too early to write up the seed order. Plant more peas. Put the peppers far away from the tomatoes. Sigh dramatically and pull the yellow cherry tomatoes, they taste good but it's impossible to eat them all and they take up too much space. I'm sure there's more. There always is. But it's OK. We keep going on.
The micro-irrigation system will be in play for next year. I'm not sure how it will play into everything. we'll see. I'm excited to get the project done, though, and turn it all on. And clear all the bits out of the garage.
So, where does the time go? Tomatoes and peppers, peas and beans. That's where.
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