Not the Biggest

I decided not to bring in my zucchini to the State Fair because, although large, I know it will not compare to the other ones. I picked zucchinis out of my garden about this big back in July. If I had let them keep growing then I might have had a contender. Our neighbor called it Hercules...it did come in at about 18 inches though!

We have a bunch of morning glories growing in our tomato plot but I let them go because there are so many bare spots.

I want to harvest all of our basil and make a ton of pesto and freeze it.

I love this plant because up close it looks like lizard legs. If you click to enlarge it you may be able to see what I'm talking about. It has grown so much this summer, if you look back on the posts you will see how small it once was. The flowers bloom in the afternoon and the bees love it.

Jim loves this plant...

Robbie Bobbie!

More Booty

I brought this small harvest with me to my visit to the new raw vegan place, Pure Market Express, in Chaska - this - along with two huge bags of kale. There are so many ground cherries on the ground right now and what I harvested above was only about five minutes of work. I also picked one of the huge cayenne peppers and a ho chi minh. Also in there are the sweet purple marconi peppers, two different varieties of eggplant, green pepper, and a summer squash. When I got to the store I was instantly greeted by the Chef and owner, Rebecca. She ran back into her kitchen only to return with a raw donut hole. Oh my god delicious. I took a few things home with me to eat for supper that night - my favorite being the cilantro jalapeño cheese on top of some of the raw crackers. I would have been happy to have that as my entire meal but I had half a piece of lasagna and half a serving of Spicy Peanut Noodles (the leftovers were for Jim). Everything was so good and it just reminded me that we really need to get back to a more raw lifestyle again. Except we'll have to wait until after the State Fair and my birthday, right?

This morning I decided to start juicing again before the summer is over. So I picked some more kale and a beet and put that in the juicer along with a cucumber, broccoli, strawberries, apples and a pear - which I got from the fridge, not the garden. Yum!

Big & Bigger

The eggplant in the middle definitely could be harvested but I have been mildy obsessed with seeing how large some of my vegetables can get...

A couple of sunflowers have started blooming but unfortunately I do not think my mammoth will be blooming in time for me to submit any of them into the State Fair for the largest circumference competition.

The kale is now as tall as the fence.

The Front

Most of the ornamental grass I put in this Spring is doing well and all of the hosta I transplanted are thriving.

This little annual plot is to the right of the front door. I don't normally even buy annuals but they work, and look, well here....

State Fair

Yesterday I registered to enter some of my veggies into the Minnesota State Fair. I have never even been to the State Fair! So below is the zucchini I am going to nurture for the next couple weeks - I am wanting to enter it for the largest zucchini category.

I harvested a butternut squash this morning and gave it to a co-worker, not this one though...

This is my first year growing celery and it looks great so far.

My stevia is growing well but I have no idea what to do with it.

Kale, kale, and more kale:

There's some beauty in this beast...

Booty!

Almost...almost!

A couple of the sunflowers have grown about another foot in just a matter of days - nature continues to amaze me. The flower heads, although they haven't peaked out yet, are about the size of a fist.

The next two photos show my bumper crop of Thai basil. Tonight I will be making my specialty - spicy Thai basil chicken - for my husband and ex-roommate. They can both handle my level of heat, almost!


My pepper garden is getting a bit overgrown with some of the lilies and The Beast and weeds and Morning Glories. I've had to tie up a couple of the pepper plants because they grew so tall and thin that they can't hold up the weight of their fruit. The cayenne peppers are HUGE! When I harvest them I'll make sure to post pictures...

The beets should have been completely harvested weeks ago. At this point they are probably too woody to eat, so we'll most likely juice them - which is not so awful...

Here are the tomatoes...we lost a couple plants to disease...

This is just two of our basil plants...we're gonna be making a lot of pesto this fall!

I love succulents! Love them. I found this cute hen & chick plant at the Mpls Farmers Market at the beginning of the season and its been sprouting up chicks all over the place. I didn't know how well they transplanted so I experimented a few weeks ago - I plucked a few of the chicks out and just stuck them in another plant I had sitting outside. It wasn't long before they took and started getting bigger. So yesterday afternoon I plucked out a bunch and put them in a new planter.

I like ending with a pretty flower picture. This plant has been flowering all year - the name eludes me at the moment, but I will be sure to pick one of these up again next year.

Still Growing

The beast plant has started taking over this side of our house, too. These flowers are one of my mother's favorites - I think they're called 9 o'clocks? They've grown much more this year than they did last summer - they were in the same place then. This year I fertilized them with some worm poop fertilizer from Terracycle - I LOVE their products! It was started by college kids and they reuse all of their packaging, and you can find it at Target. That will be my first and, hopefully, only product plug.

The peppers are going crazy!

The Tahitian Bridal Veil hasn't gone as crazy as I'd hoped - but it is still pretty! The spiders love making nests in it and maybe if you click on the picture to enlarge it you may see one.

The herb pot is out of control...a couple of weekends ago we used a bunch of the chocolate and pineapple mint in mojitos, but it has only come back harder since then.

Below is my pot of annuals. The sweet potato vine is taking over, you can hardly see the variegated ornamental grass anymore. The spiralis in the middle is still going, though - again, click on the picture to enlarge...

I have had my eye on this star, and ones like it, all summer long. I went to my favorite garden center on Central and the guy gave me $20 off of this one. It looks great in our little "café" area...when the beast vine tries to wrap around it the rust ends up stopping it in its tracks. Nice.

This will be my first ear of corn, exciting - right?

The brussel sprouts in the background to the right...almost as tall as the fence now, I definitely need to start harvesting it...

It's Alive!

The mammoth sunflowers are living up to their name. They are now taller than me and are probably over 6' tall. The flowers are just beginning.


Here's the corn behind the sunflowers - I don't think they get enough sun, but they are beginnings to tassel.


This plant is continuing in it's quest to swallow the house. The kitchen window and the plant stand have fallen victim...


Pretty morning glories in the morning!


The front yard:

Now I Can Relax...

I have graduated from college, finally. And my wedding parties are over and done with...which means I can now relax and do nothing. Or water and weed my gardens that I neglected for the past couple of weeks.

Pretty flowers in bloom!

We've seeded grass three times now and this is what we have to show for it:


My fat eggplants:

My skinny, variegated eggplants - Swallow is the name of the variety I think:


Red hot cayennes:

I love this picture...this tomato plant produced one tiny cherry tomato and the rest are large:


I told you I neglected my garden...this is what I found, and they were each almost as long as my arm:


Renee, Jamee, and I made chocolate chip zucchini cookies and bread last night with a couple of them.

These are the plants on the deck, aka The Jungle: