Busy, Busy

We had lots and lots of rain last week, which was wonderful. My last okra plant lost it's ongoing battle for life. I've been picking broccoli florets about every other day. I'm also eating about one radish and one sugarsnap pea a day. Some of the tomatoes are looking like they've caught a disease, I snapped off some yellow and brown leaves this morning hoping it - whatever IT is - doesn't spread to all of the plants. My beets are getting huge, as is just about everything. Here's some pictures I took over this past weekend - or maybe it was the weekend before?


I love, love Tahitian Bridal Veil and can't wait for this plant to really start going nuts! We don't have many hanging hooks outside so I got creative and hung one of our wind chimes from the bottom of the plant. These particular wind chimes were a present from mom-in-law from a recent trip to Texas.


Here are the peas!

More Blossoms

My early variety, Swallow, of eggplant is already starting to blossom. I can hardly wait for the beautiful purple fruits!


I've been munching on the broccoli...


I already have some fruits on my Yellow Pear tomato plant. I tried taking some pictures this morning but they were too blurry, another day...

First Harvest

This past weekend I finally cut off the big head of broccoli since it looked like it was going to start flowering any day now. It was so delicious fresh from the garden, almost sweet.


The beets I planted from seed, on two different occasions, are coming up strong and happy.


I was so excited yesterday when I saw the first (yellow) squash blossom.


I think I've talked a little bit about the back plot we started. Next to the garage Jim had a makeshift compost bin and when we got the new compost bin this Spring he disassembled that old one. He spread out all the compost that was in there and we had this whole area in front of the new bin that was not being used...and, quite likely, has some very healthy and fertile soil. We weren't sure how much sun the area got and how well anything would grow back there so we didn't want to invest too much time or money in that plot. We planted, by seed, a couple different varieties of sunflowers and three rows of sweet corn. We also put in a couple of the pepper plants that Jim's sister gave us. The sunflowers started popping last week and the corn started coming up this weekend. A few of the sunflower cotyledons have been snipped off by animals, but it looks as if we'll have a fabulous crop of sunflowers this fall.


The picture I took of the rose bush last week didn't do it justice, so I went in for a close-up this time...


And I put in some arugula yesterday, too. One more plant to add to the list!

May Flowers

The rose bush is almost in full bloom right now and it is absolutely beautiful, but it doesn't last.

Kale:


Our big broccoli:

What I Got

Here's a list of what I've planted thus far:
Veggies
Banana Peppers - 6 plants
Beets
Broccoli - 1 plants
Brussel Sprouts - 1 plants
Butternut Squash (Early) - 1 plant
Celery - 1 plant
Eggplants - 3 varieties - 7 plants
Green Pepper (Bonnie) - 2 plants
Ground Cherry - 1 plant
Habañero - 1 plant
Ho Chi Minh Peppers (Hot) - 4 plants
Jalapeños - 6 plants
Kale - 18 plants
Okra (Burgundy) - 1 plant
Pimento (Red Pepper) - 2 plants
Purple Marconi (Sweet Pepper) - 1 plant
Radishes
Sweet Corn
Sugar Snap Peas - 3 plants, trellised
Summer Squash (Yellow) - 1 plant
Tomatoes - 7 varieties - 7 plants
Watermelon - 1 plant
Yellow Pepper (Sweet) - 2 plants
Zucchini - 3 plants

Herbs
Basil - 9 sweet, 12 Thai
Cat Mint - 3 plants
Cilantro - 2 plants
Lemon Balm - 1 plant
Onion Chives - 1 plant
Oregano - 1 plants
Parsley - 2 flat, 3 curly
Mint - 1 chocolate, 1 pineapple
Rosemary - 2 plants
Stevia - 3 plants

I also have a few more plants that I got from my sister-in-law that she was given by the horticulture department at the U of M. But they are full of aphids, so I'm gonna see if I can get rid of those before I put them anywhere near my other plants...and I have to find more room.

The corn is planted next to the garage, by our compost bin, and I also planted some sunflowers back there...all by seed and we did that earlier this week - nothing's come up yet but we are diligently watering every morning and night!

Pictures of new and old, finished projects to come next week. Stay tuned.

Still Not Done

Yesterday it got up to a record-breaking 97 degrees in Minneapolis...it was over 100 in other parts of Minnesota. Just last weekend I was scared of frost.

Last night me and the husband got lots of stuff done in the yard. Jim put in the last couple of cedar edgings in the backyard. He weeded all the day lilies on the side of the house and mulched that area. I got the ornamental variegated grass put in the front of the house, seen here:


It's a little far away...I split up a bunch of the hosta that were going crazy and lined the area in front of the bushes. That whole area was mulched before but nothing was growing in there. Then there was a big gap between the bushes that are next to the house and the hosta, so that's where I put in the ornamental grass. There was still another gap in there but it was in a semi-shady area so we didn't want to put any plants in there. We went to the garden store on Central (almost Columbia Heights) and picked up an antiqued - maybe authentically, not sure - wrought iron dragonfly to stick in there. You can't hardly see it in the below picture unless you know what to look for, see if you can find it:

Halfway Through May...Already?

I believe I am all done planting in the main garden. As soon as the zucchini and squash and watermelon plants start growing more there will be much less room in there. I am hoping that I'll be able to keep them all separate from one another and they won't turn into a big mess. Here is the finished project:


The kale, on either side of the garden in the front, has been growing like crazy. Our juicer broke last week so we haven't been picking it as much as we would normally. The broccoli and brussel sprouts, far back left, have gotten pretty big, too. I am so glad I took a chance and planted everything a little earlier than advisable. All I lost to the cold were a couple of basil plants and some sweet potato vines.

Then I don't know what came over me but I decided to start a whole new project. Actually, I was milling around at Home Depot and found these short posts and decided to clean up the yard a little bit. With all of the dogs running around the grass got pounded out a couple of years ago. So now the backyard is weeds and dirt/sand - the house gets so dusty and dirty and muddy. We've been talking about either seeding it or just mulching it. Seeding it is so much work and then we have to try and keep the dogs and cat off it while it grows. No thank you. You can see below what I've started and what we'll be finishing in the next couple of days...it actually turned out better than I thought.


I also got some ornamental grass that I'm going to put up in front of the house but I didn't have enough daylight last night to start that project - tonight!