We went a little crazy with the food preservation this year. Jams and fruit butters of all kinds, dilly beans, tomatoes (and more tomatoes, and more tomatoes). Our chest freezer is now so full of garden food that we have to stack a box on top to keep the lid down. Lets hope the power never goes out.
Next year, I will definitely plant potatoes. I’ve been missing those homegrown purple potatoes we grew in our first garden back in 2009. Carrots, too. We forgot to plant carrots this year, and I’m beating myself up about it a little because the babe is now old enough to eat solids, and pureed carrots from the garden would’ve been perfect.
In any case, there’s always next year. We have officially reclaimed some of our tiny backyard from the hens by setting up an outside run, so we’ll be able to grow even more food (and flowers!) next year without fear of mass chicken destruction.
How did your garden grow this year? Anything you would do differently next year?
I’m so happy you’ve managed time to blog again! I missed reading your post over the summer but I know how difficult it can be to find the free time, especially being that you are a new mommy. I too, just gave birth to our second son this past June..Congratulations on your new addition and pretty please keep blogging! You are totally my inspiration 🙂
Congratulations to you too! And thanks so much. 🙂
I ran across you in that Adventures in Making. I thoroughly agreed with your comment about you preferring projects that are practical and useful. That is the way this grandmother has always felt.
I had several battles in my VA. garden this Summer. I had planted a new kind of tomato-Italian Tree Tomato. I had built my own raised bed and inverted a stock panel over it , which I ran the plants up on. It was magical watching them grow-UNTIL – the "aphids" showed up. It was war from then on for the duration of the summer and I only got to can 7 quarts of tomatoes-not the plants fault !(I mean my plants were layered with the aphids like you would take a leaf and spread a spoonful of peanut butter. It was horrible as they sucked the life from my plants and blooms.
My next battle was with the squash bugs and borer. I had just learned a little about the spiralizer and got to try a couple of different recipes -only to now LOVE squash because of all the different things I could turn them into. Enter the blasted squash bug -whom I SQUISHED the daylights out of until I had discolored fingers -Yuck! Then the plants collapsed and I met Mr. Borer ! How was I to fight an Enemy that you could not even see ?????
The third war was over the cucumbers: I had the absolute cutest little white cucumbers that were So Good. I made 7 pints of cucumber relish that was so good. (That will go with the beans this Winter) The bugs and the mildew moved in combined on that one. I did spray with half milk and half water and prolong the misery long enough to get a few cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches -but I was whipped.
My one triumph was testing out a new veggie from seed I got off of Ebay. It was a banana melon . I watched it all summer as it grew into a long Green Banana !(Yea-the mildew moved in) But I finally brought it in the house and cut it open at midnight one night – it was absolutely Perfect.It looked like a cantaloupe and was sweet as sugar. It was Delicious. I cannot grow cantaloupe where I live and I LOVE melons -so this will be a Definite plant in my garden next year if I am still alive and kicking. ~smile
Ugh! I can relate to your pest issues. It’s so frustrating to have all that hard work go up in bugs. I’ll have to try that banana melon – it sounds delicious! Thanks so much for stopping by Linda. 🙂