Sloooowww Garden!

Who else is bewildered by the summer weather across the nation this year? I know I am not alone, thanks to Kelly and Mama Pea's updates from MA and MN. Who else wants to chime in? Don't get me wrong, I am loving the cool, dry weather for myself (I can't shake that part of the MN girl out no matter how many years I spend in VA!), but my tomatoes don't like it a'tall! I still have yet to obtain an edible heirloom tomato out of my garden, and it's the end of July!! I have oodles of green ones out there but they don't seem to be in any hurry. The 2 that I have picked were split so badly they were inedible. We have been dry, and then when it does rain it rains 2 inches at a time so they swell up and self-destruct! In normal years, I would pick them prior to a rainstorm and let them finish ripening for a day on the counter, but in normal years they wouldn't be completely green!

Here's a pic of a True Black Brandywine that seems to be approaching 1.75 lbs this morning and isn't even faintly pink:

These are Black Pearl Hybrids...no cracking problems here, although slow, at least I am getting a handful daily now.

Heirloom Hokkaido Squash are coming along quickly, although I am not sure what I am going to do with all the squash yet!

Cucumbers look awesome, although it takes a good amount of hunting for them since they are mixed in with the squash!

Here's a rare sighting around the homestead: who is this creature? Why, it's sailor/farmer/husband! And he's actually sitting in our house! Since he's leaving again in a couple of days, it's more like a mirage!

Yesterday's Harvest. The 2 small Heirloom tomatoes were useless, had holes in them and cracks...and maybe someone living inside, lol?! They were tossed. I have let my jalapenos go to red and they look great this way, think I will do that to all since I am tired of the grocery-store green!

Wasn't sure what to do with this particular bunch of produce, so I made refrigerator pickles. This time sweet Red Popper peppers went in with the cukes and one jalapeno and garlic clove and some fresh dill added to each jar along with a fresh grape leaf to keep everything crisp. Thinking the jalapeno might give it an interesting kick. And why not? It's not like there is ever a shortage of cucumbers!!

Lastly, I have a bit of news I have been keeping to myself trying not to get my hopes up...NO, I'M NOT PREGNANT!....

I was accepted to the Master Gardener program in the fall! I attended orientation in May, but out of about 90 applicants I think, there are only 30 slots, so I was quietly keeping my fingers crossed! The other day I recieved a letter from Virginia Tech University Extension Service and was pretty excited since it appeared to be thicker than a standard "are you crazy?" response, lol! I start the VaTech based classroom training in the fall and then start the intern phase. I know I'll be busy since Charlie will be on deployment, but am excited nonetheless!

Summer Camp

We picked up Lochlann from summer camp! He had a great time, as we knew he would! I promised him I would put the pictures up "TODAY, MOM!"...so here they are. None of it garden-related, by the way...but all our family lives at least 1000 miles from us, so the blog is the easiest way to communicate our events! Some of the pics Loch took while he was there, and the end-of-camp ceremony pics I took. Enjoy!

Loch's Bunkmate

Loch showing us one of the Animal Science class animals

This boy turned out to be Loch's first "camp-best-friend", and the little boy was teary eyed saying goodbye when I took this. All us parents were a little choked up by it too!

View outside the bunkhouse

Last Day Ceremonies

The lake

Counselors performing skits

The Council Ring/Campfire Area

Loch with the canoes

Entire 5-8 year old camp with their counselors

Yay! My kid is the only one not holding his certificate in front of his face, LOL!

Go 4-H Cloverbuds!! Can't wait until next year when both my kids can go!

How the U.S. Navy saved my shallots!

You know how some women hang on to their pre-pregnancy clothes even though they will never fit properly again? It's kind of like proof that we were indeed svelte and hip - "back in the day"! Well, this is also true with veterans. We can't seem to get rid of our uniforms and all accoutrement no matter how many times we stumble upon them over the years in the course of spring cleanings. I have been lugging around 2 seabags full of Navy uniforms ever since I got out over 10 years ago! Now it's like proof to my kids that I was somebody before them, lol! (For those of you who don't know, I was an OTA, Ocean Systems Technician - big word for someone who detects, classifies, and tracks foreign submarines). So on to the shallots - I live in VA, where no one has basements, so I am trying to figure out how to store my shallots so they won't rot. After much thought (I don't have pantyhose or old onion bags to reuse) I came across said seabags in the closet. When I opened the first one, there on top was my answer - Ditty Bags! No, that's not dirty bags, but ditty bags! They are intended for laundry or storing things, and even though I have never used them I seem to have copious amounts of them stored in with my uniforms. The perfect solution - they are made of mesh, and you can launder them for reuse! Who would have thought my Navy service would have come in handy for gardening, lol!?

Here's the shallots with the tops cut off ready for storage

...and here's a "Ditty Bag" with a new life storing shallots!

Yesterday's harvest brought a few cukes, Pinot Noir Bell Peppers, Purple Rain Eggplant, Red Popper Sweet Peppers, and a few blackberries the birds didn't get to.

Harvest Dinner: Chicken Kebabs with Grilled Eggplant, Peppers, Black Pearl Tomatoes and potatoes

On to new exciting stuff: I got a new scale, and it is a sexy one at that! Can a scale be sexy, you ask? Well, just look....! It is cordless, and has a temp probe that can be plugged into it! Even gardeners can get giddy over tech-y stuff! This scale is "all that - and a bag of shallots"! So much for gardening to save money...this was one of those "I have to have that" moments!

On a walkthrough of the garden yesterday, I snapped some pics of things growing now. This is the Hokkaido Heirloom Squash and Cucumber Bed. Growing like gangbusters over the past week!

Flowers on the Hokkaido Squash. Notice the inside of flowers are filled with bees doing their busy work!

I left a few of my grape bunches unbagged so I could monitor their ripeness...the first bunch has turned purple! You can see why I bagged the rest...birds!

In other news around the suburban homestead...we took Loch to camp yesterday! How awesome is 4-H in that they have sleepaway camp for kids as young as 5?!! Nervous, you ask? No Way! I can't wait until Finn is old enough to go with Loch next year. I'm not nervous even a little bit...I know how awesome camp is and he was excited to go. He is also my kid that has no separation issues either, he is "Mr. Independent". I just hope he takes some pictures with the camera we sent with him. Finnegan was feeling a bit lonely on his first night without his big brother, so Daddy set up the tent and we went camping in the living room since it was raining outside! We even set it up right next to the lake (aquarium)! Picture is kind of grainy since I snapped it with a kiddie camera.

Here's a few pics from Finn's sleep study at the Children's Hospital the other night. It looks worse than it was, lol! He said he was turned into "Spiderman"! We will get the apnea results later this month. I guess he and Daddy had a good time there watching a movie and feeling like a science experiment!

Getting back to the Garden...

I spent the day getting some things done in the garden that were being neglected the past couple of weeks. The weather has been strange this year, unseasonably cool (mid-80's) with very little humidity (definitely not complaining!) so things have been slower than I am used to. I have had some cherry tomatoes, but am still waiting on my first heirloom tomatoes! I picked a good week to let things go since the chores only took a day to get caught up! I pulled weeds, wove my tomatoes into their trellis system, and pulled out all my bolted lettuces. I had never let my lettuce get so tall before, they looked kind of like 3 foot Christmas trees for bunnies! Then this evening, I finally went on a Japanese Beetle Massacre, ugh! My grapes were covered with them, all piled on top of each other in their shiny green disguting-ness!

Here's the damage, the beetles are belly up on the leaves below!

Speaking of pests, I have been meaning to post a pic of my first Tobacco Hornworm. The night this happened, no kidding, I dropped my little cultivator and ran! If there were any neighbors looking on, they probably thought I had found an anaconda. I have seen these in books and was familiar with the PICTURES but nothing prepared me for a live performance! This happened while I was actually searching for whatever had topped my potatoes...earlier I had noticed that one of my potato cages looked like someone had taken a weed whacker to the tops. Those of you more seasoned than I will probably laugh at the fact that not only did I take pictures, I even videotaped this monster to show my husband what was living in our backyard!

After consulting the trusty "Good Bug, Bad Bug" book for eradication tips, I almost gagged when I read "pick them off by hand, cut in half with knife, there is no known pesticide..." GROSS! Needless to say, I cut off the whole branch, and after using it for my photo shoot, put it in a Ziploc and into the neighbor's trash can, lol! Of course, my husband, upon seeing the video emails me from the ship and says "are you sure that's the only one?" So it's back out to the garden and I only found one more, but it looked like a bird had been pecking at it since it was dried up in the dirt so I left it. I just checked again tonight and I didn't see any, although now I know that if you see one with white sacs attached to it, leave it...those are beneficial parasitic wasps that will hatch and kill it for me!
Thanks, Kelly for reminding me to post the hornworm pics...maybe I can prevent someone else from a heart attack the first time they see one, lol! This one's for you 8)

Not much to speak of for the harvest the past week, a few Pinot Noir Peppers and Purple Rain Eggplant (the tomato and carrots were "harvested" at the farmer's market!) Tomorrow should be a decent picking day, I noticed while doing other chores that I have alot of bell peppers, and a few cukes and cherry tomatoes ready, along with another 40-60 jalapenos. I wasn't prepared to preserve anything today, so I figured it was better for them to sit on the plant rather than on the counter until tomorrow! I may let the jalapenos go to red this time, since I already have 2 gallon sized bags and several jars pickled of green jalapenos.
And, last but not least...tonight is my first night without one of my kids! The youngest, Finnegan is spending the night with daddy at the Children's Hospital for a "sleep-study". It is very strange without him here...and quiet! I am sure Sailor/Farmer/Husband will take pics for me after they get him all hooked up to the probes for me to post. Finn was looking forward to "being turned into a robot" and I am sure he will do fine, especially since Daddy will be there sleeping on the couch in his room. I can never get any sleep when I am in a hospital, and my husband seems to be able to sleep wherever he lands, so he was elected for this gig!

A Crabby Day

Two posts in one day? I couldn't resist! We went crabbing with friends today and had a great time, weather was great - never thought I would be able to say that in Virginia in mid-July! Here is some of the bounty from today. Friends stayed later than us and kept on catching so there is another cooler full besides this one!

Always gorgeous Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab

Finnegan's catch of the day

Dinner: Blue Crab, Jalapeno Cheddar Muffins & Home Brew!

Back from our "Staycation"...

We actually started our staycation 2 days before Daddy was set to return from sea. It was a bit like the movie 'Office Space' where he announces that he doesn't really like working and "I don't think I'm going to go anymore"... Truthfully, I was over the single mom thing and couldn't wait for the reinforcement troops to sail in (literally) and give me a break! We have a state parks pass so I figured we would use it at our local state park and go to the beach. This was pretty cool since it's on the Chesapeake Bay and the kids can see Daddy's aircraft carrier, the USS Truman, go by bigger than life about 3 hours before he gets to the piers and we go to pick him up. In past years, this has become pretty routine, non-exciting stuff for me but now that the kids are a little older it is so fun to see them get excited and see things through their eyes. Of course, in their eyes the pirates Daddy is out hunting down are of the Blackbeard "aargh!" variety and the Carrier is just like "Top Gun", lol... I envy them and their un-jaded view of the world...oh, to be 5 again!

Anyway, me-the mom who hates to sit on the beach- actually bought a bunch of sand toys, umbrella, and a beach chair and headed out. Here's Finn at the State Park excited upon seeing the first of the small boats going by belonging to Daddy's battle group.

This is a pretty bad picture, but if you look in the left center of the horizon, you can see a Navy Destroyer, this was just one of the several smaller ships that precede the carrier coming in. (Lame, I didn't get a picture of the carrier - bad mom!)

Not sure what's going on here.

So it turns out the beach isn't so bad after all...I forgot how much cooler it is at the shore, and an umbrella helped! Now if the kids could just be older so I can trust them around the water I could actually read a book! I took one with me and laid it in the sand next to my chair to give myself "the illusion" of relaxing, but in reality was watching my kids in the surf like a hawk.

After Daddy got home, we had a great outdoor lunch at a restaurant on the water and gorged on crabcakes and grilled tuna sandwiches, Daddy also got his homecoming/late Father's Day gifts of a new Leatherman Skeletool and some tactical looking flashlight. My husband is a "geardo" so he was overjoyed, showing the kids "Look, this light is for night vision, etc, etc". You would think he would get tired of it all, but he loves his job and gets downright giddy when faced with a new tactical "toy"! After lunch, it was back to the beach where we remained off and on for the next 5 days, lol! Sailor/Husband also got some new surf fishing gear, so even after a day at the beach, we would head back out after dinner to fish. All this jived pretty well with the garden, since due to the "Minnesota Summer" we have been having my first tomatoes aren't even ripe yet, so my garden is kind of on autopilot right now until the fruits start to ripen, giving me some extra time. Even if we could afford a big vacation this year, we have no time since Sailor/Husband is leaving again in 2 weeks!

This pic shows what it's been like this summer so far: the Ziploc bag of my husband's toiletries never gets unpacked since he's always on his way out! It's like he's a visitor to his own home...I am waiting for him to start knocking on the door instead of opening it with his key, lol!

Finn with Daddy

Finn and Loch digging for crabs

We headed to the beach on base to await fireworks for the 4th of July. Finn is digging to China, of couse.

Not sure what waves Finnegan plans on surfing here, but he's got "the board carry" down pat!

Here's Marley obsessing over her frisbee. She has become quite the disc dog since she came to live with us, but has never played in the wind on the beach in the sand...it was all a bit much for her and I thought she might have a nervous breakdown out there!

We are actually headed out crabbing today - then it's back to the garden! I find that I usually avoid the beach like the plague during tourist season, but am slowly rediscovering the good things about living here that I often take for granted. Plus, it tires the kids out! I am, however, getting really tired of sweeping sand up from everywhere, and the inside of the car looks like a sand dune! Oh, and before I go...here's a mental smell for you...my husband left a plastic bucket in the Outback with some rotting squid bait in it...I got in the car the next day, and....ugh! Yep, Daddy's back, alright!

Temporary Hiatus!

I am still here! Will be taking a few days off from blogging since Husband/Sailor/Farmer is home! His ship came in on Thursday and we have been fishing and going to the beach and just spending time together as a family. He leaves again in a few weeks so we have alot of activities planned for the next couple of days. Hope everyone had a great holiday weekend!