It wasn't supposed to be this way!

Yes, I'm talking about "my" weekend! I should have known better than to think that I could go see a movie, or any of the other things I had planned for myself! Here's how Friday went:

Kids were sooooo excited to go to camp, and I was too. Got them all packed, even left a half hour early so compensate for any Friday afternoon traffic! Didn't go as planned. We got stuck in traffic immediately on the on-ramp by an accident and it just spiraled downward from there. Our metro area is basically an island, you have to take a tunnel or bridge to get anywhere so you can imagine the bottlenecks that can happen even on a good day. Today traffic was completely stopped and we spent an hour inside the tunnel in 100 degree heat with all the traffic fumes in the tunnel. I am used to tunnels, but normally we speed through at about 45-55 mph, but let me tell you, being stuck in one is kind of creepy. It's underwater in the Chesapeake Bay and there was an oil tanker above us so I kept thinking about that, LOL! So anyways, we left at 3 pm and check-in for camp was between 5-6 pm. We got there at 6:18 pm!! That's almost 3 1/2 hours in the car to go about 95 miles! As soon as we pulled in, 2 college girls flagged us down and said "are you Loch & Finn?, we're glad you made it, we heard about the traffic!". It's amazing how short a distance away it can be to find small-town friendliness again. They took us to the kids' cabin, and although the other kids had already headed to the dining hall, one of their counselors was sitting on one of the bunks waiting for them! Typical, cute Virginia Tech student (remember being in summer camp, girls?!) doing his summer employment - someone should tell him to soak it up, 'cause the real world will start soon LOL! I pretty much dropped them and left, no time for the kids to show me around, they can do that when I pick them up. Loch has been before, but this is Finn's first time and I was a little worried about him since he is not as independent as Loch, but as I drove away he yelled "Bye Mommy! Luv you! See ya later!"... I guess he's okay!

Finally arriving at camp!

View outside the kids' cabin

Finn & Loch (in orange) walking with their counselor off to the dining hall

So I didn't get back home until 8:15 pm! By the time I fed the dogs and got settled, it was clearly too late to go see 'Eclipse' like I wanted to, so I settled for reading a book and watching a survival show on Discovery.... hmmmm, that's the same thing I would do if the kids were still here.

Today I got caught with another big harvest, and I hardly even touched the jalapeno bed, those are needing my attention, too. I am headed to a BBQ tonight (across another tunnel!) for my gardening & homesteading meetup group, so the rest of the day today was spent harvesting, making food, and driving again LOL!

Today's harvest was used for the potluck dish for the BBQ. It has a theme: "Catch It, Kill It, Grow It, Brew It"! Since I had so many tomatoes I am going to make Caprese Salad along with some Jalapeno Cheddar Cornbread and bring along some of the Homebrew.

Caprese Salad with a Basil Vinegarette Dressing

Jalapeno Cheddar Cornbread

Yikes, I made a lot!

This is the basil vinegarette

... and now it's time to leave again and go to the BBQ, it should be fun, plenty of new people to meet and good food to try, I just hope the traffic is okay. Unfortunately, this is a huge tourist area and while we are all trying to flee the area, crazy people mostly with Jersey plates thinking only of the beach are headed in to back up the freeways!

Hopefully, I will be back early enough tonight to finish my book! Then it's up early again to go pick up the kids tomorrow morning. They have a skit that they do and I want to make sure I'm there in time to see it! I know this camp is short, but I am just glad there is a sleepaway camp for such young kids, it's good for them! In a few years they will be old enough for a whole week, yay!

I have the feeling maybe I heaped my plate too full in the garden this year, it seems that I just can't find the time to "do nothing"!

kinderGARDENS Week 14 Update: Caterpillars, Butterflies & Uncles!

The green roof had a few plants that appear to be surviving in triple digit heat & humidity!

I think it's the mini-pumpkins!

Other things interesting the kids lately are the caterpillars! Several photos showing different branches of the same fennel plant. And there are 5 more fennel plants that I didn't even photograph! Get the kids and see how many they can count!

The main plants in our butterfly garden are Parsley, Dill & Fennel... plant some and you will see why! And don't forget Butterfly Weed & Milkweed for the adults, among other flowering herbs, they love it!

Here's a video tour of the dill & fennel wildlife:

Other exciting things this past week include the arrival of the kids' uncle, one of my brothers flies with the Air Force, and occasionally we get a surprise visit when he arrives for an overnight stay at our local base!

We made it in time for the kids to watch him park it! They were so excited, they really need that male bonding while daddy's away in the Middle East. We had a great dinner with him, then he was off again!

The kids with one of their favorite uncles... they are all favorites! One's job is flying airplanes (cool), another works for Caterpillar (cool again!) and uncle that lives in AZ drives for FedEx (way cool guy that drives the trucks with presents on them LOL!) !!

As for me.... I'm out the door in 5 minutes - dropping the kids off at 4-H Camp for the weekend, yay for me! Although I kind of wish I was headed to camp! I have to drive almost 2 hours to get there, so you know I must really want some time to myself, is that selfish? Oh, well!

As always, check out The Inadvertent Farmer for a link to other kinderGARDENS participants' updates!

No work done today

I just heard on the 5:00 news that our heat index is 106 right now... am I getting used to it or just losing my mind? It's hot out, but to me it doesn't seem as bad as it was before, even though temps are the same. I could tell the humidity was bad however since at 5 pm I had to wipe down my camera lens before every shot, and still a bunch came out foggy! I only went into the garden today to take photos and check on the melons, then it was right back into the house - I didn't even glance at those jalapenos!

Here's what's going on now:

Everybody loves fennel! I have caterpillars of every different instar stage on my fennel, I stopped counting at 53, and that was only one plant! I can't even imagine how many are on the other fennel, dill and parsley plants. The butterfly weed is already constantly being visited by beautiful huge Swallowtails, I hope to have the camera handy next time. Speaking of, this morning while watering I saw a Hummingbird Moth at rest just chilling out on the peanut plants - ran in, got the camera, of course he was gone when I got back!

Honeybee! This is very exciting this year. We have always had loads of bumbles and mason bees, but never honeybees, even though my yard is the only yard planted out for almost 1/2 sq mile! This year - they found me! I couldn't be happier. Of course now I have to teach the kids to step carefully around the clover, they are used to the bumbles which pay them no mind and the Masons which are clumsy and cannot sting!

Look closely, 1st instar stage!

Jump for joy! It's greens! I haven't been able to grow them since early May thanks to the heat. Even my heat tolerant lettuce blends said "no, thanks". On a whim I planted out some Mizuna which apparently tolerates some heat (I didn't believe it!). Germination in about 6 hours, I forgot how darn fast that stuff is! I am letting it sun in the morning, and covering with shade the rest of the day in hopes of a salad for my tomatoes. Better get out there and thin...

UFO's are coming fast and strong now, but still not the top ones that look different

4th of July Hybrid has been a steady producer and has done well in a container in the heat

These mini yellow Stuffing Peppers look like lollipops! I love how they all grow upside down like a bouquet with all the peppers on top. This looks like alot, but I am hoping to make mass quantities of stuffed (with rice, etc) and freeze - they are meatball sized, so I am hoping they will be like premade dinners, just pour tomato sauce over the top and bake.

That's the plan, anyways LOL

Planted Japanese Climbing Cucumbers June 10th, they are now flowering and looks like they are doing okay with insects so far... I threw zinnias or something in there too, that's the other thing you see. Funny how slowly flowers grow in seed trays but go crazy direct seeded. These were planted 1 month ago and you can barely see to the right of Marley's ear one lavender bloom that opened tonight!

Cosmos self seeded last year all over the place - I have a 6 ft wire fence and they are above that!

Still not ready.... maybe I'm checking too much - is 10 times a day too often?!

Easy garden dinner tonight! Scrambled eggs w/cheese & salsa made last night, strawberry jam

How to make 9 lbs of harvest disappear in 2 hours...

did you guess?

SALSA!

Most of you are well aware of the usefulness of this particular condiment as a way to "get rid of" almost anything! It's delicious, nutritious, keeps well, and is always beautiful, whether fresh or cooked and preserved. Of course you can't ask for a recipe, since it's different every time depending on what I have harvested, but here's a short tutorial for putting some salsa away for another day! Beginners are often very leery of canning their harvests, and rightly so, it can be a time consuming operation and food safety is always paramount, so here is another way, just freeze it! I know many of you are well versed in this, but there are always beginning gardeners that just don't know where to start - we were all there once! Canning has its advantages, like shelf life and not having to rely on uninterrupted electricity for your freezer, but for stress free stocking up, freezing is the way to go! I figure I will be stressing over the canner soon enough in September when the backyard is nothing but a tomato jungle, so tonight is all about keeping it simple.

Looking again at today's harvest - Red Norland Potatoes, Quadrato Rossi Bell Peppers, oodles of Heirloom Jalapenos, Heirloom Yellow Sweet Bell Peppers, Heirloom Fish Hot Peppers, 4th of July Hybrid Tomatoes, one more big UFO Tomato, 2 little Cucumbers, and a bunch of Cilantro

We won't worry about potatoes, never a problem using those up, and the 2 tiny cukes will be eaten with a salad for lunch tomorrow.

I will add to this another 7 4th of July tomatoes, 1 UFO, 4 Orange Wellington tomatoes that were harvested over the weekend, and some garlic, shallots, and onions from my stash.

Here we go!

Assemble your ingredients. Use as much or as little of each as you want! Taste whatever hot peppers you have first to give yourself an idea of the heat. I have had jalapenos that ranged from almost sweet to habanero-ish towards the end of summer!

In my case:

1 bowl of all of the above tomatoes, chopped

1 bowl containing 6 small yellow bell peppers & 3 large green bell peppers

1 plate containing 10 chopped Fish Hot Peppers and 8 chopped jalapenos (they were med-hot today)

1 plate containing 2 chopped onions, 1 whole head of garlic chopped, 4 chopped shallots, and a bunch of cilantro

Olive Oil

Coriander

Cumin

Kosher Salt

Lime or Lemon Juice (just a half to one will suffice usually, start with 1/2 and taste)

Use whatever fresh herbs you want! If you have coriander, basil, rosemary, whatever, it's all good!

Step One: Heat up olive oil and add onions, garlic, sweet & hot peppers, cook over med-high heat for 5 minutes

(at this point you may want to remove some and save for later - you can always add more hot peppers, but it's hard to take them out LOL)

Step Two: add your tomatoes and toss

Step Three: add your seasonings and herbs, cover and cook over low heat 20 minutes

Step Four: Let cool a bit, then ladle into containers, label with date and contents, freeze!

When you are ready to enjoy, simply take out of the freezer and let thaw in the fridge. Suitable containers include plastic, glass mason jars with lids (remember to leave 1/2 inch headspace for frozen expansion), even baggies sealed and laid flat on a cookie sheet while they are freezing will enable you to stack them using less space.

Mission Accomplished!

4 pints of Salsa for the freezer, a half pint for using now in the fridge, 2 quart bags of frozen bell pepper strips

(note to newbies: you don't even have to blanch peppers before freezing, they are super easy to preserve for a garden fresh stir fry in winter!)

I love salsa on eggs, omelets, quiche, whatever... we're gonna' need alot of eggs since this is only the first day of the peppers!

Produce has disappeared! (of course it helped that I saw my next door neighbor have a friend over - fresh meat! I promply brought over 2 lbs of those jalapenos, she obviously hadn't got the memo yet)... only these few remain! But what am I going to do tomorrow LOL?

Last year I planted 9 jalapeno plants, waaaayyyyy too many! I still have 7 jars of pickled leftover from last year, and I use 1-2 jars a month! This year I cut it down to 6 plants and there still appears to be a problem, like 2-3 lbs a week! Either they really like producing in Southeastern VA or there is a conspiracy. I am a closet survivalist/prepper, so I will always go with the conspiracy theory! Some people have zucchini problems, I have jalapeno problems! Stay tuned for more exciting ways to dispose of jalapenos!

help!

Dearest Husband,

wish you were here...

and so it begins...

It's Here!

It's as big as his head!

First came the extraction. Funny thing: before hubby left, he gave me this tool and said "here, you might want this for your garden stuff"... what the heck is that LOL? I figured he just didn't want to put it away. Sure came in handy!

While I was doing the extraction, I decided to look over the plant. It is VERY healthy, over 6 ft tall now, and loaded with fruit as you can see below. Here's the thing... look at the fruit at the bottom of the plant (above pic) and then look at the fruit now forming at the top of the plant. See the difference? RuralRose, are you looking and laughing? It appears we may indeed have an identification of the UFO Heirloom: "Oxheart"...! I'll keep my eyes on the fruit development but that shape is pretty unmistakeable. I have grown them before, but never ended up with the regular Mortgage Lifter shaped fruit I got at the bottom of the plant. I wonder if seeds were crossed or what the seed's history really is! I will probably never know, but it is fun nonetheless!

It's as big as Sprocket's head too!

Now on to the details:

Tomato fell way short on taste - oh, no! Maybe it's because of my anticipation... I was starting to dream about driving around with it strapped to the hood of my car like a redneck hunter with his prized whitetail, or maybe finding a veggie taxidermist to mount it for me!

It could also be the weather, it rained (thankfully, we needed it!) all day long, heavily. I went out and got it tonight since I was afraid it would split badly by morning with all the rain. It had split this evening but only a little. Maybe it was too swollen with water, but I found the taste to be quite bland, of course way better than store bought, but yet nowhere near the taste of a Brandywine. We'll keep on tasting, though... hopefully the next will be better. This would make a fabulous thick slicing tomato on a burger it is so meaty. Also interesting is that the bottom tomatoes set so much earlier than the ones on top and are so much bigger and slower developing... I will remain hopeful for the next harvest! They better get good because it looks like these two plants will provide the majority of my canning this year, each has over 20 tomatoes on it!

I have had some inquiries for the seed next season, I will definitely be waiting for the best ones to save from, this one wasn't it, sadly!

I'll leave you with a video of one of my favorite summer visitors:

Click Here to learn more about the Hummingbird Moth!

I obviously had hornworms somewhere in the garden, I just love it when I don't find them until they have turned into this stunning moth!

Tonight's the Night...

Yes, I think tonight will be the big night for the first UFO!

How AM I going to get that thing outta there?!

Below is a photo of the UFO Tomatoes, they are really getting tall, that is me reaching as high as I can next to them!

This morning I got a little accomplished before the humidity and heat drove me back inside. I was able to replant some beds with more beans, cilantro, dill, lettuces (I keep trying), and a couple of hills of small pie pumpkins. I should still have enough time in the season to get the pumpkins in time to brew our Harvest Pumpkin Ale and freeze some for pumpkin bread in the winter. I still need to rip out and replant the "green roof", and prune one of my Crepe Myrtle trees that is completely blocking one of my garden paths, but that will have to wait until evening, but truth be told, I am hoping it will rain today and I won't have to go back out!

Photos from the garden this morning, good, bad & ugly in no particular order:

Note: Orange Wellington hybrid tomato does really well in a container!

Sugar Baby Bush Watermelon containers, cosmos are starting to take over the area, though!

Planted Japanese Climbing Cucumbers in this bed just 2 weeks ago, already out of control!

Now get ready to have a good laugh...

My "cornfield" in the shade experiment! It's pathetic! About 18" high and believe it or not, has tiny ears on it LOL! I just shake my head and laugh when I see it every day, it's right next to my shed. I left my radio on out there this morning, maybe they will grow more if they have some tunes to listen to. Here's the description of it for an extra laugh:

Corn, Early Sunglow Hybrid

Best early variety, thrives in cool weather.

Garden-fresh sweet corn is summer's greatest pleasure. A packet contains enough for four 15 ft rows. Seeds are not treated. Extra-early, uniform ears are about 7 inches long with 12 rows of deep kernels. Stalks yield 2 ears. Best early variety, thrives in cool weather. Height 4 to 4½ ft. Proven tops for productivity, flavor and wide adaptability. Ready to harvest in 63 days.

Ears 7" long? LOL... and cool weather? what was I thinking?!

More laughs above. This is my Asparagus bed. The one I dug out by hand all day by myself, even bothered to fence in from the dogs... I kind of forgot about it! So now it's a bed of Sassafras, grass, and miscellaneous weeds! Should have planted that stuff in the green roof, it might still be green!

This is just plain redneck!

I swore I would not buy any more stuff for my garden except seeds for fall. I have more than my fair share of "stuff" in my shed to create things from, and this is what ensued! These are my bean and Edamame beds, and this is actually working to keep the Mockingbird out. I caught him red handed yesterday morning hopping around eating tops off my beans. I sent Sprocket the "Outback Jack" after him and then she was in there messing up my bed too! We made up our own breed for her, she's half Jack Russell, half Australian Shepherd, and the only Aussie in her is her coloring, other than that she is a complete terrier-terror to all vermin in the yard! So while my setup is ugly, it's working. It can come down in a couple of days, the birds don't bother the beans once they get their 2nd set of leaves.

In case you are wondering, this is what an Outback Jack looks like! Yeah, we can't figure it out either...

Sprocket the wonder girl

Really?!

I am really hoping my grapes make it to harvest this year, last year I put paper bags on all the bunches and the mockingbirds still got to them!

Don't you love the fact that the garden can provide delicious junk food, too?

Tomatoes, Jalapenos, Cilantro, Chives & Homebrew

I walked outside with this yumminess last night and my neighbor said she wouldn't be surprised to see me milking a cow in my backyard and making my own cheese for the nachos, too - hmmm, not sure if that was a compliment or not LOL!

Speaking of last night, this is what the kids looked like when I arrived to pick them up at the "Y" from Parents Night Out! While I am glad they had fun, this means I had to spend a half hour scrubbing them down at 10 pm before bed!

I will be hiding out from the heat all day, but hope to post about that tomato very soon...!