Latest garden scoop

I've harvested and eaten and given away a whole bunch of tomatoes. I won't be getting as many as I had originally thought because the mites really got my plants. A couple of plants just died but the rest are hanging in there and I seem to have gotten the mites sort of under control. The cucumber plants only ended up producing a few. I think it got to hot for them. They keep wilting.

The melons (cantelope and watermelon) aren't going to produce anything edible. The cantelope kept getting eaten by the cucumber beetles and I think got a fungus as well as being crowded out by a zucchini plant. The watermelon's leaves suddenly started curling up and turning yellow and looking wilty. I think it might be bacterial wilt or something else. Either way it is quite sad since I did have a few baby watermelons. One of they appears like it might be getting bigger but it could all be in my head. The plants aren't dead yet but struggling for sure.

The green beans were and are delicious. They appear to be flowering again so I might get some more before it freezes!!! Oh and most exiciting I have corn. I unfortunately picked two of them too early, but there are still 6 or so still out there. I'll let you know how it tastes. Second most exiciting thing is my green peppers appear to be starting to turn!!! My thai hots have been turning for a little while now. In fact I need to go out there and harvest some of them. I wonder how spicy they will be.

I made salsa tonight from all my different types of tomatoes. I got a hot pepper from my CSA and decided to add some of it because Sean thought it was a little bland. It is good thing that I only chopped up half of the pepper (serrano I think) and then only put half of the chopped up portion into the salsa. Now it has a bit of a kick. I think I got a seed during one of my tasting because it burned the back of my throat. It is melding in the refridgerator until tomorrow. Hopefully it won't get too much spicier or I will have to add more tomatoes or something.

I'm going to try and make pasta sauce later in the week and maybe can some chopped tomatoes. I got quart sized canning jars from my next door neighbor. Tomorrow I'm going to look at good will for some pint sized ones. I want the smaller ones for canning jam. I've got a whole bunch of blackberries that I want to turning into jam. Apparently you can make small batches of jam in your bread machine (if it has a jam setting). We'll see how it goes!

Garden: Update

So far I have harvested:
Tomatoes: 7 pear, 4 zebra
Zucchini: 1 huge one (I have no idea how that happened)

Unripe but coming:
tomatoes: a billion (way too many to count)
Zucchini: a few (however they are sneaky, so it could be more)
Cucumber: 3-4 (although I'm still trying to figure out when you harvest them)
Bell Pepper: 10-12 green ones (I'm debating whether to pick some of the green ones. Supposedly if you pick you first batch of peppers green it will cause the plant to produce more pepper overall. The problem is that Sean and I don't like them green!)
Beans: A whole bunch (It would be way to hard to count. I've got to go out and check them today to see if any are ready to harvest cause they are certainly getting bigger)

Flowering or still growing:
Corn: getting bigger but no silk yet
Watermelon: tons of flowers
Cantaloupe: tons of flowers (the cucumber beetles have been really attacking these, so we'll see what we get)

The dogs first home hair cut

Sean and I decide to save money we would start grooming the boys at home. It costs around 120 each time they are both groomed and for that we could buy a nice pair of clippers. So that sealed the deal. So this past Saturday we gave it a go and let me tell you it is a whole lot harder than it looks. As my Mom put it "They look like they were attacked by the mad clippers!" I thought everyone would enjoy some pictures!

Before


"Stop the torture!"


"What are you doing to me?"


"Oh dear, some one help me!"


After


After

None of the after picture do their "Great" haircuts justice. I'll try to take some better ones.

Dayton air show

This past weekend Sean and I took my parents to the air show. It was an awesome air show. By far the best I've ever seen! There were at least 5 aerobatic acts. Also we got to see the f-22 which is asolutely amazing. It really puts the f-16 and f-18 to shame.

In addition to really neat performances we were in a special section with free food and drinks as well as practically front row seating. Raytheon donates money to the Air Force Association so they give us a certain number of tickets for our people to attend the air show in style. The food was just your standard BBQ food however having access to cold bottled water the entire show was by far the best advantage. We must have gone through at least 8 bottles! It was quite hot and sunny.

Here are some photos of the event! Enjoy!!

Misty Blues all women skydiving team


C17 - flys like a jet but is huge


F22 - awesome after burners


more F22 coolness


Legacy flight


us


F104 - they look like the fighter jets from star wars


more F104


Sean D Tucker - areobatics

Up close to it

Patio Updates

Hey everyone, I know I'm averaging like once a month right now but I at least have some pictures to share. Here are some pictures of our completed patio.


Almost done


Grass growing


Other angle

picture of completed bed

Here are some pics of the finished bed. It has tomatoes and beet and carrot seed in it already so more pictures to follow.

raised bed progress

Well I still don't have my raised bed in the ground the 4x4 didn't come in time for the weekend before this last one and this one was mostly a rainy mess. However Saturday I was able to level out the ground for where the box is going to go. Tomorrow is suppose to be the day for installation so keep your fingers crossed. The weather is suppose to be nice. I've got to pick up wire mesh and landscaping fabric for the bottom. You may be thinking why mesh? Well moles are why! I don't want them tunneling up into my bed. I'm going to take some before and after pictures so be on the look out.

Oh and my tomatoes are huge (6+ ") so as soon as the bed is ready some will go in there and the rest will go in the unraised section. I have somewhere around 20+ plants all going strong so I think I will probably give a few away. Now the only problem with that scheme is I have no idea which plants are which at this point. My bad for not being more careful with the label when I transplanted them to bigger pots. So it could be a bit interesting. I started three varieties (red zebra, moonglow, and yellow pear) oh and some hybrid brush like ones that I got seed from my co-worker.

Last bit of garden news: I had 2 whiskey barrel planter out front that weren't being used. I kept thinking I would get flowers to put in there but I didn't want to spend the money on actual plants. So one has leaf lettuce and one has peas. I started the peas a little late so we'll see how they go. Oh and I had another ugly pot I inherited that I put more leaf lettuce in. It was quite a bit of work taking out most of the old soil and mixing in new top soil and compost so keep your fingers crossed.

Actually I lied.... even after I get the raised bed in I'm putting paver stones back by the fence to make a walkway. I started the trench but then filled partially back in while leveling the space for my raised bed. And I've got to get rest of the patch in shape for the rest of my veggies. I want to raise it up party as well but I'm not sure I will have time. I managed to acquired 37 8" paver stones like you would use for a tree ring (the smaller ones) from craig's list for 25$!!! Quite the steal however I'm not sure if that will be enough or I will have enough time to get them put in before I really need plant the rest of my seeds. I'll keep you guys posted. Pictures I swear will follow.