Garden Bounty

The garden is winding down, broccoli is spent for the most part, still have some plants out there for seed. The onions are all out and stored after a week of drying in the shed. I braided several of them this year for easy storage and use, plus they just look nice:)

This is an heirloom variety that is becoming scarce, I was lucky enough to get some sets and seeds from a friend on the Homesteadingtoday board. The sets did well, but the wind kept knocking the tops over, so I finally pulled them. They are a nice size, but due to our cool, wet weather up here they were put in later than they should have been and I think they would have gotten a bit bigger if they had been able to withstand that wind. I'm happy with the results though, especially with this being the first gardening year for us up here.

The tomatoes and peppers have been turning for several weeks despite the cool weather and too much shade. The tomatoes are being tossed into the freezer for now. Once I have a good amount I will be making sauces and salsa for canning, the plants are still loaded but are turning a few at a time instead of all at once. Before anyone suggests it, I did plant a determinate variety, it's got to be the weather and location. As for the peppers, they are one of the easiest veggies to put up.

Just remove the seeds, chop up, bag, and pop into the freezer. Can't get much easier than that.

We will be making a lot of improvements to the soil and Jesse is busy taking care of some of that shade today. I've learned a lot about gardening up here and next year we will be able to really expand the gardens and step up production.