Erin Erin, trying to be an agrarian, how does your garden grow?

We have gone back to our NORMAL west coast weather this year (finally!) and as a result there has been more moisture falling from the skies, more lawn mowing and much lest forest fire scare out here on the island.  By this time  last year I was fearful for the forests around my home and praying for rain.  This year's off-again-on-again rainfall patterns have decidedly not been falling. in my favour, and as a result my outdoors projects are much slower to completion. Again, because I try to be a glass-half-full girl, I have had less watering to do and as a result of the optimal conditions, MOST of my garden has been growing REALLY well.  

As at my last post in May, I'd just planted my corn, onions, tomatoes, carrots, and beans. I'm having a slow grow with the bed that the onions, carrots and Health Kick tomatoes are in.  I have started feeding them all, but I think the soil that I have in that bed (which is ALL new potting soil) had very little in the way of nutrient in it and so that bed is still looking very much as it did in May. The rest of the plants, including the apple tree and grapes (which I pretty much ignore and they grow astonishingly well) and the Damson Plum tree (which has now made its official comeback - and HOW!) are HAPPY HAPPY HAPPY!

So, for the record, here is today's gratuitous garden gallery (like the alliteration there? tee hee)

Damson Plums - ripe and ready for the picking

Grapes will be giving a bumper crop soon too
and yes, I need to replace the shed!

Just a few of the grape bunches I will be working with

This is the bed that is not growing as I had hoped
This fall I will deep compost and plant a cover crop

Cherry tomato plants that are VERY happy

Corn - higher than the eye can see - and already
starting to show tassles!

A pretty green place!

With love across the waters...

Springtime Catch-up

Spring is here in full force - flowers are blooming, fruit and vegetables are growing, home renovations will be starting again...

With the start of spring, I also came across a new opportunity for work - and decided that it really was time for a change.  The change in employers (yes, I left my last employer after 25 years) has me working a whole 2 blocks from home.  I walk to work.  I walk home at lunch.  My total commute is about 3 minutes - and that is if I stop to smell the actual flowers on the way.  With this change I have regained 10 hours a week.  

10 hours!

The work week is two and a half hours shorter, but the biggest change is that I am not in my car for an hour and a half each day.  I get up a little later - yes - but I am still out walking my dog in the early morning hours. I feel more rested and less stressed.  There is the "stress" of learning - oh, and there is some stress in that, for the first time in 25 years I am actually on "probation" for three months and there is the risk that I don't make it through - but the feed-back thus far has been really positive.

Spring has hit in full force, though, and this weekend I finally got to the serious gardening that I needed to complete.  I dug out the other two vegetable beds (pernicious weed removal) and ground layered some heavy-duty landscape cloth.  It is woven cloth covered in plastic and I sure hope that it finally stops the nasty weed that I have been battling for the last few years!

Once dug out, weed-barriered, and then back filled with cleared soil and potting mix, in went the vegetables.  Last weekend I planted the Principe Borghese (cherry) tomatoes - four plants this year - into the same bed I had the two plants in last year.  I generally harvest and dehydrate these ones as they store brilliantly and a handful or two makes a wonderful addition to my soups, stews, rice dishes and so on.  Slightly reconstituted, they make wonderful pesto sauce.

I also potted some Genovese Basil - admittedly, it may be too early to have it out, but I also have some seed that I can start in the house and grow in my garden window in the kitchen.  

This weekend was the lion's share of planting efforts. Two kinds of lettuce.

Pole Beans:

Health Kick tomatoes, Red Onions and Purple Haze Carrots (This will be the colour-filled harvest bed)

And two kinds of corn:

I have also put up some pet-deterrent screening to ensure there is no jaunting through the beds (or digging in them) until everything is well established.

I also have two kinds of squashes planted in the little bed out front.

All in all, a very productive day.

Tomorrow will also need to be a productive day  I will need to get the car in for emergency brake repairs, call repair people about my vacuum (something has disconnected somewhere and while the hose has suction, the chassis does not,) call other repair people about my awning (the metal loop that the pole connects to and then turns to open and close the awning has broken off and I need to get that dealt with ASAP,) Do the requisite laundry and weekly cleaning, and also clean out the front bedroom in advance of the next stage of renovations - the new window.

Yes, more renovations are on my table for this summer - but nothing as big as last year's job!  Additional window installation into the front bedroom (for more natural light) and then a full painting refresh in here.

Other summer projects include finishing the pantry shelving and then tricking it all out (paint and flooring) and MAYBE building a Murphy bed with a floating desk for the front  bedroom. Or it may go into the bedroom I'm currently using and I may move myself into the front bedroom - something I will have to decide after the room has the new window and been painted.  It has more closet space, and I think it is also bigger. I'm still on the fence about that, though.

With love across the waters...

Feeling Summer Bounty

My cupboards and freezer are starting to fill with garden bounty – and I’m LOVING the sight!

The past few weeks have been very tumultuous – as a family, we have not only been dealing with the sudden and shocking death of my Grandfather, but also the clean-up of his house – which has not been a small job.  While I haven’t been able to be there to help with the major week-day efforts, I have been down on weekends as much as possible (since he fell and ended up in the hospital) and as a result, the garden has been largely ignored.

With the exception of watering, I’ve done very little other than pick things, here and there, until this week. Last Sunday I came home from Mum & Dad’s house with a plethora of tomatoes. I then picked all of what was ripe in my yard and last Monday I really got into the guts of starting to process some harvest.  First things first, I made up some roasted tomato sauce – SUPER easy – the recipe was found and piloted by my Mum and can be seen on her blog about Roasted Tomato Pasta Sauce - Mum's blog is called The Messy Gardener. 

I had long booked today (Monday the 18^th of August) as a vacation day – and so was looking forward to a three-day weekend that would allow me to get some things that I have been neglecting around the house taken care of.  Friday night after work, I picked all of my pears.  They are now divided up – half (the larger ones) are in a paper bag (with a couple of apples to help speed the ripening process) on my kitchen table and the other half is in a basket, also ripening, but at a slightly slower rate.  The second set will be made into pear butter a recipe for which, I found online, and the first set will be for fresh eating (YUMMY!) and canning – I’m going to make light syrup for the canning ones, and I’m going to try out another recipe I saw on line for that one…

Pear tree - pre-picking!

Harvest!

Ripening in a Brown Paper Bag - with Apples to help

The Rest of the Pear Haul

Friday I also got to meet up with my Mum & Dad for lunch – and they supplied me with more tomatoes (yay!) as well as a HUGE bag of green beans and a couple of ears of corn! After I picked the pears, I cut up all of the cherry tomatoes (for drying) and got the dehydrator going. 

Getting the Dehydrator Loaded

Saturday morning I got straight to it!  First, I checked on the tomatoes in the dehydrator…

Overnight's Work - Still Some Work to Go

Then I made up another batch of roasted tomato sauce

Plum Tomatoes

Ready to Roast!

And canned it all.

Two Kinds of Tomato Sauce

While the tomato sauce was cooling, I turned off the dehydrator and packaged up the dried tomatoes… 

All Ready to Make Sundried Tomato Pesto!

I also stewed up the previously frozen Damson Plums and got them all stone and skin free… After that I quit for the day.

Frozen Plums

Cooking Down the Plums

Yesterday I had an out of town chore to look after in the morning…

Once home, though, I opted to get at the beans and look after the plums.

I chopped, blanched and froze two colanders’ worth of the beans – the third colanders-worth I decided to try my hand at dehydrating (for consumption in soups and stews through the winter. One colander is equal to about two cookie-sheets in the freezer – a cookie sheet vacuum sealed and frozen is 3 - 4 meals’ worth of beans (as a side dish)

Beany Madness in the Kitchen

In the Freezer

Dried Green Beans

Then back to the plums.  I tried (a couple of years ago) to make plum jam… I was using powdered Certo and it never did set, but it made this delightfully tart syrup that was amazing on pancakes and waffles… this time I didn’t even bother trying to make jelly – this time I went straight for the syrup.

Plum Syrup - 2014

Quite a haul!

Last night, before bed, I took out all of the rest of the applesauce from last year that I bagged and froze… I thawed it out overnight, added cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger to it and canned it up today…

On to the beans.  Pulled them out of the freezer, bagged and vacuum sealed them – they are now in my chest freezer waiting for winter dinners!

Frozen and Vacuum Sealed

In and amongst all of this activity this weekend, I also managed to mow the lawn, get the kitchen and bathroom floors washed, three loads of laundry done, pick the next small bunch of nearly ready-to-make-sauce-out-of tomatoes, and a *very* little bit of tidying and organizing taken care of. All in all, I’m very pleased with what was accomplished this weekend! The next major harvest activities will be more beans and tomato sauce... and the apple tree...

Oh... the apple tree...

Apple Tree 2014 - So Heavy With Fruit
That the Branch is Touching the Ground!

With love across the waters…