An outdated update.....

As I explained in an earlier post last week, my computer and camera have been giving me much grief. I haven't been blogging much because it's been a rather frustrating experience to have my computer freeze up more than the popsicles in my freezer....also I have been painting all this last week for nine hour days at my friend's house...I've been just a wee bit tuckered out at the end of each day... Anyway, back when I was still in the throes of painting my own house I wrote this blog post and never published it because the photos to go with it simply wouldn't load off of the camera. 

Since this post the garden has grown and grown and my absolute glee has right along with it. I hope to be able to update my posting here more regularly now that our summer is winding down and routines are starting to wake up from the hibernation they usually succumb to when Kevin is home for the summer. 

So a few weeks ago, here's where things were at....

the painting and general nesting renovations continue around our house. We've taken a slight break...and by break, I mean we concentrated for a few days on the outside of the house. We drove to the local nursery that was having a HUGE sale and picked up some hydrangeas, spireas and a pair of very sad looking little apple trees.  We lugged them home in our van with all the branches in the children's faces so that the little girl pretended she was a fairy living in a tree the whole ride home and the baby just screamed.

We (and by that I mean mostly Kev) dug a bunch of holes and got them in the ground and now we are giving them lots of love and saying somewhat nervous prayers. (only a touch of nerves because the trees cost a combined $45.00, but it really would be sad to see those little scraggly babies die)

The apple tree Kevin planted for me back in the spring has actually sprouted 6 apples and that is nothing compared to the 32 tomatoes that have sprouted in my container garden. ( the plants themselves are a little root-bound and sad looking but the tomatoes are coming along beautifully). Really the whole tomato experiment has gone just as I had hoped.

I have made several large mistakes along the way (hence the root-boundedness) such as not knowing how to prune or force pollinate the tomatoes myself to get the best yield out of them. But the way I look at it. I spent about .20 on tomato seeds and about $20.00 on dirt and zero for the containers...so that's not bad for a crash course in growing a few vegetables.

Oh, man have I mentioned the lettuce....it is the mother of all lettuce heads I swear.... it's like Don King or Sideshow Bob out there.

and the green onions are seriously having a party in their container too, a spicy green party that get's chopped up every night and made into a salad party for our supper. I've actually had to cut back, our breath is so strong from the onions that we will be in danger of losing our close personal relationships with others.

Anyway, all of this has spawned some serious confidence (unfounded I'm sure, but try telling my gardening ego that) and I have drawn up plans and made lists and lists and lists of what will be planted, pruned, pulled and partied with next summer. Right now I am able to scoff at the mental images lurking in the back of my mind of me, a year from now, shaking my fist at the heavens, on my knees in a weedy patch of failed carrots...I am preferring the mind's eye image of myself on a ladder pulling down baskets of crab apples from the mini orchard we've got going in the back yard... which should tell you how delusional I am because those trees are, in reality, only five and half feet tall....

so, wouldn't you like to know what two more weeks have done out there?....

{the tomato count is sitting somewhere around 62...}

cheers.