Mid-Summer's garden report.

I've been waiting to post my garden report in a fit of superstition.  It seems that every time I post a garden report we get hit with hail and all my lovely almost veggies get beat up and I have to go and buy my produce for the year.  :'(

Well this year my garden has been extremely slow going thanks to the very late start we got from the late freezes and then all the rain we were getting.  Perhaps I'm just not allowed to have a garden?  I don't know.

Here's the old location of my garden. 

old garden with volunteer plants.

I picked this location when we first bought the house as it was a nice sunny place that got everything my plants need.  As you can see, some plants still do well here.  But as you can also see, it doesn't get the sun it used to.  Thanks to these...

Apple tree, came with house.

Pine tree was 4 ft 10 years ago!

But even with all the shade, some of my plants continue to thrive in the old location.

Looks like I get spinach for lunch today! :D

These are all volunteer plants (seeds from previous years).  Sorry about the weeds, I've been neglecting it for a while.

Of course over the years the trees grew and started shading the garden space. So I had to move the garden. I still haven't done anything that is permanent yet as I'm trying to figure out where the plants like to live the best. So I picked this location due to it being good for plants and I wanted to prevent Lilly from jumping off the retaining wall and hurting her leg anymore.

peppers with tomatoes in the back.

Zucchini appears to be all male flowers.

Hey!  I finally have two green beans!

the green bean planter, zucchini in the back there.

Lettuce is coming in.  Herbs in the green planter.

cherry tomatoes.

We also suffered quite a setback with my tomatoes.  I bought these planter boxes not really realizing that they were a grow system.  I just wanted the boxes because they were portable and they have this water reservoir in the bottom.  I didn't realize that they came with fertilizer also.  Which is great, the plants exploded!

Unfortunately due to the fertilizer ratios, while I got huge plants loaded with fruit...I also ended up with this...

This is blossom end rot.  :'(  It causes the fruit to ripen early, but be totally unusable and rotten inside.  So I've had to go pick as much as I can find and then go back to the garden center and get some Lime to add to the plants to give them enough calcium to grow. 
The good news is that some of the later tomatoes show no signs of rot and hopefully we'll get some more flowers before our season is over. 
I'm also hoping that I can (with help) move the pots to my back porch when the temperatures start dropping and extend my growing season.  I might even fashion some "green houses" over the pots if I can keep them healthy enough to continue to produce.

Fingers crossed!

A great way to drive hubby nuts!

So I've been drooling over this set of furniture from Oakwood Interiors forever.  I probably even mentioned it here before.  So I had pretty much given up on ever getting this bedroom set because the company went out of business.

However, when I was at a friend's house she mentioned that I look on Craigslist.  So since then I've been doing that...and guess what?  I found the set.

But of course that set sold.  bummer

Then I found the set again...and it sold.  bummer!

Now I've found the set a 3rd time.  Only one small problem...they have the sleigh bed instead of the panel bed that I wanted.

But all is not lost...yet.

I figure I can get this set, put the sleigh bed in our guest room and then order the panel bed that bought out all of Oakwood Interior's inventory.

Oh and since this set doesn't have the armoire, I thought we should get a flat screen tv and put a two way mirror over the tv.  Then it looks like a mirror most of the time but when hubby wants to watch the ball game, it's a tv!

Genius!

UPDATE:  The listing for the furniture is no longer there.  I hope it means they pulled to repost this weekend, but I fear that someone else snagged that great deal.  sigh!  

UPDATE #2 - Hubby strikes back!:  He says "Why didn't you go get it?"  grumble, grumble, grumble...it's a very good thing he isn't in town right now.  But I just thought... I could turn this into a green light to get the next set that comes along.  w00t!

all of it with some TMI thrown in for fun

So Darly is off to Girl Scout camp this week.  She was a bit nervous to go... in fact she was saying that she did not want to go right up to when we left for camp.  I think she was a bit worried about me being here without her and she likes to fret about the unknown as well.  I teased her that she was sounding like someone else we know (no, not me!) that gets really annoying when she doesn't know what is going to go on.  (NO SERIOUSLY!  I'M NOT TALKING ABOUT ME!!!)

I just threw that in to be funny.  Yes I do tend to get a bit annoying when I don't know what's coming up, but this other person is like me on crack or something.

We drove through some rain to get to camp (and I had to drive back through the rain to get home again).  Let me tell you that there isn't anything more fun than flying down a mountain road that curves back and forth with the road covered in water and cars all on the one side and a drop off on the other.  Fun times!  And the really sad part is that even though you try to take it slowly, the other cars get annoyed and think you're being a sissy.  Well to that I have to say that I wasn't the one pulled over by the cops!  I learned that they have gotten MUCH better at disguising unmarked cars now.  I was totally shocked when that black suv suddenly turned into a "christmas tree" with lights flashing and all.

So since I won't be catering to miss picky eater this week, I've decided to try out some new ideas on the culinary front.  Last night was my first foray into this adventure.  I tried out making "pasta" out of zucchini.  I pulled out my mandolin slicer and the julienne attachment and sliced the zucchini lengthwise to get long strips.  That was fun as after about half-way the zucchini didn't want cut evenly anymore.  I had to keep adjusting the finger guard to keep the pressure even on the veggie.  Otherwise I had "noodles" that were thick on one end and super thin on the other.  I cooked the zucchini in the microwave with my favorite seasonings and then grilled some shrimp with lemon juice & garlic salt.  It turned out really yummy although it took me a while to get over the fact that there were only two things on my plate.  So used to having that starch there also.  I think that tonight though (I usually do plan overs) I'll chop up the shrimp because it was difficult to have both zucchini and shrimp on the fork with whole shrimps.

Or maybe I'll make one of the other dishes.  I will also be trying out making cauliflower "rice."  In fact that's probably a good idea to make that this evening.  I was going to make chicken & "rice" for this meal.  I already have some chicken stock in the frig that I need to use up.  So that will be good.  I can throw some mushrooms into that also.  yum

In case you haven't noticed, I'm also trying to drop some pounds.  I know that part of my weight gain is my being a sloth.  But I also think that it could be my age and fluctuations in my hormones.  I can't be sure but I believe that I've finally experienced some hot flashes... I can't be sure because they haven't really bothered me like other women have reported.  I suppose that I could go see my doctor and have my hormones checked, but I REALLY want to do this w/o pharmaceutical hormones...and I have yet to find a doctor who agrees with me.  Who can blame them really when they get kick backs from the drug companies...right?  I'm betting that finding a doctor who not only would agree with me on not taking anything AND actually knows how this process is supposed to go naturally would be a small miracle.  So for now I'm holding out.  sorry, I am so disenchanted with doctors that I have to be pretty much dying before I go in.   I get enough out of them when Darly has to go in for her physical to go to camp.  I think I posted about how our doc who is supposed to be more holistic tried to push us into getting a vaccine that I am totally against.

Another thing on my agenda for while Darly is at camp is spending more time at the gym and also cleaning out my frig & freezer.  I guess that means I should really get off this computer though.  LOL!