Collards, Chard, and Kale oh my!

Good amounts of rain. Really hot weather. The garden is happy.
No issues to report...knock on wood.

Made my last harvest of radishes, turnips, spinach, lettuce and arugula until I plant again in the fall. I have a lead on a green house we may be able to attach to the barn....so I am hopeful for a fun fall/winter and early spring of planting in the coming months.

The broccoli has sent out some yummy shoots that don't even make it into the house...as the boys gobble them up before then. I can see some cute little cauliflower bunches growing within their leaves also...can't wait for that. Lesson for next year...plant at least twice as much broccoli so I can preserve some.

A LOT of greens have been ready each day. In a picture below you can see my harvest from Tuesday night....this amount has roughly repeated itself every two days for that last 2 weeks. Success on the greens. I have had enough to enjoy eating right away, give some away to my sister, and even managed to freeze a few baggies full to enjoy this winter.

Beets...I am worried about those. They look beautiful but I am not detecting any bulbs yet....should I be thinning?

Tomatoes...some plants have flowers already. I can't wait too see what we end up with this year. No signs of blight yet!! Yipee!!! I think I may have successfully avoided that. I think mulching with straw has been great.

Some pictures:


A full view of the garden-

Tuesday's harvest

The boys having fun in the "fort

Sunday's harvest

Green

It's all green here. No, I didn't win the lottery. The yard, the garden...green and happy.

On the other hand all my kids seem to do is bother eachother all day long. Morning to night. Why can't you just get along?!!?!? They do love to be outside, so most of our time is spent outdoors playing in the yard. Lately the big hit has been the sandbox. Arden digs holes, throws dirt around and generally makes a mess. Baker has taken to creating sandcastles that include a co-op with a food storage basement, a place for the "bad guys", a place to store arrows, and several hidden doors. Kids love sand.

The garden is producing radishes, turnips, arugula, leaf lettuce, chard, spinach, sage, red russian kale, and collard greens all ready to eat! Next will be broccoli I believe. The garlic has sent up scapes and we have enjoyed those in our dinner the last few days.
All of the seeds I planted are moving right along including sunflowers, basil, delicata, zuccini, cucumber, bunching onions, cantalope!

As promised some more pictures!



Bear keep digging and prefers to spend most of his time in this hole he created:

Arden showing off his "digger" that can actually hold a whole dinosaur.

Baker displays his sand castle handy-work.

and dirty little boy feet-- yep, it's summer!

Spring and into Summer

Hello Friends!

My favorite time of the year. I have been so absorbed in the outdoors, the garden, playing with the family outside that I have been avoiding off-work time use of the computer at home.

The camera finally filled up with nearly 400 pictures taken over the last month so it is time to unload, upload and update.

The winds of change are blowing at work and I am hoping for the best there...could mean more money, less time, more time, same money, could be good, could be bad...I am hoping for good change, more money, same amount of time. Should know more next week.

The family is good and we are busy working in the garden and making plans for camping weekends this summer. Did I mention this is my favorite time of the year?!

We have also been doing a fair amount of socializing and entertaining. Friends over, cook-outs, kids play dates, family visits, etc. Again, did I mention I love this time of year???

Without further ado.....some glimpses of the happiness I have seen in the last month: