First Mystery Revealed

It looks like the smaller of my mystery squash has revealed itself: petty pan! Not my favorite but I have to admire how persistant this rascal is!

Flowers in the Garden this Week

Squash curly thing and first Cucumber Flower

Yukon Gold Potato Flower and the first of many sunflowers

Here are some of the flowers growing in the garden this week. I am

amazed that the cucumber is actually flowering because it looks rather anemic to me. The tomatoes are also flowering and I am just so happy that these tomatoes are starting to thrive. I tied them up on stakes today - except for the cherry tomatoes because I ran out of stakes and will have to use cages.

Also, when my five year old saw that the sunflower had opened

he said, "Good. Now we will have golden finches!"

Tale of Three Beans

Above is a picture of my bean bed. On the right I planted Anasazi bush beans, in the middle I planted Dry Soup Tiger's Eye Bush Beans, and on the left I planted a green bush bean: Fagiolo Nano La Victoire. The Anasazi Indians used to live in places like southern Colorado, so theoretically, this bean is a native. The Tiger's Eye Bean is a beautiful heirloom from either Chile or Argentina. The Fagiolo Nano La Victoire is a french bush bean - although sold through an Italian seed company... Clearly, in this little plot, the native has out germinated and looks the most vigorous. Hmmm...

Back Yard Jungle

Left side of Yard and the Right Side of Yard

As you can see, my back yard, which was bindweed and dog-spotted grass last year, has developed in to a fine garden and suburban jungle!

Mystery Squash Growth!

My son and I marked where our mystery squash was this past Monday and then again today. Almost two feet in six days! It also started blooming this week. Still no sense on what it is...

Sunflowers Tower above Will

We had a couple of sunny days this week and the garden seemed to explode. The volunteer sunflowers are taller than my son. The mystery squash is vining onto the patio, much to the irritation of my husband. The peas are producing like mad: 60 this morning. I planted two rows of carrots this week - which of course, are not up yet. The edamames are struggling and the corn looks anemic. However, the garlic is thriving and has these cute little curly tips.

I bought some flowers for the garden - an impulse buy really. They look great around my peach tree (also a volunteer from many years ago.) I grew some forget me nots from seed this winter - along with some alyssum. It looks like a little bouquet at the bottom of the tree.

New Ground Cherry Tomatoes

This year I bought a bunch of fun seeds in the winter, did my best with them, and the results were mixed. The fancy peppers all died because of hail and cold. The fancy italian onions look great - I am hopeful. The leeks are plugging along. The tomatoes from seed seem to be doing alright - although I think they are slower than the seedlings I have bought from the store in previous years. Again, it has been a cold early summer - so I don't know what the deal is.

Anyway, one seed that seems to have done well are the Ground Cherry Tomatoes. I have never tasted or grown these - so I am hoping they will be fun. There never seems to be enough fruit around - especially with kids. Here is a picture of the Ground Cherry plant now:

My Mystery Squash

I was thrilled to learn I am not the only gardner who gets a kick (cultivates even) mystery compost squash that appear in their garden. Bramble Berries in the Rain has her own mystery squash and I personally think ours are twins. Toni's Weedless Squarefoot garden also has a mystery squash. It will be fun to see the 'final reveal' in the fall.

(Also, in a desparate move this morning, I stuck a couple of the snails I found in the garden in the birdfeeder -hoping that the birds would do the dirty work. Sadly, the snails wiggled off before a bird could get them. Lazy birds~)

Peas Love Rain

More rain is forecasted for this afternoon. Yesterday the kids and I were hiding in the basement because of tornados. My spring crops, however, really like all the rain. Our farmer friend used to tell us, "It can rain all it can before the 4th of July, and then it needs to stop." His favorite crop was watermelon and late summer rain caused the melon to rot in the fields. I will be happy if the hail doesn't shred my tomatoes!

Rain all Week

It has rained and stormed all week. It's a good thing the ground is sandy because otherwise the garden would have drown! The climbing beans are up - although the Chinese red noodle beans came up about week earlier than the Romano climbing beans. The tomatoes are alive but slow. The bush beans got hit by the marauding grackles. I have some beautiful volunteer alyssum that is filling in between the pavers in the patio. The sugar snap peas are enormous and I think at least a few of my cucumbers will live. I hope it is sunny this week.

Cat in the Garden

No garden would be complete without birds, bees, pets and children, although I don't plan on keeping a supply of children around forever. Here is Janie, my ferocious cat.

Good Kitty.

Bird Feeder out my window

This week I hung a bird feeder on the side of the house so that I could work on the computer and look out the window and see birds. I have a compost pile underneath it, so I imagine next year, I will be looking out my window and seeing sunflowers. I wish I could have captured the squirrel who has discovered it and does acrobatics to get at the seeds!

Grackels in the Melon Patch

I saw a group of these little guys in the garden early last week. I thought they were cute: social, chatterly. I assumed they were eating bugs and worms, however, it seems like they were eating the tops of my melon seedlings. It looked like a cut worm on stilts had been in the melon bed. So, I replanted and covered the bed. Hopefully, they will grow back quickly now that the ground is warm.

New Trellises

I added two trellises today for climbing beans. I tried a new method: bamboo tripods with netting. They seem a little flimsy- so I'll keep my fingers crossed. I planted Romano climbing beans - which were one of my favorite finds from last year and Chinese Red Noodle climbing beans - just for the fun of it. Here's a link to the Chinese Red Noodle beans:

I also finally planted the edamame beans - not sure why I've been dragging my feet on those. I planted a double row with apricot zinnias in the middle. It was a good day in the garden ~

Kale Recipe

(before and after)

I have been enjoying some tender, mild kale - much to the disgust of my children. Here's my favorite way to fix it:

Kale and Eggs

___________

Bunch of fresh, Russian Red Kale

Garlic

Button Mushrooms

Soy Sauce

2 Eggs

Sautee Kale with garlic until just wilted. Add a splash of soy sauce and then add sliced mushrooms. Cook until mushrooms just soft them set aside and cover. Fry eggs and set next to the kale - eat while hot.

to

Volunteer Awards

Here are this year's top volunteers:
1. Sunflowers (self-sown)
2. Cosmos (self-sown)
3. Iris sisters (compost two years ago)
4. Squash (from compost)
5. Speckled Romain (self-sown)

Sugar Pod Pea Flowers - & blog

The blog is finally caught up to today! Here is a shot of the sugar pod peas that are blooming in the garden this morning. The ground is drenched but the sun has finally come out. It has been so overcast you would think we were in Michigan or Buffalo. Saturday is my big gardening day - so I will update again then.

Early June

We have had lots of rain and cooler temperatures for the past couple of weeks. The potatoes seem to love this. Beets are up and happy. The peppers, however, have all but been shredded and eaten. I will have to replant.

The picture on the left is a wide-angle shot of the bindweed bloom - which also enjoyed the rain. Next is a picture of my yukon gold potatoes and then a shot of my tomatoes (Constoluto Genovese - lovingly grown from seed - fingers still crossed) which were planted after the bindweed was evicted. My cat Simon is also lurking about in that picture. I have a super volunteer sunflower crop and I plan to let some of them grow in the middle of all the beds. Last year the native Colorado sunflowers (we call them Ditch Weed) grew like crazy and brought lots of bees and yellow birds. The last picture has my green beans in it - although they are a little touch to see because the sunflower is so prominant.

May Garden

May finally saw then end of most of the spinache and a flurry of planting. I grew some fancy onions and leeks from seeds and tried my best at fancy heirloom tomatoes and peppers - we'll see if any make it. May 15th is technically the last frost date, but I remember from last year that May was still cold and damp - so that all my beans, squash and cucumbers rotted before they germinated. Therefore, I only planted a few beans in May and held off until the end of the month to plant my warm-weather stuff.

April Garden

April saw more amazing spinache and lettuce from the winter. I planted potatoes and sugar snap peas. The garlic from last fall continued to do well. The speckled romain in the far left picture self-seeded from last summer and I was really suprised to see it do so well.

Winter Garden

I had the best winter garden this year - lots of spinach and lettuce that overwintered, plus another crop of spinache that I planted in January. All I did was cover the plants when it snowed or was bitter cold and the rest was all Colorado winter sunshine!

Prologue- Dead of Winter

Last year I tore up half of my backyard and put in a delightful garden. Last fall I decided that this year I would get rid of the rest of the grass in the back yard. Here are the early winter pictures.