season end and sweet starts

So we totally moved and our new place is totally A+++. I pulled up all the remaining plants and I'm hoping that I get some serious indoors ripening action in the next few weeks. I have mega plans for next year, and I'll be prepping my new plot next week. Here are some pics of my current garden life:

I'll put in a 4' wide by 12' long plot in front of the garage. All day sun and warm south facing wall, betches! Mike's gonna do a lean-to greenhouse for the springtime too, so don't be surprised if my garden kicks all y'alls gardens asses next year. P.S: landlords totes gonna repaint the deck and house/garage exterior in the spring. Beat that! Also, that trashy looking cardboard box is drying after the rain, Vera and Dot play in it alla the times.

Garden shed filled with garden things. Boom. Also, that happens to be an apple tree that grows small fist-sized apples. Double boom.

MY KITCHEN. FOR ME. So many cakes and jams and preserves will be born here. Makes me a lil misty-eyed just thinking about it.

Lazy shot of the final harvest IN. YOUR. FACES. We got a big bag o' dill, two paper bags o' sweet peppers (ripen, damn yooouuuuu!), a bigass bag of heirloom tomatoes (with an apple in there for ripening encouragement), a summer squash, and an eggplant. SNAP. BAM. BOOM.

You guys aren't even gonna know how to handle how amazing my garden will be next year. Juz sayin. Gawd this post is so gangsta fresh! 

pickling season!

And by pickling season, I of course mean that I have pickled one jar of carrots. OPEN A WINDA, THIS KITCHEN IS BUSTIN.

cosmic purple pickled carrots. no biggie.

mini harvest

With the risk of winter barging in and with our move coming up, I figured now would be a good time to grab up what I can. The forecast calls for warm and sunny next week, and there is still lots left for harvestin', but in the event that a major ice storm or some other such freakish apocalyptic disaster happens between now and then, I wanted at least one photo to remind me of all of my 2010 garden efforts.

Here's what I got:
Bottom - leetle eggplant. There are many many more and the plants seem unaffected by the cold, so I'm hoping that, even after we move, I can pop over and reap my little purple beauties.
Clockwise from eggplant:
- summer squash. There are a few more, hopefully the plant pulls through and we can get some more off of it n the weeks to come.
- one sweet italian pepper. Again, I picked this one early (green) and there are many more. Same sich for the eggplants. Vera devoured it while my back was turned. I guess they weren't kidding about the sweet part.
- basil! Everything in front of the south-facing front window is doing fine, including the basil. I picked most of it though. Don't want to push my luck.
- sage. Lots of sage! Anyone want some sage?
- beets. Rather, beet greens. The beets didn't have a good enough spot for bulging, but these greens will be delish anyway.
- leetle onions and a garlic. When I first planted everything I jammed a bunch of garlic cloves in the dirt to ward off squirrels. The cloves cheerfully grew into more garlic. Neato! The little onions need more time overall, but I got a couple good ones.
- cosmic purple carrots! I'm actually impressed at how big these got despite being miserable in the shade. Sweet little snacks for Vera!
- tomatoooeeeeess! Lots of them and for the most part the plants look like they'll put through into the nicer weather. Some of these 'maters are frost damaged. Booo! I'll maybe make salsa verdé or something? I dunno.

So yeah. Oh and PS. I AM IN LOVE WITH GARDENING AND WILL DO A MORE AWESOME JOB NEXT YEAR. I can't WAIT!!

don't tell my garden that it isn't July

If it were early July, my garden would be kicking ass. Unfortunately, it's late August. We'll see what it can do in these last few weeks before the frost. I give all of my plants regular expectant yet disapproving and highly critical glares, so I'm hoping they notice at some point that my standards are far, far higher than what they're currently reaching for.  I'm also hoping that I can cover them for the hard frost and then they can continue into a nice warm September... dare to dream!

sage and basil. basil is finally kickin it. anyone want some sage??

eggplants and peppers have exploded. these are from organic seeds too! shove it up yer arses, GMOs!

sweet italian peppers. waiting for their redness.

BOO YEAH. EGGPLANT.

the back garden looks like this. the overall theme is "struggle for survival". shade is a no-no. I have yet to learn that lesson.

BUT whaddo we got here? It's a summer squash, mthrfckrs. YOU'VE GOT TWO WEEKS SQUASH. DO IT.

and yep! cucumbers! might even have enough for one jar of pickles before the frost. one jar. thanks garden. thanks a lot.

and my purple carrots are actually making carrots!! a rabbit hangs out with me when I garden, and I let him eat the sad lettuce and nibble on the carrots. we're like that because we're friends. I can get about a foot away from him before he's like "uhhh... yer creepy" and runs away. vera named him "bugs bugs".

BLUE-PODDED PEAS IN YOUR FACE. There's only about three pods so far, but I've witnesses the miracle of them and next year I'm doing them again.

all of the tomatoes are doing awesome, but the silver fir heirlooms are really fun. the plants cannot be tamed. just like me, so we totally get each other. I'll post pics of the golden ones and PURPLE ones (black princes) once they've got some colour and are more interesting to look at.

So yeah, that's how my garden's growin. Annnd FUN GARDEN NEWS: we're moving (again), which at first sounds crummy, but get this: Oct 1st, we're moving to a house just at the end of our block, on a HUUUGE corner lot. Massive fenced in yards, awesome deck, double garage, fire pit, garden shed... and they gave me the okay to dig out a small garden. There is a perfect, sheltered, sunny spot in the northwest corner, and I'm gonna work it HARD. I'm really excited. And after this, NO MORE MOVING. Seriously. We've moved too goddamn much. This place is worth it though. It's perfect and a sweet deal. Can't wait!!

time, love, and miracle grow

Garden update! I'M GROWIN FOOD YO! Yeah, I used miracle grow, but I needed a miracle. Several miracles. Next year I'll do it perfectly organically. My need for garden satisfaction trumps nature.

parsley! 

sage! like the wisdom!

basil finally decided to step it up. delicious, but lazy.

pepper blossoms! can't wait for peppers!

pretty eggplant blossoms!!!

lots of tomatoes!

dill, marigolds, and summer squash that is tiny and might not produce... there's a bigger one that'll probs make squashes, but the picture of it is really boring. you can also see the scraggliest pumpkins plant up top. it is making a fool of itself by living.

hey cucumbers, do you think you'll make any cucumbers? cucumbers: "meh".

leetle onions!

skipping over my sad shady plants...

nanking cherries! we're gonna make some sweet sweet jelly with these!

these things are amazing and they are everywhere. EAT THEM Y'DUMMIES!

July 13, it was the hail, I swears!

Whoa so much for keeping this updated! It's been a struggle and I'm super frustrated that I don't have a BIG SUNNY SPOT for my dingdang garden.

GRAGH.

But it's going okay, and I'll have some harvestin' to do this late summer/fall. Biggest disappointment so far: LOST MY MONTREAL MELONS. I even waited two weeks after the last frost date. Planted them and then whammo, a week of cold gross drizzle. Transplants did not take well. I also almost lost my pumpkins. I say almost because there is still one plant wheezing through. WONDER IF I'LL GET A PUMPKIN.

Anyway, here are some rainy day, post freakish hailstorm garden pics.

golf ball sized and bigger!! this is my excuse for my crappy garden!

cilantro is growing enthusiastically, as if to say "it's not so bad! we're fiiiinnne!"

sage too! thanks guys.

basil, not so much

eggplants and peppers are finally recovering from transplant setback. might actually get some stuff!

eggplants got slightly shredded from the hail...

tomatoes lost a couple branches to the hail, but are so far looking good. my leggy little seedlings have almost totally caught up to our neighbours' greenhouse ones, so... 

this little dude decided to start makin babies while still in the house. I decided to let it go, just to see how much it would affect the plant. as you can see, it is pouring all of it's feeble energy into those t'maters. one of them got knocked off by hail. still, those two tomatoes is more than I got from all my plants last year... sigh that makes me feel like such a sucky gardener...

after my extreme hardy cucumber experience last year, I was like, "transplanting? noooo problem. these dudes will be fiiinne," and they were like, "we die now." they were organic, maybe that explains it? so I ran and got some GMO ones because I'm determined to get some goddamn cukes. this is them. they have until early august to please me.

me: "how y'doin pumpkin plant?" pumpkin plant: "GASP WHEEEEZE COUGH COUGH." me: "well okay then, keep up the good work!" the photo is blurry because I couldn't stomach looking for too long.

some plucky summer squash and dill. keepin the dream alive.

and this, which punctuates my failures as a gardener. guess what? veggie plants HATE THE SHADE. what we have here are some silently weeping carrots, bad-attitude lettuces, suicidal beets, and 'not so much angry, just extremely disappointed' peas. the only guys who are happy are the garlic. I should have planted all garlic.

So there it is. Next year I will have learned a thing or two. Mainly that gardening in this zone in the city is really freaking frustrating.

faster, slower, FASTER! slooowwer...

The last frost date is this coming Saturday and I'm DYING. Of course it has to be the nicest, most titillating garden week ever. I went ahead and planted some seeds this past weekend, I figure that if they pop up before the frost I can toss a bed sheet over them no probs. I planted blue-podded peas, winter lutz beets, cosmic purple carrots, small purple onions, and a ton of herbs.

What's left to plant are the lettuce and my seedlings. They need to get outside so bad, and I've been putting them out during the day, but eeeek they need outta those little pots. Some of them have said "to hell with it" and have start blossoming. Come ON already, May!

Of course, I want May to fly by for gardening purposes, but for everything else I'm begging it to slow down. I have four big things happening right now that will more or less wrap up as the month ends. This is when space-time manipulation powers would come in really handy.

Anyway, on to recent planty progress:

One of my silver fir tomato plants (heirloom, with foliage like carrots!) has decided to go for it. It's about a foot and a half tall, so I'm not pinching them. I'm happy that we might have tomaters early though!

This is my summer squash. It wants wide open spaces asap. The melons are coming up nicely too. I can't wait to get them out!

One of my pepper plants, the variety of which I've actually forgotten because I tossed the package after I planted them. Anyway, it's looking busy too, and will hopefully actually produce something, unlike that weird robot-pepper plant I bought at the flea market last year.

I'm sooooooooooooooooooooo excited about my garden this year! Next week is going to be AWESOME.

doin it!

First off: can anyone tell me how I can make the blog portion of this thing wider?? Least intuitive blog template evar!

I was hesitant to continue on with this blog, since after our move so much was up in the air as far as having time or space for gardening. HAPPILY, my garden this year will be even more awesome than last year, as my landlord has been super enthusiastic about my proposals re: our backyard planting potential. Seriously, guys. This garden is going to rawk.

A few things I learned last year:
- most veggie plants need lots of SUN. I underestimated how much shade full summer leaves would cast, and this year I need to be more careful about that.
- overfeeding plants doesn't make them fat and healthy, it makes them dead.
- peas don't like to be too hot
- squirrels, rabbits and birds will eat/destroy most things that they can reach

Kay, but on to my current garden sitch. Here's where I'm planting:

Also, I just wrestled with blogger for like, a half hour trying to add words between these friggin pictures, and I can't seem to do it. SO:

First pic: my amazing landlord DUG OUT the entire contents of this (south facing) raised bed, and then filled it with awesome rich garden dirt.

Second pic: half of the plot is quite shaded, but I think my LL is going to trim back the hedges quite a bit. On the shady side I'm putting peas, lettuce, beets, and carrots (carrot along the front where most of the light hits). The end by the garage wall is sunny almost all day and is really well protected from wind and stuff. I'm putting pickling cucumbers, summer squash, sugar pumpkins, and melons there.

Third pic: this spot is right in front of our living room window and gets lots of sun. I think I'll put peppers and eggplants here. You can also see a few of my seedlings. They are literally dying to get outside. I started the tomatoes too early, wah!

Fourth pic: this is our backyard. It's pretty nice. We share it with two other apartments, but they hardly ever use it. The people above us do potted tomatoes and are really nice.

Fifth pic: we even have a nice water feature! I'm going to plant thyme in the brown patches between the stones.

So ya! Yay!! I have many many tomato plants inside that are becoming increasingly leggy and sad-looking. I'll likely re-pot the nicest ones and have to -sniff- toss the others.

Anyway, the rest of my garden is going to kick ass and I'm very excited. Two weeks till I can plant stuff!!! Wheeeeeeeeee!