Beans Beans the Musical Fruit the More You Eat!

It is always exciting to watch the young plants start producing their bounty.  Here are a few pictures to show the stages of growth with our beans these last couple of weeks.

These little beauties are worth the wait.  They are so tender and tasty - yum, yum!

Sharing



Now we will enjoy beans



The snap peas have slowed down

Friends stopped by last weekend for lunch.  We all enjoyed Tom's Caesar Salad & various other goodies from the garden - even the squash blossoms!



Look at the bright yellow color of this squash





The squash tastes better than the blossoms



We enjoyed the 5 red tomatoes before I snapped this picture



Here They Come

We have been watching the squash for the past couple days & it is amazing how quickly they grow.

Some of these beauties should be finding their way into a stir-fry this week!

Rain, Rain, Go Away............

We were blessed with water pouring from the sky this week.  The roses took it the worse as the heavy blossoms pulled down two stalks.  I rescued the roses and they make a nice bouquet.

In fact so much poured during the morning hours that there were floods where we store our products. 




We're hoping to rescue most of our expensive units, but it sure made a mess!

End of the Line

Looks like it's time for a remodel for the pole beans.  Just how long will these vines get!?!

The leeks look like they have got ideas about touching the sky too.

Now I see how the idea for the story Jack & the Beanstalk came about.

Not Yet, But Soon!!!

These are going to be cherry tomatoes



A couple of our strawberries are getting ready



All In A Row



The lettuce looks good enough to eat! 



Tomatoes, peppers, squash, & cucumbers.  It will be awhile until these come to the table.

There are lots of leaves on the green bean plants.

Eating Greens Is A Special Treat.......

This isn't our first salad from our garden, but it is the first Cesar Salad from our garden, and that is what this whole thing is about as far as "the mister" is concerned.  It was good with all those young leaves in it. 

Our Hut

Tom has wanted to hide the garbage cans from view for as long as I can remember living here.  That idea was fine with me, however, I didn't relize that their place would be nicer looking than ours!

Perhaps this is a sign that Tom has too much time on his hands?

Front Bed Too

Tom seems to be in "the zone" when it comes to garden improvements.  He worked on this bed out in the rain.  It will need more work, but the neighbors have been telling him that they like it. 

Going Up!

There are green shoots sprouting in all of the raised beds, so we are very happy about all the plant growth we are witnessing.  However, we are thinking that the beds will only hold so much, & some of our "crops" are going to need more space than the boxes will allow.  So for their comfort we are going to try to get some of the plants to grow up on trellises - wish us luck!!

Who Knew Lupins?

The weather was back to normal for this part of the country, but we were outside working - because we're natives.  I found this cluster of lupins and was facinated by the water being held in each cluster of leaves.

This one held even more, but was bumbed during photo session

We thought this drop looked like a seashell

This drop looked like a diamond & I think the sun came out just as we were looking at it

So Close

After the stones were in place Tom could not wait to get the bark down on the ground, even though the weather was not co-operating.  It does look nice & it feels good under foot, but it also means that I won't be doing any barefoot gardening this Summer - unless I want slivers in my feet ........... ouch!

Getting Fancy

Tom has been working every sunny day we've had this week out in the yard.  He wants to put bark around the planter boxes and doesn't want it to stray too far out of the boundaries so he decided to purchase these stones from Lowes.  Lucky for us they were on sale!  It is almost ready for a magazine shot.

Trying

Initially I couldn't post this with my computer so snuck down to use Tom's in the early morning hours.  Better late than never!

Slowly

We put some starts & seeds into the raised beds over the weekend.  It's a good thing because today is pouring around here.  There are now green onions, spinach, garlic, tomatoes, red leaf lettuce, romain, snap peas, and pole beans in the beds.

Here we are relaxing with Susan's dog Samson.  He enjoyed all the attention and food that Tom would share with him while we were planting.

Let's Get This Garden Started

The sun finally warmed the earth and the rains stopped.  We jumped on the chance to get our greens into the ground. 



The garlic & lettuce made it into the ground, but I'm not sure all the lettuce will make it to maturity!



The stawberries should be plentiful with all these little plants.



Making Sod While the Sun Shines

Looks like we are opening a pet cemetery

It's more dramatic in person, but Tom is lowering the yard by about 6 inches

Yesterday was our nicest day to date.  The entire afternoon was spent outside digging up sod and soil and filling the garden boxes.  Then I spent last night in pain with a cramp or spasm in my right arm.

Almost ready for planting

Can You Dig It?

Tom insists that the ground become more level for our future addition.  This portion of the flattening of "Schilperoort Manor" took a couple of hours and several wheelbarrows full to accomplish the task.  We still have another section to do and we're running out of places to put the soil!  Lucky for my back and arms it rained yesterday so I had a day to recuperate.

Just a Warning

Our friend Susan came by the other day & even though she was dressed up we gave her a pair of gloves and a sweatshirt & put her right to work.  She was a big help too.

Words to Live By

My friend Sharon sent this to me.  She doen't even know that I'm working out in the garden - however, it is Spring so it's not that unusual that I would be.  I thought the words would be appropriate for this site.