Sunday, October 12, 2008

Harvest Part 2/Preparing for Winter

The potatoes weren't the only thing we harvested on Saturday. We picked all the rest of the tomatoes, dug up the squashes, picked all the cucumbers (we didn't get many), picked the beans, cleaned off the peppers, and picked blackberries (those were just for munching, though).

Most of the tomatoes were still green, so we have to let them ripen. We probably got about 20-30 pounds of tomatoes from our 6 tomato plants. Hopefully they will ripen for us! They look gorgeous, even green! They are all heirloom tomatoes, so odd shapes and flaws are common (but delicious!). The varieties we planted are: valencia, burbank, brandywine, pineapple, striped german, and delicious.



We also got a couple hubbard squashes. I was really disappointed, because I expected more than two squashes from that huge plant. Another tried to grow, but it rotted off the vine for some reason. The neighbors grew pumpkin and gave one to us. Dave is severely allergic to pumpkins, so we don't grow any. Lacy was very excited to get a pumpkin of her very own! I'm thinking about covering it in glue and glitter. I saw it on Martha Stewart and it was so cute, and that way you don't have to cut it but have the fun of decorating it (Dave is allergic to the flesh, membranes and seeds, but I don't think he has much of a reaction to the hard outer shell and stem).



We got another meal's worth of green beans. I am really happily surprised at the green beans. I planted them way too late, so any harvest is good news for me. I think I planted them in LATE July, so I'm very surprised at how prolific they've been, considering how young the vines are. Next year I'm planting them in June! Or May!

Finally, we cleaned off the pepper plants. We had only two this year-- banana and serano. I'm very excited to do something with them-- just what, I'm not sure.

After we harvested, we started getting some wood ready. To keep costs down, we like to use wood heat as much as possible. So we started stacking, making kindling, and pruning trees and cutting up the larger branches into logs. Rose was very helpful in stacking the kindling and did the whole box all by herself. Dave didn't even ask her, and every time he was done making kindling, she would take it and say, "Thank you."

3 comments:

Kathy Habel said...

Great job on growing so much in your garden!

Blonde African Americans said...

Amazing how well you guys live off the land, Great produce I think your garden is awesome - Raphael

Affe said...

Where do you get your seeds?