Summer's Conclusion......

Wow, it has been a long time for me in posting....I guess the purpose to blogging to to actually write something. With so much happening this summer and Jen feeling better from her last summer illness, time has disappeared and I put this blog in the background. I missed writing in it so here I start...again...

Things outside have been going relatively well. Although the summer is coming to a close, I still have plans of which is a huge patio project. We had a deer problem this year but it seems to have subsided; why I am not sure but at least some of my plants can survive now...I suspect, due to my ADHD, it will take some time for me to re-find my groove here and keep things up to date.

Tomatoes oh glorious tomatoes.....holy crap do I have a lot. Last year the kids ate them right off the vine and I barely had any left over every day from 12 plants. This year, in delirium, I convinced myself I needed 38 plants, some of which reached 12 foot tall!! Even with record spring cool temperatures and rainfall, I am hauling in 5-7 lbs of tomatoes a day; that is after Jack and Charlotte eat their fill from the garden. I managed 13 different varieties and again, Jen's favorite is Marglobe. There are some good ones this year that are new to me but I think the only one I would replant is the Italian Heirloom. It produced huge fruit (+1lb), a lot of it and it was the earliest to ripen. Next year, I think I will go with either 24 or 30 plants....

We have made some great things with all of the tomatoes...fried eggs, cheese and tomatoes on fresh spinach...tomato and mayo on toast.... homemade tomato soup.....even oven roasted tomatoes over fresh salmon in a balsamic reduction.

As for what my spring plans were, I did manage to put in 10 thornless blackberry plants. I chose Chester and Triple Crown varieties for the overlapping seasons. Although they are small this year with no fruit, I expect that next year there will be a decent yield as long as the deer keep away. I purchased both a 3.5' peach tree (Redhaven) and 4' cherry tree (Danube). Within 24 hours, both got mauled by deer which was the first sign of trouble. I managed to fence the peach in time but the cherry is really suffering. I will see if I can prune it back to health but I am not optimistic on that one. As a last second addition, I also put in 10 rhizomes of asparagus. They look rather weak but I guess that is to be expected as I have to wait 3 seasons before I can harvest anything.

Losses are not a great but still a disappointment. Deer managed to destroy 90% of my string beans and all of my beets. Funny that they did not touch my carrots. They got the first crop of Swiss Chard and managed to kill off the last of the snap peas. They took the Blackberries to the ground twice; thank someone that they are resilient plants. Overall, this is small in terms of the damage they can do.

Lastly for this post (kids are getting restless) is the pick-you-own apple farm. As we did last year, Jen and I took the kids for some picking. It started with over 30lbs of blueberries (of which I made 12 1/2 pints of jam) and 32 lbs of Honeycrisp apples.

The apples have made 4 apples pies thus far and as I am typing, I am taking 20lbs to make and can some apple sauce :) Will let you know how this turns out.....

Food Harvested:
Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes

Things Planted:
Sunflower Seeds
Peach Tree
Cherry Tree (may not make it)
Blackberries (10 of them)

Seeds Saved:
White Coneflower (Echinacea)

Preserved/Cooked:
Apple Pie
Apple Sauce

Things to Remember:
1. 30 tomato plants, not 38
2. Less number of grape tomatoes

Fun Canning

Jen has finally backed down to 20mg of Prednisone but her symptoms are coming back. On top of that, the side effects of the meds are not being too nice. It feels like we are right back to where we were 5 weeks ago.


We ended up back at the Hillview Farms for round three of blueberry picking. With Jen not feeling well and me on a mission to have enough berries to can, we were focused and determined and in the end, successful. It is truly amazing how much blueberries kids can eat!

• Trip #1: 5 lbs
• Trip #2: 7.5lbs
• Trip #3: 6.5lbs

After some time reading and waiting for the mason jars, I finally decided to try making my own blueberry preserves. It took more time than I realized but all said and done, we now have 10 1/2 pints of hopefully tasty preserves. Not having all of the right utensils, I made do with two large soup pots for the water bath. I first started with one but the recipe I used yielded more jars than would fit in one water bath.


Blueberry Preserves
(makes 1-8oz jar for every cup of berries)

• 10 Cups fresh blueberries
• 5 cups Sugar

Mix blueberries and sugar in a large stainless steel pot and let sit for 15-20 minutes. Slowly bring to a rolling boil stirring constantly. After 15 minutes, turn heat off and use a chilled spoon to check gelling. If OK, then can, if not, boil another 5 minutes.



Watermelon plants are starting to take off. It is hard to see if there are any small watermelons yet and I suspect rabbits are ensuring there are none. Zucchinis are still growing too quickly to pick or use. It is amazing to me because there is only 2 plants.

Flight of the Bumblebee

With Dr Cohn calling on Jen's cell phone, I had to take work calls from outside to make sure I had signal strength. The two Chaste Trees are in the midst of blooming and looking closely, there are thousands and thousands of large bumblebees. I was completely in awe. Jen signed up for the The Great Sunflower this spring which counts the number of honey bees so I was interested how many were here......I could not find any....there were well over 100 bumblebees before I started to lose count. It was pretty cool to watch though.....a little nerve racking to get close enough with my digital camera though.

Last few days have been a blur, Jen is still the same and Dr Cohn ordered a brain MRI with no contrast yesterday. After calling 4 places, we had three appointments one of which was the same day. Laura came to babysit so I could go and while in the waiting room, the MRI machine broke. So today we went at 11:15, got the films, drove them over to Dr Cohn and by 3:30, had semi good news. With his untrained eye, his interpretation was that there was nothing out of the ordinary, abnormal or anything grabbing his attention. He will wait until Tuesday's report shows up form the Radiologist, but he seemed to have a good sense and feeling: all clear. Jen's blood work was normal as well....at least the absolute worst is ruled out but still no answers.

After the kids went to sleep, I headed out to the garden. With all the crap lately, I have not spent much time out there. Jen picked two zucchini well over 24 inches, I found two more and inspecting them tonight, I will have three more in the next few days. The squash do not set as much fruit but they grow just as quick.

After watering everything and rooting around, I noticed that there were a huge number of Sultan Peas ripe. I have only picked one or two to date but today I got a good bowl full and left plenty on the vine. The vine itself is well over 7 feet tall as it is starting to come back down the far side. These are sweet and the vines are fun. Now I have to actually cook them :)

The cukes are growing just as crazy but so far I only have picking cukes. Jack doesn't mind as he ate 4 for dinner last night. i just ordered picking stuff and mason jars so hopefully I can try my hand at pickles by next week. I still have not seen any lemon or slicing cukes and I feel like I should have

Just a closing picture of Jen and Charlotte walking up the blueberries. Last Saturday was about 5.5lbs that lasted until Tuesday. We went back on Wed at lunchtime and picked another 7.5lbs. I promised Jen that we would grow our own blueberry patch one day.

Blueberry Picking

Well, yesterday was blueberry picking. We tried a new place much closer to home, Hillview Farms in Gillette. With Jen still feeling the same, I was hoping being so close to home would make it easier. Didn't start out too well as Jen felt pretty bad but by the time we got there, her medicine kicked in.

We picked up our baskets and walk across the street to the "bobbing heads". Sounded a little funny. We walked through some planted rows (about an acre's worth) and I was completely amazed, 6'-7' tall blueberry bushes, rows and rows....each row probably 500' long.

Although there was complete excitement on Jack and Charlotte's part, there was a calm that sort of came over us, a distinct mission at hand. Charlotte ate every berry that she picked over the hour or so of picking, Jack needed to fill up his pail entirely by taking mine, Jen had the determination and patience to pick only the very ripest, roundest and largest of the millions of berries around us and I was just plain happy, something about being outside picking right from the bush has had more and more of a draw for me than ever before.

I am probably going to register for Margret Noon's library talk on Slow Food.org. I did quite a bit of research and is seems to be focused on local, sustainability, etc... concepts that I am feeling more and more strongly about. There is so much to know, so much out there, and even with what Jen and I already know, I feel like we are in the dark.

The garden overall is going well. the Sultan Beans are now ripe and I picked the first few, the picking cukes are now starting as well, 3-4 every other day. No Slicing or lemon cukes though. Zuc's and Squash have take off and I now need to figure out how to freeze, store, cook more than I care to admit. Knowing that there would be a lot per plant, I only planted two of each but it seems these 4 plants are producing more than any other plant I have ever had or seen.

Tomatoes are growing well. As are the beets. I picked my first beet and I now think I can pick all of them as I wish. Since these are root crops, I will leave them in the ground until I am ready to use them. I am thinking about a recipe that Cheryl mentioned, Roasted Fennel and Beets. Sounds good.....need to try that. There are many more green tomatoes but none turning. My only problem is one of the Black cherry plants next to the house is skyrocketing in size to almost 7', wilting and I had to stake it today.

Rainy Day

Trying to quit smoking for the 100th time this year. Jen is still a little sick and it is raining out so just had a frustrating morning. Ended up in the garage with both Jack and Charlotte starting to refinish a coffee table so Jen can have it double as a sand tray for her work.

Sometimes it is amazing to me, just losing focus on the crap of the day while doing something you enjoy with your kids can fill up your cup. Jack and I sanded with 6o grit to remove all the old finish. Sort of detailed work because the legs are all turned but it ended up being fun

Charlotte is not as into things like that, her patience is not too long. She joined us for a few minutes then went off to play with the bikes, then back to us, then with the dogs, then back t0 us, then with the cat......she is so Jen.

As for the garden, the first tomato is getting bigger everyday but it is split in the bottom. I am waiting to see if it heals itself or if I need to take it off. I hope it will be fine. Other than that, I have 6 little Black Cherry tomatoes and all the other plants now have flowers.




The Sultan Peas are just starting to come out and I have about 100 cucumber flowers with 3 or 4 really small cucumbers. I have picked about 5 or 6 zucchini and one yellow squash




I am starting to look into a pickle recipe and I am thinking about blueberry picking every day now....blueberries are in season and I cannot wait for the kids to turn blue....