The chill has set in and all our plants that can move indoors for some prolonged grow time have been moved. We potted the jalapeno plant because it still had several babies growing and had bloomed in the past few days. The other pepper plant was potted to begin with so it just found itself a new sunny spot in the house.

The tomatoes are too large to move indoors though or I'd have tomatoes as there are still a few on the bush. We  pulled the majority and ripened them in a brown paper bag. They are all small but very tasty and a great addition to omelets and salads.

We lucked into a find, a friend of ours was cleaning out one of the buildings they own and found some panels that are covered in chicken wire. So half our chicken coop building supplies and cost are free! Even if we have to dismantle a few they will make a great chicken tractor.

We've gotten the first snow in state, but not quite that cold in our area yet, so the carrots that have been thriving in the fall chill are going to have to come up in a few days. I can't wait to see how they fared!

Usually our area has a nice long breezy fall, but this year, we are already in the 30s at night. Some days are still fall, and some times we even get a little leftover summer, but for some reason we are pogo-ing with winter. 

The first night the weather stations said there was to be frost we pulled all the edible sized tomatoes from the plants and then yanked all the potted plants in. *Horray for potted peppers!* 

That was about two weeks ago....and then the weather turned warmer again. So the tomato plant didn't stop producing.  I'm completely ok with this, but still feeling sorry for the weighted plants who are about to have a freeze tonight. So I'll be pulling more child palm sized tomatoes in hope we can warm them up to red in the house. 

Not long after my last post, I transplanted some carrot plants that had been sulking in the back yard beds. They seem to have enjoyed the odd weather and are steadily growing. I may have to pull them a bit early as well, but hopefully they had a chance to create some tasty young carrots. 

We have begun planning for next years growing season. As it stands we have 3 medium/large beds for planting. Two in a bit of dappled shade and the other which gets a decent amount of sun. Next year we plan on expanding to 8 beds so that we can plant more of what we know works, as well as a few new things. 

Sometimes old wives tails really do hold truths.

 I've been frustrated with some of my plants because they've just been well....blah.
 Yes we've seen some things come from them, but the majority of it has been not what I was expecting.
 Granted the heat this summer has been trying on everyone and everything. So now that the heat has seemingly broken, what my grandmother, and several other peoples mothers/grandmothers have told us has proved true.
 My tomatoes decided that since it's not been in the 100 degree range as of late, they were ready to pounce.
They literally shot up a foot and now have around 10 tomatoes growing.

 Now that's not bad considering there are 6 tomato plants out there, but I'm hoping for more. Besides, that's really just the first three plants, the back three aren't quite as excited as the front ones.
 We also found out that our jalapenos, the tiny little things that they are, are extremely hot. I'm not sure how, or why, but they are!
 I am thinking that we might be making some killer salsa this year.

Photo Tour of Growth Aug 22

As a budding gardener, I take a good bit of joy in seeing the literal fruits of my labor. I could go on in too many words about the things I find in my garden. However, I find that in this territory, sometimes pictures do a better job.

Every so often we'll take a small photo tour of the growth I'm seeing.

Trials and Tribulations of Heat

As many of you may or may not know, our area has been awfully hot as of late. In fact, not long after we started our little garden and were happy to have wonderful sprouts, the heat set in. Meaning that most of my after school, evening, daytime, and all other time was spent trying to save our sprouts from becoming crispy.

A large water bill and lots of rain catching buckets later, we have had some luck.

Our garden brought in some small but tasty potatoes, some wonderful green beans, as well as a couple of cucumbers.

Our cucumbers however were all yellow, which I've found out since then to be from too much water. Our fault entirely. The tomatoes next to them and the jalapeno plants loved the nearly daily watering, but the cukes...not so much.


Ah well, it's a learning year anyway. We really want to know what grows best where in our yard and what doesn't. Next year the squash, cucumber and zucchini will all have it's own bed.


Otherwise several things have hung on through the unbearable heat and have started back up. One lone tomato is trying to turn red. The okra has started producing and I cannot wait to enjoy a batch of that.

A New Year

**This post is a long one, it's an intro and most will not be this long!**

Last year we planted a garden, it was an experiment and a rush job.

This year, we hope to actually grow some tasty additions to our menu and we hope to help others in the process.

This blog will tell the story of our gardening trails. Not just the good, but also the bad. Were going to post tips we find, toss out information that we come across, and hopefully help others to create their own little slice of the country in their backyard.


One of our problems with last years garden {and there were a myriad of them} was that we did not give our plants space or depth enough to grow. The bed was a previously a sandbox and after emptying it we started a layer garden. We did not give enough layers for the plants to really take root and show a yield. This year we started from scratch.


Almost the same time last year as we started our garden we acquired a mass amount of "landscaping" rocks. They were various sizes and shapes and were from someones yard. The listing was on craigslist and basically was a you move, you keep deal. No funds involved other than the gas to get them to and fro.

We spent several hours over a two day period and gathered as many truckloads as we could. The idea at that point had been to use them for a patio.

The more we moved, the less they looked like possible patio rocks. They were large and odd shaped and sharp edged. Something we were going to have to seriously dig out for. And so they sat.

For nearly a year they sat in our front yard collecting leaves. I was determined they were going to be used.


This winter we decided several trees in our yard would have to be removed. They are encroaching on the house and one we believe to be dead. As such, we started discussing the plans for this years garden. My husband mentioned the stones out front, asking if perhaps we could build a rock wall for the garden. We'd already used a couple of stones here or there to help in our reshaping the flower beds to help with the flow of water across the yard in the rains.

It was decided quickly that that would be a great way to use the rocks.

Now, there are only a few spots in our yard that get decent sun right now. Most of the yard is covered by tree shade. The one area that does get a bit of sun was lower than the rest of the yard. So first we had to build up the yard in that area.


We've been quite busy over the past fall and winter and thus had lots of leaf matter in the yard. We raked the majority of this into the area of the yard that was lower as fill. Every time we went out and raked up spots we'd add it to this area. Instead of hunting down a load of dirt and just tossing bags of leaves out to the curb, we managed to fill the area several times over with leaves. {I did say we have a number of trees!}

About two months later and the ground was nearly level. When we ran out of leaves we used some of the neighbors. They were fine with us picking up their bagged leaves.

The wonderful thing about doing this is that we created a very nutrient rich bed in which to start our garden.

Our city does not have a program that I've seen in some other cities where they offer mulch/fill for free. Ours charges for it. We would rather compost our own mulch*.

Lines set out we built our garden wall in one day.

It's not perfect, it's quirky and makes me think of wild English gardens. I cannot wait to fill it with leafy greens.

But sprouts come first.



*We will discuss compost in another post later on. It's great stuff and simple to fix if you feel you've done something wrong.