If you’ve been receiving WritersWeekly for more than a year, you probably know that the children and I sow seeds each year in our small outdoor garden. Most of them never come up and the majority of the ones that do end up dying sometime during the Summer. Sometimes, we get lucky (or the garden fairies take pity on us) and a few things actually SURVIVE!
You may also remember that our daughter, Ali, and I have a pumpkin growing contest each year. (A few years ago, I gave her miniature pumpkin seeds as a joke – the BEST Hoy family practical joke ever, by the way!) Anyway, this year, we had tons of rain and, while most of my plants didn’t do so well, the root vegetables, grapes, and pumpkins are doing GREAT!
I’m inserting photos this week to share our babies, I mean our harvest, with you. (Can you imagine how I’ll be when we have grandchildren some day?)
Starting at the top:
A small pumpkin I found hiding by my carrots. We didn’t even know he was there! He’s about the size of a large orange now.
Just a few of our strawberries. We harvest them in the Spring and the Fall. They’re growing by the back door and many visitors have seen them, stooped down, and plopped one or two in their mouth. Yes, they’re organic. We don’t use any chemicals in our yard.
Our first crop of turnips! Only two have been picked (for my next door neighbor) and the ones still in the ground are getting huge!
GRAPES!! We’ve never had more than a tiny bunch of grapes before this year. A Booklocker author, who owns a vineyard, told me to cut the vines all the way back to the main vine in March. I did and ended up with loads of grapes this year – two different varieties!
Our back door pumpkin. I’ve always wanted a pumpkin growing by the back door that visitors could see, still growing on the vine. This year, Frank found this elongated fellow hanging / growing on the side of the house (we have pumpkin plants growing everywhere right now!). He helped me gently move the vine over the fence. We then put a small table by the door and placed the pumpkin there. It’s doing great!
This is our biggest pumpkin this year. It’s growing in the EXACT same spot as last year’s biggest pumpkin. She’s just now turning orange and she’s a beauty!
These last two are growing by the driveway where passersby can see and enjoy them. They’re pretty small so I think they’re from pie pumpkin seeds.
Not pictures are the hundreds of carrots from seeds Max planted in the Spring. He’ll be harvesting those in a few weeks. He loves parting the stems in his carrot patch and looking at the tiny orange humps coming through the soil. Also not pictures are Ali’s apples. They already ripened and fell, before we expected them to, and the birds and other critters had their fill. We’re always happy to share. And, finally, there are just a few blueberries left on Max’s blueberry bushes now. Mason and Max go outside a few mornings each week and eat the ripe ones right off the plants. Mason, at age 3, already knows exactly what color they must turn to be the sweetest. He won’t eat a blueberry unless it’s the darkest blue (which looks purple to me).
WE LOVE GARDENING!!!
And, on the other end of the health spectrum, here is this week’s Maxism…where he’s obviously speaking on behalf of all mankind:
“I wish candy was good for you.”
Hugs to all!
Angela
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