June Garden

Summer is flying by and my garden is starting to produce some lovely things!  I figured it was time for a peek at what I'm growing this year and what's proving to be successful so far.


The strawberries I planted last year have quadrupled in size.  I'm guessing in the next year or two I'll have an entire box of strawberries.  I went ahead and bought netting to keep the birds from nibbling our berries and that's been successful.  The ants (or whatever else) I have under the netting are still getting their fill of ripe strawberries, though.  Boo.

I have 5 tomato plants that have lots of green guys but haven't quite ripened yet.  I am excited for them... it's almost salsa season!

The brussels sprouts came back this year but I'm not holding my breath on those.  I ended up with very tall stalks and baby brussels last year, but nothing ever really happened past that.  We'll see how this season goes.

My squash has blossoms like crazy and I've planted more flowers and a bee balm plant near them, so hopefully I will actually get some squash this year.  I tried hand pollination last year but I'm hoping the bees and wind will go ahead and do that job for me!


My cilantro, rhubarb, and peas are doing great!  I planted onions and a green bean bush (?) for the first time, so we'll see how those do.  My peppers are flowering but I'm still waiting on buds.

Anywho, this is the first exciting stage of the year for me when it comes to gardening.  Most fruits and veggies are either green or flowering, and I get to sit by and see what works and what I will need to change next year.  Also, if you know of any other ways to utilize rhubarb besides pie, please let me know.  I have no idea how else to use it but have a TON!

July Garden

Now that we are well into August, I suppose I should get my July garden post in!  In July, travel and general busy-ness made everyday watering less of a possibility.  Not to mention how blazing hot it's gotten.  Some of these plants didn't stand a chance against this weather!  It's okay-- it's to be expected.  Here's a peek at what July looked like in our garden beds:


I'm going to pause right here.  Even though my squash vines have had kind of a rough go of it, they are still producing blossoms.  I haven't had any squash babies yet because they haven't been pollinated, BUT!  A friend told me a way to hand-pollinate and I just tried that, so I'll keep you posted on how it works out.

We FINALLY went from seeing tiny little baby hot peppers and bell peppers to a pepper explosion! Cucumbers and all of the peppers are my very favorite things to grow in the garden.  We use them in almost everything we cook at home!


We've had an abundance of tomatoes for a couple of months now, and I've been perfecting my salsa recipe to share with you!  I'm almost there, so you can be looking for that in the coming weeks.  It turns out a little different each time, so I've been making batches and writing down what I'm doing each time to make sure I'm happy with the recipe I put out there.


The junebugs were SERIOUSLY bad this year.  They ended up destroying my rhubarb and definitely did a little damage to my brussels sprouts.  I haven't seen any produce from the broccoli or brussels yet, but I read that they are both great fall vegetables.  All hope is not lost!


You can see that the plants have gotten much, much bigger since my first post.  The peas are officially done for the summer, but the green beans are still producing.  I feel pretty good about all I've grown and more than that, all I've learned this summer.  I haven't entirely decided if I'm going to do a fall/winter garden or not.  Sometimes it's nice to keep hobbies seasonal so you can't burn out on them. I guess I'll see how I feel once summer starts wrapping up.

If any of you have been posting about your own gardens, please leave me a link!  I'd love to see what others have going!

June Garden

Whew.  Summer has officially gotten busy!  We've been traveling a bunch while trying to still keep up with all the things.  I took a small blogging break to give my mind a little break from one more responsibility.  It was seriously hard not to beat myself up about it, but it was a good exercise in self-forgiveness and self-love.  Now, here I am back at it and feeling good!  Shall we take a peek at the garden in July?

June has been my biggest produce month so far!  We are getting lots of peas and beans, the tomatoes are ripening (in big batches), and the sweet banana peppers and jalapeños are growing in!

The kale is officially a LOT to keep up with, the peas are getting to the point where they are drying out and probably won't produce much longer, and we don't have any squash or cucumber babies, but there are a lot of blossoms.  It's been a rainy June, so the head lettuce ended up starting to rot and I cut it all out.  If I do lettuce again I'll definitely do leaf lettuce so I can keep a better handle on it.  The broccoli, brussels sprouts, and bell pepper plants are getting bigger, but I haven't gotten any veggies from them yet.


My cilantro and basil are both bolting big time at this point, but the strawberries are shooting more and more and getting really big!  The squash is growing and reaching so much that it's starting to wrap all the way around the trellis.  I've made two batches of homemade salsa so far with the garden offerings and I'm certain there's more to come in July!

June was definitely good to us in the garden department!  xo.

May Garden

Guys!  My garden is shaping up quite nicely!  We've had a lot of rain this spring, so the plants are happy and perky.  Johnny and I finally finished the trellis and the climbers are really going after it.  You can peep my first garden post to see where we started.  Here is what the garden looked like in May:


I harvested my first bit of lettuce this week!  I've never tried lettuce and I'm pumped over how easy it's been so far.  My jalapeños and bell peppers are flowering, I have small green tomatoes on my plants, and the broccoli and kale have pretty much doubled in size since planting them.  My brussels sprouts are getting really tall and, after hours of separating them, my peas and beans are on the up and up (literally).  May was a good month for the garden and I seriously can't wait to see what June brings!

My New Garden

It's that time of year again... the time where I become completely obsessed with and consumed by growing things.  We had garden boxes already waiting for us when we moved into our last house, which spawned my love for growing fruits and veggies, but this year I'm starting from complete scratch.  I don't mind, though.  It gives me a chance to really assess what I want from my raised beds and maybe streamline things a little better.  Here's a glimpse at where we started:


Our backyard has a lot of gravel to create extra parking spots in the back.  My initial plan for this space was to rake out the gravel and plant grass to create more yard, but once I got a feel for where the sun hits our house throughout the day, this became the perfect space for the garden.  Plus, I don't even have to bother with the tedious task of getting rid of all these rocks.  Whew.

Johnny's definitely a trooper when it comes to stuff like this.  He built the boxes, sourced my dirt, and then shoveled it in for me.  #keeper


Here is where the garden actually started coming together.  I got my seeds and baby plants into the ground as soon as the boxes were ready.  There is a chance we'll be adding one more raised bed, but these 6ft x 7ft boxes are doing a good job at holding quite a few plants!


Now that my peas and beans have fully sprouted, we're working on building a trellis for vertical gardening.  I still need to add the netting, but pretty soon we'll have a great area for spaghetti squash, cucumbers, peas, and beans to reach for the sun!

Oh.  And as you can see, we don't have a fence on this side of the yard.  BUT!  Once my veggies start climbing, we'll get a little bonus privacy!

Here's a list of what I have planted so far:
-Bell Peppers
-Sweet Banana Peppers
-Hot Banana Peppers
-Jalapeños
-Better Boy Tomatoes
-Roma Tomatoes
-Broccoli
-Curly Kale
-Head Lettuce
-Cucumbers
-Spaghetti Squash
-Zucchini Squash
-Snap Peas
-Pole Beans
-Brussels Sprouts
-Strawberries
-Sweet Basil
-Cilantro
-Lemongrass

I'll be back with a garden update in the coming weeks!  This is really my favorite hobby of the year!  xo.