Garden Then and Now

What a difference a few warm months can make in the garden!

This is a before and after tour.

Before:

My veg. garden last spring with newly placed raised beds.

Now: Veggies galore!
Squash and tomato explosion.

Before:

Another view of the veg. garden.

Now:

Same view.....well, a little different!

Before:

View of the veg. garden before it was planted.

After this pic we had another 6 inches

of snow.

Now:

Same view.

Squash, tomatoes, ect.

Then:

Overall view of garden from the

East to the West.

Now:

Same view.

What a change!

Then:

Flower garden with raspberries in the back.

Now:

Whoa!

Flower garden and raspberries

gone crazy!

Then:

Flower garden.

Then:

View of garden from my porch.

Now:

Garden jungle.

Now:

There is a pond somewhere in there.

Then:

Flower garden with newly placed raised beds.

Now:

Same garden beds.

But where are they?

Then:

Pond.

One of my first efforts with the pond.

I moved it (and re-dug it 6 times).

And it grew to 10x its original size.

Those poor phlox in the foreground were

moved over and over again.

But they are blooming now!

Now:

Pond.

With flowers!

Tuesday's Harvest

A few pictures of Tuesday's harvest.

The tomatoes were canned into 2 kinds of soup.

The red /pink tomatoes were cooked down

and then I made Vegetable soup.

The white/yellow tomatoes were cooked down

and then I made Curried Potato soup.

All of the broccoli was added to the curried potato soup.

And I didn't find a single caterpillar in the broccoli.

The summer squash was shredded and turned into yummy patties.

The 4 giant squash went to my girls.
Thank goodness for chickens!

The small cucumbers were eaten

and the too big ones went to my girls and Carol's chickens.

Her chickens can eat a cucumber in seconds flat!

The eggplants were roasted and

frozen.

Some of the chiles were used in

the curried potato soup.

And most of the beans were too

tough to eat.

I should have picked them sooner.

So, I sifted through them and

picked out the tender ones to give to Carol

in exchange for some eggs she gave me on Monday.

A good trade back!

I gave her a little bit of everything peppers,

beans, tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, ect.

A Few Flowers

Here are a few flowers from my garden.

Squash blossom and a bee.

Zinnia

Morning Glory

Summer Squash Patties

These are so good!

You have to make them.

I didn't think I would like them, but I've eaten about 10 now!

They are crisp on the outside, moist in the center and sweet and salty.

You can eat them out of hand like a cookie or add a sauce and eat them with a fork.

Mix together :

3 cups summer squash or zucchini

(I'm partial to the "Butterstick" variety)

1 cup shredded cheese

2 eggs beaten

1/2 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder

pinch salt

pinch pepper

Place batter in 1/4 cup patties on a grease cookie sheet.

Bake at 375 degrees for 15 min. or until the

patties are toasty brown.

Yum!

Pixie's First Egg

Pixie laid her first egg!!!

Here it is-

Isn't it cute?

It looks a lot like Pippa's eggs.

In fact, for a second I

thought, "Hey! How did Pippa get here?"

My little baby is all grown up.

Now she is officially a pullet.

Isn't it amazing, in 5 months, she went from this-

To this?!?

Following Directions

Don't follow MY directions for this craft!

~

Instead go to this blog here and follow HER directions.

~

I saw these candles and when A. stayed at my house we decided to make them.

I couldn't remember exactly how to make them......so I came up with my own idea.

They look nice, don't they.

~

But they are extremely flammable!

We used glue and PAINT mixed together

and then rolled them in cocoa powder

or curry powder.

It was my mom who said, "Isn't paint kind of flammable?"
Doh!
I guess these are just for looks.
This was a very good lesson in reading directions
and not substituting things in a recipe.
Or at least try not to use
such flammable items as substitutions!
~
Better luck next time!

Last Day of Summer Tour

Tour my garden with me.

P.S. About halfway through

my shadow does NOT pick its nose!

I was just scratching!

Birdbath, Blooms and Junk

Oh, yeah!

It's JUNKY!

~

This is a pic of last Tuesday's haul from Goodwill.

I had my little gardening friend, A., over

and we went crazy.

Then we stayed up until 12 o'clock making

glass flowers!

~

Now A. is just as addicted as I am to making

garden (junk) art.

All of our finds - What could we possible DO with this junk?!?!

A teapot birdhouse.

This is a work in progress. It still needs paint and

a cute sign to welcome the birdies.

We are thinking : Welcome feathered friends,

but we're open to suggestions!

A birdbath.
Remember those 4 soda/malt glasses from the first pic?
And the blue bowl?
Here they are reborn!
P.S. It's not crooked - I just have a leaning problem


Top view.

Side close up.

These are the backs of the plate flowers.

You can see the bell hangers in these pics.

A.'s plate flower creation.

She gave it to my 86 y/o grandma.

So sweet!

My plate flower.

The plate is very iridescent in the sun, but

of course the sun WOULDN'T come out!

Congrats! August Winner!

The winner for the August giveaway was poster #3

It is Jennifer from All Because 2 People Fell In Love

Congrats!