End of Summer Update

Drew found a Dragon in our back yard last week!

Luckily he and Douglas were able to kill it with their trusty PVC bows and Dowell arrows before it ate us! (Bows and arrows made by our neighbor Richard.. very cool..)

And then all of a sudden…School Started! Douglas is in 3rd Grade this year! Oh my…

Camera phone pictures.. not the best quality, but at least I got them! Douglas’ teacher this year is very fun. It’s going to be a good year for him!

And tonight we had one powerful rain/thunder/lightning storm come through… it was awesome! And the aftermath looked so clean and pretty, I thought I’d get some updated yard pictures taken!

Front of the house looking West (betcha couldn’t have figured that one out on your own).

Pretty pink cotton candy in the sky!

On the left…after storm rainbow through sunflowers! On the right, my new multi-colored rose bush planted earlier this summer. In bloom!

Now the remaining shots all look like it’s nighttime, but really, they were taken seconds after the cotton candy shot! Just dusk, not night. This is my new flower bed in the front of the yard. Almost all flowers in it were donated by neighbors (except for the rose bush I scored on clearance!). They’re starting to fill out, this is going to be really pretty next year!

The little Iron Trellis Dude made me.. it has a pink honeysuckle growing on it. He made the trellis out of an old porch support that was ripped down before we bought the house. But the remains were left behind! Good thing for us scavengers!

Black-eyed Susans!

Dark Purple Butterfly Bush…

Lavender Butterfly Bush (this bloom is about 3 times as big as the dark purple)

Our yearly volunteer Moonflowers. The bees LOVE these. The bloom on the right that is wound up is tomorrows bloom (they only open for one night then drop off), it unwinds slowly around dusk. The bees fight their way into the blooms and get stuck until they unwind. So what do I do almost every night? I walk around the yard pulling the blooms open and releasing trapped bees… entertaining…

The Moonflowers are almost like Kudzu.. this one is swallowing a bike and a scooter..with a second bike looking good for dessert.

And yet more volunteer Moonflowers growing out of our driveway cracks! Prettier than our old driveway, and out of the way, so I let them go. Lots of bee traps there…

And this years Tomato crop. Remember how I decided to do the square foot gardening thing and plant 1 tomato plant per square foot? I created a monster! The trellis is barely holding them up, so the plants decided to cascade out of the hot tub. It’s a jungle. There are tons of red tomatoes in the interior of the jungle, so I make the kids go on a ‘treasure hunt’ and find them for me! Next year I’m planting about 1/2 as many in this space.

So I’m educating myself with a few ‘let’s not do this again’ ideas this year. The one in this shot is the dark green Pole Beans growing up the right side of the trellis. Yes, they’re doing well! However, I didn’t think of them grabbing onto the Wisteria (lighter green leaves) and continuing to climb. These didn’t produce until late September last year, so no beans from them yet, but it sure is going to be fun finding them 1/2 way up the house!

The bed itself now has Cucumbers, Kohlrabi, Carrots, Bush Beans, Brussels Sprouts, and the odd volunteer Tomato plant from last year!

On the left, my new fence post garden bed! FULL of Yellow Crookneck Squash and Cabbage. This is my first year trying Cabbage, I only have one successful head.. the other four fell to aphids. But the aphids haven’t found my Brussels Sprouts yet!

Drew’s only Snake Gourd. We planted about 20 seeds, got about 4 plants, and only 1 gourd. And it’s not ‘snaking’ because gravity is pulling it straight. Next year no trellis!

One of our MANY Acorn Squash’s!

The Gazebo is full of Acorn Squash.. last time I counted we were at 14, but I’m sure I’ve missed a few!

And our BASKETBALL crop! Isn’t that what they look like? We’ve got at least10 pumpkins growing along the back fence, all nice and healthy! There are also bell peppers and raspberries growing in this back bed. I pulled all the onions up earlier this week (20+ onions) to let them begin to ‘cure’. I found a blog that said you need to leave them in the sun for about 3 weeks to form the outer papery skin before storing them. I had to haul them under the carport to avoid rainstorms during the past few days, but once they’re clear, the onions will go back out into the sun again. I’ll post results when done!

Happy little pumpkin…

Our Basil well! The old wishing well lost it’s roof this year and became an herb garden! There’s actually 4 Thyme bushes and 2 types of Basil in here, but the most common Basil is taking over! The Thyme will survive the winter and come back yearly, so I’m going to re-locate the Basil bed next year. We had a fresh homemade pesto pizza this week for dinner… soooo good!

Volunteer Sunflowers and Moonflowers. Way back in the corner are 2 Zucchini plants. I have to fight my way back to them every couple of days to harvest..

The back of the house.. and Shadow’s nose.

Dude’s hanging Pepper planter. Not hanging at the moment because the wind was knocking it around, but it is doing very well! We’ve had TONS of banana peppers off of it this year! I’ll be drying a bunch of them, we can’t eat them quick enough!

And lastly… the aforementioned curing Onions! Not the biggest, I also heard (too late) that if you push them back into the ground just as they start to grow above it, they will get bigger and fatter. Next year!

So that’s it for today’s updates! Stay tuned….