The Seeds Have Arrived!!!

I ordered seeds the last week of December and they arrived on Saturday. Wooo Hoooo! We are sunk in the depths of winter right now so the thought of green growing things is like a faint ray of light in a cold sunless world! Wow- I'm sounding pretty dramatic! I love having 4 distinct seasons but honestly, it has been a really LONG, COLD, SNOWY winter....DH and I can't remember the last time we saw the lawn....and it's only half over. Thank you Mr. Groundhog! Mayor Bloomberg should have bitten you!

To keep busy over the long winter I perused countless seed catalogues and plotted out different garden schemes on graph paper. I also bought a new-ish sewing machine -new to me anyway. It's a Singer 99k that I found on Craig's list. The cabinet that it's housed in matches my old sewing machine cabinet that houses a Singer 66 (that has never worked in the 10 years I have owned it). Both machines were "born" in 1950 the new one in Clydesbank, UK and the old one in Elizabeth, NJ. The new one is actually a 3/4 size model of the old one -it came with a manual!!! I used the maual from the new machine to fix the old machine. So now I have 2 working machines and matching bedside tables.

Since the long winter is still going on I have decided to put the sewing machines to use and I am attempting to make a baby quilt for baby niece Maddie. She can't talk yet so she can't tell me where I have screwed up! My other niece and nephews can talk so they will have to wait til I get better. I have attached a picture of the pieced bit (that's DH hiding behind it). Thus far I have pieced it and made the backing/batting/pieced part sandwich. I am waiting for a walker foot attachement to arrive so I can quilt it and then I will add the edge and Voila! it will be done! It really isn't hard. I just had to follow directions carefully and put my seam ripper to good use several times when things didn't look so hot. Quilting is like pottery: if you screw up and don't fix it, it will only get worse so fix your mistakes and move on. A bit like life I guess.

Jack Frost nipping at my toes.....

....Well, not yet but he's gaining on me. The weather people were waffling on whether my area would get hit or not on Thursday night. I was out in the dark covering up my tomatoes. False alarm. I kept the big sheet of plastic hanging on the garden fence so it's ready to go when Jack arrives. Heritage is blooming (see photo) I forgot it doesn't have much of a vase life until after I cut it. Whoops! I also cut some zinnias and cosmos. The zinnias aren't really too impressive this year. I'm warming up to the cosmos. Some of the blooms are really tiny and delicate-lilliputian is how I would describe them, some are medium sized and some are large. The colors range from pale pale pink (almost white) to Raspberry pink. Some are pink with Raspberry edges. Very pretty.

Bodie got under the deck again this week. This time he decided to try the other end -right next to the Heritage rose. Aaaagh! Luckily, the rose bush came out unscathed. My perennial Helianthus wasn't so lucky-it had been infested with tiny red bugs so I cut it all down about 2 weeks ago. If it doesn't make it I won't be bummed. Some sweet peas got clobbered too they are the annual kind so they're about done anyway. Father in law was at the house when it happend (we were at work) he's a good one not to panic and got Bodie out from under the deck with a trail of dog biscuits.

I dug up one of the daikon radishes I planted back in July. Not at all impressive. Didn't look like much of anything so I put it back in the ground.

Well it's Sunday and Sunday in the Fall means Football!!! Go Bills!!!!! Hockey season is right around the corner-Wooo Hooo!

Tomatoes at last!

First regular sized tomato was harvested September 2- a Super Sioux. Since then the Garden Peach and Green Zebra have decided to join the party. I ate everything so fast I forgot to take pictures. Whoops. I have posted a pic of cherry tomatoes from the farmers market in one of my favorite bowls (by Richard Aerni a nationally known local artist). I wasn't at all scientific-I haven't weighed or measured anything. I have just sliced and salted and popped in my mouth. Mmmmm..Super Sioux has a really nice flavor-perfectly round and for the most part unblemished fruit (I picked a cracked one today we had a TON of rain last night and SS suffered as a result). Great flavor. I'm kind of weirded out by Garden Peach-it really looks like a peach and has fuzzy skin. I haven't tried to eat it skin and all yet. But I did try one that I blanched and peeled-it has a really nice mild but not too mild flavor. I made a fresh tomato sauce for some spaghetti for dinner the other night. I can honestly say it was the best spaghetti I have ever had. I shocked the heck out of myself.

2 of Each-Super Sioux, Garden Peach and Green Zebra-blanched seeded and diced

c. 1 Tbs fresh Basil -chiffonade

1 clove Garlic- minced

Olive Oil

Salt & Pepper

Israeli Feta cheese (not as dense and less salty than Greek feta)

I put the olive oil and garlic in a large fry pan over medium heat, when the garlic started to release it's garlickyness I added the diced tomatoes, salt and pepper to taste. Brought the whole thing to a boil, added the basil and then poured over a bowl of spaghetti and topped with the feta- not too much more of a heavy garnish than an actual ingredient. Mmmm the salty creaminess of the feta was a nice compliment to the acidity of the tomatoes.

I gave up on the squash and zucchini-the powdery mildew really took it's toll. The plants weren't putting out much fruit and what was coming out was really weird looking. I ripped everything out this morning. I left the cucumber plant, it is still producing despite looking like hell. I also ripped out all of the lettuce-it has all bolted.

Good news is the roses are happy for the cooler nights (in the 40-50's) They have bloomed in the last 2 weeks in the following order: Winchester Cathedral, Sweet Promise, Gruss an Aachen. Heritage has 2 buds and will probably bloom later this week. Eden is growing like a weed. Captain Sam and Distant Drums are looking a little peaked but not too bad.

I potted up the rose cuttings I took during my class that I took in July with der Rosenmeister. Belle Sultane, Rosarie de l'hay and Illusion didn't make it :( in defense of der Rosenmeister, it was the hottest day of the year and my cuttings were in the hot car for quite a while that day when I was supposed to put them directly in cool shade. The Fairy is doing great and has been transplanted into a gallon container and Thor is chugging along (I'll see if it's ready to transplant in another week or two). I also took cuttings from my moms roses- all are mystery roses given to her by family friends and neighbors. They all seem to be doing well and have been transplanted to 1 gal containers-this is probably their only chance for survival as I had to plow through weeds to find the sickly plants to get the cuttings. This success with the later cuttings leads me to believe der Rosenmeister was spot on in his instruction and I'm just a schmuck for not having a better plan in place after the class.

Note to self: don't let DH drink two cups of coffee and then watch football-he gets WAY too agitated!

Woe is me!

Veggie garden is being assaulted on 2 fronts: squash vine borers and powdery mildew! That coupled with the green tomatoes has left me very discouraged. So far we have had 3 ripe (peacevine) cherry tomatoes 4 more are ready to come in. I harvested 1 black beauty zucchini and another cucumer and a green serrano- the serrano wasn't hot at all. We had a couple of cool nights (down in the low 50's) and the garden is starting to look a little sad. The powdery mildew seems to have taken off over night. Yesterday was a very warm 90'F and it's back in the high 80's today. I woke up this morning and the powdery mildew was everywhere! I cut a lot of leaves off the squash and zucchini and sprayed the rest with a milk solution to try to contain the powdery mildew. I've also cut out 5 squash vine borers from 2 plants (the only 2 plants that have produced thus far!) I'm thinking they are so stressed out now they will probably kick it. I hate squash vine borers! One plant that had them was planted early and not covered, the other was planted later and covered with a floating row cover until the week of July 4-obviously that didn't work well!

I broke down and went to the farmers market today and bought tomatoes. The ones in the garden don't seem to be producing much fruit and the fruit that is there isn't growing very fast and it's not ripening at all. I got some heirlooms, some hybrids and a ton of cherries for drying in the oven. I haven't tried them yet.

Good news: Winchester Cathedral, Gruss an Aachen and Sweet promise all have buds. Zinnias and cosmos are blooming-tiny flowers -it's weird! Veronica has sent up a second flush and the cone flowers are going bonkers.

I'm not feeling the garden today so I decided to share a picture of Watkins Glen taken on Aug 1 when DH and I went down there for a hike. A beautiful state park at the south end of Seneca Lake,

Progress...?

I think I may hav 2 potential zucchini's-it looks like 2 zucchini plants each have a female flower, fingers are crossed! It also looks like I may finally get some tomatoes to ripen-one of the cherry tomato clusters seems to be changing from green to an orangey color. I believe it is the peacevine tomato. Most of the seeds I have planted are sprouting.

On the flower front-Sweet Promise and Winchester Cathedral have buds again. Eden has little worms munching on it-I have been squashing them. My "Cut and Come Again"Zinnias are finally blooming-the flowers are tiny and rather pathetic looking. I really don't have much luck with annual seeds!

A Small Harvest

1 more crookneck yellow squash (total:3) 2 Amira hybrid cucumbers (total:3), 2 really small, red Serrano chiles (total: 12) and enough lettuce for 2 1/2 side salads (total: about 4 side salads). Everything tastes so good! The squash have been really tender, the cukes were AMAZING-refreshing and crisp. I haven't had the chiles yet. I'm thinking of putting them in an omlette tonight. The salad was very good: Black Seeded Simpson (bolted-I'm waiting to see what the flowers look like-probably not the best way to go but F-it), Red Fire- both bought from the nursery. The Red Fire is excellent and hasn't bolted-yay! Also Jericho, planted from seed, a romaine lettuce that I planted from seed, also tasty- hasn't bolted=BONUS!

Everything seems to be growing really slowly this year. I'm not sure why, we've had heat, sun and rain...my tomatoes are still green-Uggggghhhh! I have been torturing myself by reading about tomato taste testings on other blogs and forums. That's probably not helpful. I think the bunny delay really set me back. In the unplanted portion of my garden I found some tomato volunteers and potted them up out of curiosity. They obviously won't fruit before the first frost (mid October-ish) so the plan is to try to grow them in the sunroom and see if I can hand pollinate and have winter tomatoes. It probably won't work and if it does, they won't taste like real summer tomatoes -but what the heck?

Through the self imposed tomato taste test torture I have been exploring the different Heirloom tomato options-phew- There's a ton out there! I have been plotting next years garden. I'm obsessed with Goose Creek tomatoes but of course can't find seed in the US. I have 2 options: try to get seed from the UK and hope it doesn't get confistacted by "homeland security" or get a seedling sent from California. I really love starting things from seed. Who knew tomato seeds were a threat to national security???

The tomatoes I planted this year are as follows: Brandywine, Super Sioux, Green Zebra, Garden Peach, maybe a Consolato Genovese (extra seed-not impressed with the tomato last year), maybe a Sanibel Hybrid (free seed sample from Totally tomatoes), and maybe a San Marzano. I planted 2 cherry tomatoes- Jelly Bean and Peacevine. The maybe's are in there because once all the seedlings got confused I chucked all the seed packets into a box and I can't remember what I planted and what was hanging around from previous years. Duh! I need to be better behaved when I start my seeds! So next year I will LABEL my Plants, take NOTES about what I planted, start them EARLIER (so I can be eating tomatoes now instead of writing and reading about them!), and try some new colors and kinds. Garden Peach and Super Sioux are the only 2 new regular tomatoes this year. I've never grown cherry tomatoes for myself before so both kinds are new for me. I've never tried a dark tomato before-I'm definitely going for a black or purple tomato next year!

The Sound of Summer

I found this ugly little guy hanging out amongst the rose cuttings in the shade of the maple tree. It's a cicada, it's pretty big -a little bigger than my thumb. Everytime my husband hears one he says "sounds like summer!". They emit a kind of raspy sound when it's hot and humid. You can listen to cicada songs on wikipedia from all over the world but they don't really sound like the ones around here.


I was off from work last week (family in town). On Tuesday I worked for a long time in the garden and yard. I planted seeds of Swiss Chard, beets, turnips, rutabagas and NY head lettuce. I haven't grown any of these before so this is an experiment! I also weeded the heck out of the existing beds and put down newspaper and a layer of grass clippings on the paths. On Sunday I planted peas, beans, spinach, and 3 different kinds of lettuce: jericho, red deer tongue, bibb. Following Sally Cunningham's advice, I'm trying to extend the growing season here. I'm really curious to see how it works.


Harvested from the garden: 2 yellow crookneck squash, 9 serrano chile's (gave them to my BIL), 1 cucumber. Squash tasted great, cuke is in the fridge, we'll put it in a salad tomorrow night. I think things are going kind of slow, combination of the bunny delay and the weather. I've got a lot of green tomatoes but nothing ripe so far.