Martha Steward minus creativity/conviction



I hate to say it but part of me kind of wishes I were Martha Stewart! (minus the whole insider trading/obstruction of justice thing)   I would love to get paid big bucks to cook, garden, and make crafty things!  I don't have her creativity, but I enjoy doing all those things.  Here is a picture of our garden.  We've got peppers, jalapenos, cucumbers, lots of tomatoes, green beans, basil and parsley.  In the spring we also planted onions,  sugar snap peas, and potatoes (in the black tubs).

It's not as big as I would like.  I would love to move on an acre or three of land and have a massive garden, fruit trees, chickens, etc...hopefully someday.  Anyway our tomatoes are growing like CRAZY!  Our peppers and jalapenos are not doing nearly as well as they did last year, and we found the culprit - slugs!  Yuck!  For a gal that grew up in the country I hate creepy crawly things!  Thankfully my wonderful man does all the dirty work for me.  Like make and clean up these slug traps which is just beer on a shallow dish.  He also goes out slug hunting at 10pm with Epson salt and a flashlight...this is true love!  :)  Anyway he has killed probably 100 slugs in the past couple weeks in the garden area alone!! 

 

 About a week ago I found 8 baby caterpillars on our parsley plant.  I didn't want them kill because they turn into a really pretty butterflies, but I also didn't want to have them munching and pooping all over the parsley we are eating.  I decided to contain them to a bucket of parsley so I could watch them grow.  They are getting huge so I would think they should be changing into a cocoon pretty soon.  8 big caterpillars in a small bucket = a lot of poo!  I also won't touch cute caterpillars so Zac dumped out the old water and parsley today (after I took this picture) and got them set up with some fresh stuff.

My mom went all crazy and bought about 6 books on gardening.  So I have enjoyed reading/skimming through them also especially ones about gardening through the winter.  Last fall I half hazardly threw a few seeds in the garden to see if it would grow - which it didn't do much.  Turns out I should have started many of them inside for several weeks before transplanting it in the garden come aug/sept.  The books inspired me to be more intentional.  So I've started some broccoli, cauliflower, kale, and swiss chard seeds.  I stole a rack from Zac's side of the closet and rigged a $10 fluorescent light to it.  I tried to do it without the light and they seedlings died.  This week I'll plant some carrots in the large black tubs.  

In another month or so I'll start some greens that are really cold tolerant so we can have fresh salads much of the winter (ideally).  I figured if a guy in Maine could grow them all winter surely I can! 

I've been dabbling in canning the past couple years with my mom's help, but this year I've decided to go beyond the typical jellies.  Since I have tons of tomatoes I wanted to store some of it back so we can feast on organic produce during the winter months.  So Saturday I made some incredible canned salsa I found on pinterest as well as some yummy chow chow.  Throughout the summer I've been buying delicious local grown pesticide free fruit (cheap and in some cases free) and mostly freezing it to save for smoothies, parfaits, or the boys will just eat them plain.  But I decided to try canning some peaches.  I would have had 6 jars, but 2 broke...I guess they really mean it when they say your jars need to be really hot when you stick them in the water bath.   

Most probably think I'm crazy, but I love the idea of growing and eating organic/pesticide free food throughout the year for a fraction of the cost you would buy it at the store.  It truly is amazing how so much food can come from a tiny seed.