First Batch of Tomatoes

I intended to can peaches today, but the half bushel I bought last night was not ripe enough. Since I had the kitchen all prepared for canning, I decided to do tomatoes. Turned out to be a good choice! I was able to completely fill this basket with ripe tomatoes from the garden, some of which really needed to be dealt with ASAP. The peaches will wait for a couple of days.

This picture didn't quite capture the beautiful colors of the heirloom tomatoes the way I hoped it would. They were so bright and juicy that I found my self smiling throughout the process of chopping them up. What one would think might be a mundane task was really quite enjoyable.

Filling the jars and loading them into the (new!) pressure canner.

Ready to process!

The canner to survive the Apocalypse! (Let's see what kind of Google hits *that* phrase gets me, lol!) It was a little tricky getting the lid screwed on evenly, but after that, it was so easy to use. Good old American-made quality!

The finished product: 7 quarts of heirloom tomatoes canned in their own juice. Should make some yummy chili and spaghetti sauce this winter!

For the curious canners among you, this was a simple raw pack, which is partly why the fruit is floating as much as it is. Not as pretty on the shelf, but oh so easy and probably more nutritious.

Garden and Yard Photos

Two of the 4 main garden beds. The one on the left has broccoli, kale, rainbow chard and peppers. The one on the right is my first attempt at a "lasagna" bed -- layers of mulch placed right on top of newspaper-covered sod! It's doing great, with a sprawling pickling cucumber plant in the foreground, basil, cilantro, tomatoes and parsley. Firmin has started building boxes around these beds. Eventually, he'll do all four beds. They will look very neat when he is done. They already add some sharpness to the garden! In the extreme foreground, you can see the edge of the dying pea patch on the right and a corner of another tomato bed on the left.

Looking from the new blueberry patch (planted this year) toward the apple trees (last year) and the main garden beyond that, next to the house.

Another tomato bed (the one you could see the corner of in the first picture.) My tomato plants are doing very well this year. A bit of leaf spot, but not too bad. Many, many green tomatoes and still many flowers as well. The bed in the foreground with the spent peas will be my fall bed. Just planted carrots, with lettuce and spinach to come.

Another view of the garden with the big tomatoes in front hogging most of the view. All my tomatoes this year are heirloom. I'm going to try my hand at seed saving this time around.

In this picture you can see the blueberry patch on the left, the garage on the right, and into the back yard. We have let the far back grow wild, with paths mowed through the tall grass. (Ethan loves it back there -- the grass is higher than his head!) My plan is to eventually have another garden plot behind the garage for space-intensive things -- pumpkin, corn, melons, broccoli, etc. (I really need a much larger stand of broccoli, since we eat a ton of it!) It's a long way from the water spigot, but some rain barrels by the garage should take care of most of the water needs. The biggest obstacle is fencing. Right now, this section of the yard is very wildlife friendly -- we have rabbits, deer, skunks, raccoons, woodchucks, and more visit or live in our yard. Needless to say, any garden back there will need a good fence!

Back to the Garden

I took a break from my garden this year, since Ethan was at a very attention/vigilance-demanding stage during the spring and summer. It was absolutely the right decision, but I've missed having my own produce right out the back door.

Next year, Ethan will be able to toddle around the garden with me, digging holes and generally entertaining himself. So I've been getting ready for next spring. Having a baby in September of last year meant that the garden never did get "put to bed" in 2007. There were dead garden plants and weeds everywhere. Not to mention gobs of grasshoppers, which I recently learned thrive in messy, weedy garden plots. Earlier this fall, I got out and cleaned up the mess. Then last week, Alexander and I weeded one corner and planted lots of garlic.

This week, we finally managed to get the tiller from my parents' house (thanks solely to my father -- thanks Dad!) Firmin tilled up everything but the garlic patch yesterday before dinner. After dinner, I worked like a maniac until after dark, picking out as many quackgrass rhizomes as I could -- a whole wheelbarrow full, and there are still more than I want to think about left in the garden! Those plants play to win.

Today, I gave the kids the day off from homeschooling so that they could help me get the composted manure in and plant the cover crop (field peas and fava beans). A trip to Lowes for the manure put Ethan to sleep, so we were able to work uninterupted by him. Brianna and Alexander were incredibly helpful and we got the work done in about an hour.

Here's what it looks like now:
It's not much to look at, but my garden has never been so nice and clean in the fall! I think I'll add some straw or mulched leaves when I can get some. This isn't the final look, however, as the cover crop will come up and cover the plot during the winter, fixing nitrogen into the soil and discouraging weeds.

It feels good to get back to the soil. It feels good to work hard and see progress. It feels good to share this endeavor as a family, each of us doing our part to provide some portion of our own food. It feels worth every minute.

It also feels small. I'm starting to gently work on Firmin (because I'll definently need his help) about putting a large plot further back on our property. I'd like to grow quantities of bigger crops -- squash, melon, potatoes, corn -- that I don't have room for now. But that would entail breaking a lot of sod and building a good fence to keep out the many critters (including deer) that inhabit our urban "nature oasis" back there. Getting it set up would be a project for next summer, with planting beginning next fall at the earliest. I'll let you know how it goes. Those of you who know Firmin can help me butter him up! You know -- what a great husband he is, how nice our land is, how it would be perfect for a big garden, how educational it would be for the kids, etc., etc. ;o)