My berry cup runneth over with tomatoes

Another weekend spent in the garden, bent over tomato plant after tomato plant trying to get to all the ripe tomatoes... we've had an abundance of grape and cherry tomatoes this season. I had to cut back one of the plants as it was invading my raspberry climbing wires! As I wrote earlier today on the CelticMommy Facebook page (have you been there to "like" it yet?), I love being out in garden each morning, barefooted and bumbling about. Sadly this morning, a large cherry tomato was in my path and got squished! Is tomato juice a good foot exfoliant?

Anyway, after distributing about 250 of these beauties to surrounding neighbors and relatives, I wanted to get a quick pic of some of the rest of them in my beautiful new berry bowl made by Melissa of the Bridgman Pottery blog and Etsy.  I love that this bowl was made for me by Melissa and that the bowl has its' own uniqueness that typifies her wabi sabi creative spark!  Like Melissa, I too believe that the beautiful things we collect should be used and not sitting and collecting dust.

To add to that sentiment, I will soon be working on a new crochet project with some beautiful yarn that has been sitting in my stash.  Catrina of Because Mommy Said So created this sweet hat (Ravelry Link) that looks both warm and stylish!  As soon as I am done with my current seekrit project, my own pattern to be coming soon, I'll be crocheting the Nottinghamshire hat for my noggin.

I hope your cup runneth over today with all good things!

Garden Stages

Psst...  Yes little tomatoes I see you there, hanging down beyond your fence!

 
Welcome to our home sweet onions, I have a dinner date planned with you in mind.

Hello pretty berries!  You are looking rather yummy today.

I'm talking to my garden.  The days are long and dry and hot and this makes the garden talk back to us.  We have more tomatoes than I expected, onions harvesting quicker than expected, more berries than expected and a few plants unexpectedly returning for another season.  It may be a small garden, but it gives away its goodies in stages, making them last. 

The sleepy quietness here at CelticMommy is coming to a close.  I have much to share with you and a moving date coming up soon!  Recipes, crafts, links and more all showing up ahead.  :-)

Dirt under my fingernails

I've spent the last 10 minutes attempting to get the dirt out from under my fingernails and I think I am giving up for now... but that's okay.  For the past hour, Ro and I have been in our wee garden spreading some TLC and thinking about things.

Weighing Options:  What am I going to do with this many grape tomatoes!?
Wondering:  How did that lone carrot survive?  And, in the middle of the blackberry bushes at that!
Watering:  Our little onions and garlic are not so little anymore... my hubby planted such nice rows that I feel bad harvesting.  But not bad enough not to harvest!
Watching, Waiting, Mouth Watering:  Ahhh, the blackberry crop is looking quite nice we think.  Quite nice indeed.

Our garden is not big at all, but it brings great smiles and satisfaction to our family.  So, the remnants of dirt under my fingernails will stay there for now as a reminder throughout the day of time spent bringing smiles to our family.

Happy Monday!
Hettie

Way in the back

In the back of the garden by the corner of the shed,

he spotted a wee striped green ball and turned his head.

He ran running and yelling at the top of his lungs!

The fruit we've been waiting for had finally sprung!

I came with him quickly, little brother in tow.

We three bent down close to oooh and aah and say hello!

Grow grow wee watermelon, we've been hoping you'd show!

Homemade pickles

With our garden producing pickling cucumbers at a rate of 2-3 per day, I had to come up with a way to keep them!  This fast recipe does not require any special canning supplies and will make one full pint (or two half pints as seen above) of pickles that will keep in the refrigerator for about a month.

Ingredients and Supplies

• 1 clean pint, or 2 clean half pint Ball or Kerr jars... or a very very clean glass salsa or spaghetti sauce jar will work.
• Fresh pickling cucumbers, washed, about 5 or 6
• 1 cup of granulated sugar
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, smashed
• 1 teaspoon dried dill or several sprigs of fresh dill
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 2 teaspoons pickling spice  (I use Penzey's)
• 1 1/4 cups white vinegar

Directions

1. Slice cucumbers about 1/4" thick, set aside
2. Combine sugar, onion, garlic, dill, salt, picking spice and vinegar.  Make sure sugar is dissolved.
3. Put cucumbers in jar (jars) packing lightly
4. Fill jar with vinegar mixture to top.  If you are splitting into two half pint jars, you might need about 2-4 tablespoons of water
5. Cap tightly and place in refrigerator

The pickles will be ready pretty quickly... about 2-3 days.  I have already gone through one jar and put new cucumber slices in the vinegar mix.  The pickles are sweetly tangy and still give some crunch.  Yum!

Enjoy!

Anticipation

*With thanks to my children who waited to eat the cantaloupe so mommy could take another photo!*

One of my earliest and fondest memories from my childhood is of sitting on a bench in my apartment building. My great gramma had handed me a slice of cantaloupe with the rind on. I think it took me at least fifteen minutes to eat it.

By the time I was done, my face was covered in sweet cantaloupe juice... even my bangs and braids were sticky! My shirt was a mess and my whole upper body needed to be washed pretty much... which was a bonus as that meant it was now pool time. I think, because of this memory, I have always loved and always will love cantaloupe over honeydew and watermelon.

Flash forward to now, to my own children who also love all melon types. It just dawned on me about 15 minutes ago that they have never had melon with the rind on it... eaten the way I did. I look out into my garden at the spreading watermelon plants and it makes me smile to think that, one day in the not-too-distant future, I will be able to offer them our own, homegrown melon.

I will plunk them outside on a lawn chair with a juicy slice.
I will smile and watch them eat their melon alllll the way down to the very very end.
I will laugh as I turn the sprinklers on to wash the juice from their faces!

-- to be continued --

The First Tomato

Just before watering this morning, we picked our very first tomato of the year. We've all been watching this front runner of the garden... waiting patiently for it to ripen and be ready for plucking.

Today was the day. Em walked out with me, we opened the gate and examined the tomato carefully. Was it fully ripe? Was today the day or would it be tomorrow? The birds in the neighbors tree were chattering away... Em looked up at me and I smiled. I nodded. Today was the day!

The tomato came off easily, ready to leave the plant and plopped into Em's waiting hand. He waited patiently for me to finish watering the garden... waited for me to check the zucchinis (allllmost ready!) and then waited for me to take half a dozen photos of his tomato. Finally, he washed it off and popped it in his mouth.

"How is it?" I questioned. No reply. He was still chewing. Rob had recently taught him about savoring things... chewing slowly and enjoying things to their fullest. Here was this lesson being perfectly executed!

A full 30 seconds later, this was his reply: "That was an excellent tomato! I liked it better than the Trader Joe's tomatoes. It was sweet but not too sweet and it was juicy. It wasn't sour at all. Are there any more that are almost ready??? I want some more!"

And that is the story of our first tomato.

Garden Update

Cukes, Zukes, Tomatoes, Strawberries, Green Beans, Herbs!! The raspberry and blackberry bushes are growing nicely, and maybe maybe MAYBE we'll see a raspberry or two by the end of the season, but I'm not sure.

My poor lettuce is being eaten! I'll continue researching organic solutions for that today. Also, we'll be training the green beans now that they're getting taller and the tomato plants are higher than their cages already!

The boys and I love going out each morning to water and discover what is growing. Going to the supermarket to purchase fruit and veggies has taken on a whole new learning opportunity... where did the lettuce grow? Is it organic? Why can't we buy ___ now and why is there so much of ___ at the store?

Tonight we'll be using a bunch of our flat leaf parsley in a marinade for chicken and grilling in the backyard. I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Oh, and if you have organic solutions for anything, please feel free to give advice!

Birthday harvest

I can't believe my little one is three today!

We picked four strawberries from the garden this morning to celebrate! A windy and somewhat chilly Southern California morning, and the first thing they wanted to do before anything else was to harvest their berries and water the plants. It is so much fun learning about our fruit, herb and veggie plants together!
Four strawberries shared, yogurt and birthday singing! Juicy red smiles at the breakfast table.
Life is good.

Garden progress

So I was outside watering yesterday and saw something red peeping out from one of my plants...

already! There are several green ones too... this strawberry is the size of a quarter maybe...? Now that the lettuce is netted and protected from birds, they are growing quickly! Tomatoes are looking good, raspberry canes are leafing (is that the right term?) and the blackberries are still bare. That's okay... I know they're a long term investment.

The boys are super excited and love coming out to check the progress of the plants each morning. Each has a set of gloves and wee watering cans.

This weekend was a also a planting new and relocating existing shrubs one. Here's Ro proudly holding on to one of our new Sweet Pea bush/trees. The blueish purple Felicia Daisy plants to his right are being planted as a hedge.

That's it for now! Are you planting anything this season? And if yes, what?

New garden fence

Am I not the luckiest woman on the planet?! My wonderful husband and oldest son made a fence for the garden this weekend. I have more pics to upload later but wanted to post these for now. Next comes the painting of the shed... It's already been sanded, so I just need to make the time to paint it. My raspberry and blackberry plants will go in sometime soon as well. The big planting will be in mid- March.
Tomatoes, cucumbers, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, zucchini, herbs, peas...

What would you plant?

Progress on the new garden

We've been making progress on the preparations for the new garden! This is part of my 101 challenges in 1001 days.

Moving the firewood from one side of the back yard to the other... this section of our yard has never been used for anything but holding firewood, so there are no sprinkler lines or pesticides to deal with. Lots of black widow spiders though! I stopped counting after 13...

Raking up the last bits of bark and cobwebs. The boys have really been excited about having a garden.

Now that the area has been completely cleared, we can begin making the new fence to keep Petey out of the area.