Summer Harvest

(this was at the beginning of the season)

Our summer garden was a success! Yeah, Yippee! I'm so grateful for success! If you will remember, our winter garden failed - miserably. But we decided to try again.

We planted 12 tomato plants where the sandbox used to be. We planted 4 green beans, cherry tomatoes, 3 bell peppers, green chili, banana pepper, fools you jalapeno and a jalapeno in the planter on the east side of the yard. We planted zucchini, yellow squash and 6 cucumber plants on the south side of the house. We have strawberries planted there too. They were planted late, so no berries. But they have been putting off babies like crazy. So our one surviving plant has reproduced about 10 plants. We expect yummy berries this spring! We also have a strawberry plant in the planter on the north side of the yard. It too has been putting of babies! It's fun to see all the little plants growing strong despite the heat!

We enjoyed the zucchini in June. I googled all kinds of recipes and tried them on my family. Chocolate Orange zucchini cake, zucchini muffins, oven *fried* zucchini and zucchini lasagna . I never ended up trying the lasagne, but the muffins and the fried zucchini were a hit! In fact I made them twice! YUMS!

(garden green beans and our oven *fried* zucchini!)

I ended up bottling almost 5 cases (57 quarts) of tomatoes! I'm so excited, because I was hoping to bottle at least 52 jars. Our tomato vines still look beautiful, so if they hold on until September I think I will be able to bottle more tomatoes this fall. *fingers crossed*.


We ended up with more cucumbers than we could eat. It was crazy! I tried to google recipes using cucumbers, but didn't really find anything my family would eat. I ended up taking most of them up to the cabin. I would peel and slice them in the morning and before lunch they would be gone! They really were delish! They were the most mild cucumbers I've ever eaten. I think it's ruined me for store bought cukes now! I thought I took pictures, but I can't find them.

The cucumbers have quit producing, but the plants look good. Even the green bean plants are still surviving! We lost our squash plants, but I'll just plant again this fall. I'm SO excited for our fall garden. We have a little more grass to get out of our planters and I think we will plant carrots and lettuce there! I'm thinking maybe I should turn the front planter into a veggie garden! The possibilities are endless!

Fresh veggies really are the best!