GREEN THUMB SUNDAY Fall beauty

This is my view from my kitchen window. My husband usually rips out the red vine, urgh! I've forgotten it's name, but it does spread around a bit too vigorously. It has climbed up the pine tree and is a spectacular shade of red, don't you think? Here is a closeup-- somebody tell me what it is called, please. I am embarrassed that I've forgotten its name.

This is a closeup of the Japanese maple that you can see in the first pic, on the lower left. It gets more colorful and beautiful every day. I am thinking the sheer beauty of fall almost makes up for the fact that the next season is winter (i.e. too much snow, too cold to garden, etc.etc.).

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY The Mother Ship of Squash

I grew several different varieties of squash this year, this one was a fun surprise, it is really called Bennings summer squash. We have made UFO jokes all summer. Summer squash is really good at hiding under those big squash leaves, and so we had a variety of sizes, because I would miss one (or five!) now and then. Bennings has a milder flavor than other summer squashes; I'd have to say it is my favorite this year. Of course I grew zucchini, and Yellow Scallop, Sunburst Hybrid, which are very similar, and a lovely yellow zucchini called 49er.

Grape Juice

I decided a few weeks ago that I was not going to do any more canning without some help. So when a neighbor offered me free Concord grapes, I asked my 11 yr. old if she would like to help make grape juice, something I had never done before. Maybe some grape jelly or jam, but definitely juice. We don't eat as many pbj's as we used to around here, so grape jelly is not a high-use item. They make great gifts, too, but I decided we would start with grape juice (which is delish!) and see if we felt like doing anything else after that. We picked about 6 gallons of grapes, which didn't take long. The hardest part was taking the grapes off of the stems. Some people don't when they make juice, but our extension agent advised me that the juice would have some 'stem' flavor. So, we sat in front of the TV and stemmed those grapes. K, my 11 yr. old, enjoyed mashing the grapes most of all, I think. We cooked them, then let them strain and drain overnight in the frig. This is the finished product, it is tasty, and we didn't stain too many things with juice spills. We ended up with 8 or 9 pints. One didn't seal, and the other one? hmm? maybe some grape juice thief has been around?

I know another neighbor who has green seedless grapes- hmm, white grape juice is sooo yummy! I wonder if K is up for another batch???

Garden Blogger's Muse Day - Veggies Sing !

I hope I am not being too silly for blogger's muse day, but it is the month of Halloween. If you have never seen Charlotte and Vendetta, characters on makingfiends.com , then you are missing a good smile for the day. Here is a low-res pic of them.
Charlotte (the sweet one) has taught the vegetable 'fiends' to sing a song, much to Vendetta's horror:

'Eat vegetables with every meal

Or your lips will start to peel

And your eyeballs will fall out,

And your teeth will smell like trout.'

Happy Muse Day! Happy October!

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY Last of the tomatoes

These are the last of our tomatoes. We had a cold snap last weekend, and again today. The weatherman says it will warm up, with highs in the 60's through next week, but I am glad to be done with them. In year's past, I've covered my tomatoes and kept them into October. I am glad we pulled the plants last weekend. I still have pumpkins, beets, parsnips, carrots and summer and winter squash to deal with. Not to mentions that I am really tired of figuring out things to do with tomatoes.

I blogged earlier about which tomatoes I liked and would try again, I have also heard about a yellow cherry tomato called Sun Sugar that is supposed to be wonderful. Has anyone tried this variety? I think I will put it on my list for next year to try out.

Sun Sugar

Shoes! I bought new shoes!

I am an 'old' lady - I switched over to flats over ten years ago. My feet hurt if I'm not wearing tennis shoes with some good support in them. My mother and my sister have both had foot surgery, but not me (yet). Sensible shoes and I are like peanut butter and jelly.

These black, strappy heels are the only pair of heels I own, with an inch heel. They go nicely with a red, two piece outfit I own that has black bows as trim on the jacket (it really is nice, I promise!). I would never have bought them (I don't like to shop for shoes at all, really) except I was on a trip last year or so with my daughter, the Sassy Lime, and she talked me into these very cute (if uncomfortable) shoes. I wear them when I'm trying to look really cute. I have short, narrow heeled, wide at the top feet (one shoe salesman said I had feet like a duck), and there just aren't too many shoes in my size - 6 1/2 wide.

I've been very pleased to see that flats are 'in' now, and determined to stock up before they go out of style. So I went on a rare shoe shopping trip, to get some shoes for the 11yr old, K, and to look for some flats for myself. And I found a pair of dressy black flats (with some glitter on the sides that you can't see) and a pair of Barbie-pink shoes, with heart cutouts. I have to admit that I own a pink suit (it was on clearance!) and these shoes go with it perfectly.

I couldn't bring myself to buy the pink ones, so I bought K's shoes, and the black pair for myself. The next day I was still thinking about those crazy pink shoes, so I went back and bought them. They are a bit over the top, aren't they?

Edge and I are now challenging the true shoe hound of the family, Sassy Lime, to post about her lovely shoe collection and love of shoes - c'mon Sass, let's see it!

There's no place like home

I was visiting one of my favorite places on line, Our Little Acre, and enjoying the visit, as always, when I saw a familiar place, Bear's Mill, in Darke County, Ohio. I was raised in Darke County, and our family visited Bear's Mill often, my grandmother grew up near there, and Zion's Cemetery on St. Rt. 36 has several of our ancestors buried there. I am related to the Cromer family, one of the families that owned and ran the mill.

On one visit, my grandmother noticed an old tool on the wall, and said 'that one is ours! They borrowed it and never brought it back!' (I was afraid she was going to climb up and get it! Ack!) I have not written much about my love of genealogy and family history. I became interested as a teenager, and had some great experiences 'finding' my family. The fact that they had lived in the same county for 3 or 4 generations did make my search relatively easy. (bad pun).

My sister is a lot more computer savvy than I am. She put together a great website with our family tree on it at http://elizabethsattic.tripod.com/

Thanks, Kylee, for a great walk down memory lane!

This short clip (I couldn't find any .jpegs) shows my youngest daughter, K, in front of Bear's Mill.

Freezing Rain - no, Snow ! at 5,000 feet

I am glad we got half of the vegetable garden pulled on Saturday - this morning we have freezing rain,
which quickly turned to snow at our house. (We are at 5, 000 feet elevation here in Utah) I wonder if it will stick.

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY old reliables finish out the summer

Iceberg roses weren't my favorite for a long time. I wouldn't say they are now, either, but we have two neglected Icebergs just outside our bedroom door, and they have bloomed all summer, despite needed the grass pulled out from under them. Maybe it is because they have been around a few years, but they bloomed and bloomed this summer. I'm becoming more and more fond of them as time goes by. Rain and cooler temps came today, they are predicting a low of 40 degrees, and possibly snow in the mountains. We'll see.

Pansies and pumpkins

I saw this idea in a magazine, somewhere. I bought some black violas and orange pansies, and hollowed out the pumpkin from our garden (this little pumpkin was the result of a lumina pumpkin getting cross-pollinated with some of our squash, I think).
It took a few tries to get the flower pot to fit, but it wasn't too hard.

Then I took the pot out and planted some of the Halloween - colored pansies in it, and put it back in the pumpkin. I plan to make some for my daughters and friends for fall decorations.

Maybe I'll show some more when I get them potted up. I think I'll get some regular pumpkins, and try one of the Lumina pumpkins, too.

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY Purple Ruffles Basil

This was a volunteer in my veggie garden this year. It is not so tasty to me, but I love the color, and have used it in some flower arrangements for an unusual filler. I hope it self-seeds again next season.I grew lettuce leaf basil for eating, and I have enjoyed that variety ok, but am remembering a smaller leafed basil - oh - spicy globe basil- that I think I will grow next year. Any other recommendations for yummy -or beautiful- basil varieties?

Garden Blogger's Bloom Day - September 2007

I should take paper and pencil out so I don't forget what is blooming, but the sun was almost down and I was trying to throw some grass seed on some bare spots this evening. Some of the roses are still blooming. We have not had a frost here, yet, and so are still enjoying these beauties. The volunteer sunflowers are still going strong, and the hollyhocks, cosmos, valerian, gaura, a few perennial geraniums, snaps-

This little guy is some kind of wild onion that pops up now and then. It has been fun to watch it grow and bloom this summer.

The pots have petunias, etc, still going along very well. One aster has begun to bloom, but will take off later, I think. I think my disco belle Hibiscus are done for this season. I am looking forward to seeing what they do next year.

Pasta salad with fresh basil and tomatoes

I found this recipe in my files, it is pretty tasty, and I am also looking for other good recipes that use basil, so let me know if you've got a good one. This one has tasted good enough that I've made it two days in a row.

Pasta Salad

Cook pasta and drain – cheese tortellini or bowties
While hot pour (Paul Newman’s) Italian Salad dressing over the pasta and let cool
Prepare fresh snipped basil (a lot) , and a jar of marinated artichoke hearts, drained and cut into chunks.
Add to : pasta mixture and chill for 3 hours.
Just before serving drain salad dressing from the pasta.
Add to mixture quartered red tomatoes, and large black pitted olives.
Mix together and sprinkle with fresh Parmesan or Romano cheese, and coarse black pepper.

Salsa time

I have been processing tomatoes, I made some tomato sauce last week, as well as salsa last week and this week. It is a lot of work, chopping all those veggies. This last session went better, though, because my 11 yr. old helped. She was a great assistant! I even tried to make some 'hot' salsa - mine is typically very mild - even when I try to make it hot. We'll see if I finally succeeded. Next time (if I make any more) I'll use my LaPresse- I think it is called.

Here is my recipe for salsa, I got a great recipe from a friend, and made a few changes:

Salsa

½ bushel tomatoes (about 28 lbs)
2 sliced garlic cloves
2-5 green peppers (or red, orange, yellow)
2-5 other types of peppers (banana, Anaheim, poblano, etc)
3 large onions
2 T salt (non-iodized for canning)
2-3 jalapeno peppers
lemon juice

Scald and peel tomatoes. Dice them and put them in a colander to strain out some of the juice. (I press the tomatoes against the colander, then put the drained tomatoes in a saucepan to cook briefly, and drain and press them again- this results in a thicker salsa)

Clean and chop all other vegetables, put all veggies in the large saucepan to cook until onions are soft, and salsa reaches a low boil, stirring occasionally.

Add salt, and 1 – 3 T. of hot crushed bottled peppers, if hotter salsa is desired. Stir.

Add 1 T. lemon juice to each pint of salsa, process in pressure cooker at 15 lbs pressure for 15 minutes.
Some of my friends use a water bath canner to process this, but I am a bit cautious, and use the pressure cooker. The best thing to do is to check with your local extension office for their advice.

End of season evaluation - peppers

My plan, way back in the spring, was to have peppers to make salsa with, and to try out some ‘cool weather’ varieties, because the nights here in high desert Utah can be cool in May, June, and September, which slows down pepper production. So I bought seeds for Gypsy Hybrid and Giant Marconi, which are both supposed to be good varieties for cooler weather. Of course we had one of the hottest summers on record! I ended up with eleven pepper plants, and expected many more peppers than I got from these plants.
I planted a variety of types, hoping for sweet peppers in a variety of colors, and a few hot ones, as well: In addition to the two cool weather types, I planted Jalapeno, Poblano, Super Shepherd, Sweet Red, and Sweet banana. (This last one usually produces tons of peppers for me. I haven’t seen a poblano, yet either. The Pimento pepper plant that I bought has probably done the best, producing 5 spicy peppers for me.
It is my own fault, however that I didn’t get more peppers from my plants. I am having trouble remembering details, but I do know the pepper plants I started from seed were not wonderful starts. I don’t remember what I did wrong. No help there!
Then I was a little too carried away with the beauty of the volunteer flowers in the veggie garden. I have some volunteer sunflowers that I had to prune heavily, because they were blocking the peppers from the sun. I let some cosmos grow too close to my pepper plants, too, and so my puny pepper plants had to compete for sun and root space. I like having flowers in the veggie garden, but I have to be a lot more selective about that. The plants never got very big, and thus never produced much fruit.

I know there is a jalapeno plant somewhere, but I never got any jalapenos, and all I endeup up with was only 2 or 3 peppers from each plant, all very undersized (as you can see from the photo). The lovely big pepper on the left is from the store. :(

So, next year I'll try to be more diligent with my seed starting. I won't let the garden volunteers take away from what I really am trying to grow. More evaluations to come!

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY - and they say disco is dead!

Yahoo! my 2nd Disco Belle bloomed, it is a red one!!! The seed packet just said mixed colors.

So far I have 2 whites (w red centers) and this lovely red. They really are remarkable plants. I wonder if they will get more colors, I think all that is available is white, pink and red?

Tomatoes on my Windowsill for Garden Blogger's Muse Day

This poem fits this part of the harvest season perfectly for me. I found this poem in a women's magazine, years ago:

Tomatoes on my Windowsill by Robin BenzleTomatoes on my windowsill,
Lined up like happy soldiers,
from pale green as Key lime pie
To red as sunburned shoulders.

They seem to smile at the sun,
While they patiently a-ripen.
And when I do my kitchen chores,
I smile back, enlightened.

One by one I take them down
From their nest upon the sill,
And add them to a salad or
Perhaps a sauce with dill.

Then to my garden I return
To pluck another load,
And tenderly I line them up
On that shelf in my abode.

No sooner do I get them shelved,
Than my garden calls me back.
They're ripening all at once, I think,
As I stuff them in my sack.

So I give them to my neighbors and
I give them to my friends.
I give them to my enemies,
Just to make amends.

Soon, I note, they're turning red
So fast it makes me ill.
From off the vine, they drop like flies.
My plot looks like road kill.

Tomatoes on my windowsill
All rotting in a row.
I never though I'd say this but,
"Where the heck's the snow?"

Which tomato is the best?

I have learned a lot about tomatoes by reading other people's blogs this summer. I don't know what the blog etiquette is about mentioning other people's blogs, but it has been fun to see and learn about new varieties of tomatoes, especially Hanna's This Garden is Illegal .I have grown tomatoes for years and years, they are easy to grow, and I have always felt like I had a 'sure success' with tomatoes in my veggie garden. I just grow the more common varieties, though, nothing very exotic. I usually use my tomatoes for fresh eating and cooking, and can some salsa. I especially like to grow Roma-type tomatoes, because they are heavy producers. This year I bought seeds for Siberian and used some old seeds from our seed collection to start plants: two cherry tomatoes, super sweet 100 and Sugary (grape-type), Roma and Viva Italia, Early Girl, and Brandywine. I messed up the labels and have a few plants I still am not sure what variety they are : (. Then I felt like I needed a few more plants (I ended up with a total of 20 plants), so I bought a few- a Big Beef and a Lemon Boy. Last year, I had too many cherry and Roma types, so this year I only planted two cherry tomatoes and made sure I had a variety of the 'regular' types to try out. Here are my thoughts at this point in the tomato season-

This is Brandywine, they have done ok. My DH likes this variety, they are ok. Not heavy producers, but ok.

Lemon Boy was an impulse buy at IFA (Intermountain Farmers Association). It has been fun, because it has produced well and has a different flavor as well, obviously, as color.
This is a Utah or Western tomato with the unglamorous name of DX5212. It has produced the most unblemished 'regular' type tomatoes. Good flavor, medium volume of fruits.

Mass quantities of Roma and Viva Italia. I have not seen much difference between these, heavy production, which is important to me.7 of my 20 plants are Roma-type, and they are doing just what they should be doing, giving me lots of tomatoes! Next year I want to try San Marzanos.

Hard to say whether these are Early Girls, Big Beefs or Siberian. Smaller size round fruits than I'd like, small to medium volumes of fruits. Siberian was just a hedge against a cool summer, which has not happened.

So, to summarize, I am pleased with the number of tomatoes I've grown. I will try a different grape tomato next year; DH says Sugary's skin is too tough. I will try a few Siberians next year, jsut in case we have a cool spring/summer, and keep the Romas going. I'll have to look around and see what else I might try. I will move them to a different part of the garden, though. I haven't explained how some production suffered because they are in too shady of an area. OH, and label my seeds better, obviously!!!!

Any recommendations of varieties?

GREEN THUMB SUNDAY- a modest success

This is, of course, sweet potato vine, I grew the dark purply one last year and it never amounted to anything, so everytime I walk by this lovely, lush specimen, I smile. This pic was taken a few weeks ago, the plant has wound itself all the way to the top of the railing by now. Happy GTS, all you gardeners out there!

Desert Four O'Clocks

This was one of my favorite 'finds' at the Jordan River Water Conservancy garden! In some places, it was so full and lush that it had hidden the identifying plant label. It is very lovely. As a native Mid-Westerner, I am very familiar with 4 O'clocks, my grandmother grew them every year. But these are lovely and good in dry ole' Utah, and just a bit different than what I was used to. I will have to get some of these and try them out for myself! This was a lovely sunflower in the Jordan River Conservancy garden's veggie garden area. I wish I had taken a pic of their artichoke, I had never seen one growing in a garden here in Utah before. This shot was actually taken by my son-in-law, who is a wonderful photographer. You can see more of his pics on his blog.