Garden 2022

 In the Garden

The garden has been a little neglected this year because of the flower farming.  BUT...some things are finally starting to take off!  I know I probably sound like a broken record about this but the cool, wet spring really kept things from getting a good start.

My radishes grew well.  In fact, I had so many that I made some radish kimchi.  I liked it so much that I decided to plant some more radish called daikon radish and they grow like super big!  Like a foot long...we will see how this goes...

Cider enjoys hanging out in the garden!

Baby watermelon are so cute!  I think I saw a total of 4 watermelon growing...

Harvested this cabbage this last week and made a 1/2 gallon jar of sauerkraut.  It is fermenting now and will be finished next week...

The onions are doing well!

Here are the sweet potatoes.  I have tried to grow them the last 4 years with little success.  Feeling a little more optimistic this summer but we will see if there are any potatoes under those vines soon...

Some Jacob's Cattle Bens and celery in the background.

Pulled the garlic the end of July and it is about down drying down.

Basil and tomatoes!

Used the tall sunflowers as "poles" for some pole beans and I have just started harvesting some of the beans...

This cantaloupe vine looks amazing...waiting for the cantaloupes to develop! 

Tried a new heirloom zucchini variety called Cocozelle.  It is striped and we have too many!

The beet seeds got eaten by some birds so we only got a couple of beets.  I planted some more when I planted the daikon radish and they are coming up slowly.  Got a little bit of broccoli but then the flea beetles came in and demolished it.  Same with the kale and swiss chard...ugh...flea beetles!

Have an eggcellent day!

~Denise

Forever Flowers!

 In the Flower Garden

I know it has been a few weeks since I put out a blog post but things have been VERY busy!  Lots of planting and re-planting this past spring.  The weather was so wet and cool, it seems that it was hard for plants to get growing.  Decided to try and plant some everlasting flowers this year for something different.  They keep their color even when they are dried.  I picked 10 different flowers.  I only got 5 of them to grow.  That was a little disappointing at first but I have been so busy that I have not had much time to despair.  Here are a couple pics of some flowers that I have picked and are drying...

Now, let me back up and go through the flowers that grew!  Let me start with the Love Lies Bleeding which is a type of Amaranthus.  This is a type of pigweed.  I did my Masters thesis on identification of 10 different pigweeds so this one had a special place in my heart!  It was by far the largest plant.  It is in the background of this pic and it grew as tall as me.  

It produces these long, reddish flowing flower heads and they are so beautiful!  I took a bunch to the Farmers Market last time I went and someone walked by and offered to buy them.  Sold!

This flower is called Globe amaranth but it is not an Amaranthus species (at least I don't think so).  It's scientific name is Gomphrena.  There are little flowers and they have a really neat flower with lots of detail.  It reminds me of a round seashell pattern.  There are white and purple ones...

This flower is called Statice and I am REALLY liking it.  It has a unique growing pattern with a whorl at the bottom and then sends up the flower stalks.  They look like they belong in the desert or another planet...

I feel that a bouquet of them is pretty all by itself!  Ignore my dirty sleeve...LOL!

This is a type of Nigella and it is called Love in the Mist. The flowers are pretty but I don’t care for the way they dry down...

...BUT they do make some interesting seed pods though!

Here is a type of strawflower. It has single flower heads. The plants are pretty small and only about a foot tall. They dry nicely but are just so small I am not sure if they will work well in a larger bouquet but I am going to try and make some smaller ones. 

This is another type of strawflower and it has double flowers and is much larger than the first kind mentioned before this. I like it a lot better and I think it will look nice when dried!

Several of the flowers I planted did not grow. Among those were yarrow, baby’s breath, Flamingo flower, globe thistle and foxtail millet. The foxtail millet did not even germinate so I must have gotten some bad seed.  I was most disappointed that the yarrow didn’t grow because I really like yarrow and was hoping for some pink yarrow plants. 

Of course, the birds, butterflies and bees LOVE all the flowers!

The sunflowers are finally starting to grow too!

I am going to start attempting to put these bouquets together this week.  Wish me luck!  Hopefully, will be back with a garden post in a couple weeks...

Have an eggcellent day!

~Denise