Garden & Greens 2016

My proudest harvest yet would have to be blueberries. Even though earlier this year, we had a bountiful harvest of broccoli and cabbages. I love spring & summer. So much green and fruits and veggies. 

I took a LOT of blueberry pictures. It was just so cool to see them grow. Every day I would ask Andrew to go pick them and dutifully, he would go. Surprisingly, he ate them. Elena enjoyed eating them too. We have two trees in pots and they are loved. 

One day this summer, while gardening I found some berries. They seemed to be blackberries to me, but what do I know? After posting on Snapchat about it, a friend told me they were dewberries and they were totally edible. These grew on small tiny vines alongside our fence. It was pretty cool to find edible berries on our property. 

I did have a funny video of Elena eating the dewberries. She ate one and made a sour face. Totally adorable. It must have been a video that was lost when I dunked my phone in the water and there was no resuscitating that thing no matter how much money I spent. So just picture her eating these things and making faces. She liked only a few of them, and the rest, I ate. 

This year, I planted one of my two brown turkey fig trees in my yard. And it is doing great after a very poor start in the spring (I think it outgrew its pot).

However, since we left of vacation, they became neglected (they're very young) and most of the figs dried up & fell off. I did manage to savor two of them though. I thought they needed a cute photo op.

Since we've had such a wet summer (so.much.water), we have mushrooms come up every day. You know I have a love affair with these things--at least photographing them. Not eating them. 

Elena wanted to touch them, I'm not sure if she likes them or what. 

This here is Elena touching little mushrooms from last year :) Aren't they cute? 

Earlier this year, without much success, I planted a bunch of cucumbers. At many points I doubted myself because I couldn't remember if I had planted squash alongside the cukes. I never got squash but I couldn't figure out why the blooms were different. I did get about 4 cucumbers and two of them were pretty good since I picked them in time. 

I planted strawberries and no go there. No strawberries that were edible, anyway. My jalapenos are always good. And I finally got more than 2 bell peppers this year!!! I was excited about that.

I had good success with cherry tomatoes. The boys would pick them but not eat them. They do not like tomatoes. I think I must have raised them wrong. I remember pulling carrots & tomatoes from gardens when I was young. They were a delicious treat. 

These are my first two tomatoes. Pretty soon after, I had a bucket full. 

Anyways, I have to talk about my compost. My failing compost. 

You guys, I'm not a good gardener. I'm just ok. Barely getting by. And I know that every successful gardener keeps a compost (thanks Uncle Jackie!) My father in law has never planted a garden but he'll tell you everything about it...it's ridiculous, his knowledge. 

He has told me that my compost does not get hot enough. It's not 'baking' properly. It's more of a raised bed at this point. 

So far, I've found 6 avocado pits growing (I have killed all but one), cucumbers, pumpkin, squash and pinto beans all gleefully and beautifully sprouted. 

The joke around here is if I want something to grow, just throw it in the compost. 

You guys, this is my compost after Andrew dumped half a bag of pinto beans from one of his projects. Such a sight, right?

I hope you liked my pictures and my gardening woes. Help me out if you know anything about my struggles along this green thumb adventure. I did attend a Master Gardener's meeting earlier this month and I very much enjoyed it. So much information that has to be applied. 

Have a good week, everyone!