Garden Wrap-up

Between Charlie going back to work in May, finishing the painting on our house, and all the other stuff we had going on this summer, I didn't have any time to work on this blog. Sorry to all two of my regular readers. (Not even my mom... really!)

I learned so much this year about planting, tending, harvesting and preserving vegetables, and I'm very excited to put all of this to good use next year. Here are some things I would have done differently:

~ I certainly put my tomato plants too close together. Here's the kicker: it actually led to fewer tomatoes to harvest. Because air didn't circulate well, so many of the fruits were rotten before they fully ripened. As the plants grew and grew, there was so much tangle among the plants that there were some good fruits that I couldn't reach at all! This was especially true of the cherry tomato plants that will live next year in big pots so I can walk all the way around to harvest. There was simply too many plants. I remember the tiny seedlings pushing up from the soil- it seemed impossible that they would grow to such a size. Ha!

~ I wished I had given more time and focus to scheduling my garden around the seasons. I could have tripled my crop by taking advantage of cool weather crops in the spring and fall. My peas were weak in the hot sun. (St. Patty's day, supposedly, is when you're supposed to plant these. I think mine went in the soil in late April. This is bad.) My broccoli succumbed to nasty worms that wouldn't have survived cooler weather. I completely avoided a fall crop, because I knew I wouldn't have the time to give it the care it needed.

~ Herbs were great, and I've enjoyed cooking with them! We just pulled and froze my parsley, and I'm in the process of drying the chamomile. I tried cooking with mint and sage, which I've never done before. Having stuff on hand forced me to experiment, which was a lot of fun!

~ Even though I laughed at the huge zucchini and cucumber crops, I wish I had more! Our zucchini was HUGE! It took up an entire square bed. It pushed other plants out of the way. It had the personality of Andy Dick. And I wanted MORE! A second plant would have been really nice. We just didn't have enough zucchini! The cucumbers were also great, but since I planted them all at once, and they were heavy fruiting, determinate vines, we had three weeks of more cucumbers than we knew what to do with, and then NOTHING.

~ I am, by the way, also looking for a new pickle recipe. The nearly three gallons of pickles we put up were really pretty gross. Shame.

~ I have a side bed that could have been put to better use in the form of carrots and potatoes. Tomato crazy like I was, I let the volunteer plant that I found growing in that bed just take over.

~ I have to fix an imbalance in the soil. Apparently this led to a lot of the blossom-end rot that I witnessed across the garden.

I really can't wait to put all of this to good use next year. Plus, I suspect that our little one will have more to do with the garden next spring. How fun to play out in the dirt with a little bud! Awww...

Now that the weather is cooling down, this blog is going to warm up with a whole new theme! Stay tuned!