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It’s finally here, time to plant. With every new season, I get really excited about the prospects of what I am planting. Using some of the money we made from last year, my dad and I turned 2 rolls of concrete wire into brand new 6′ tall tomato cages. I found that the previous cages were too short which probably hurt my tomato yield. Not to complain, last year’s tomato harvest was great. I just want more…
8 rows of tomatoes, 7 plants in each for a grand total of 58 tomato plants. I’d plant more but I can’t sacrifice land meant for the peppers we are planting. The first three rows of tomatoes are all heirloom varieties. I planted these closest to my house so I can keep a watch on disease. The rest of the tomatoes are all Whopper varieties from Parks Seed. We have found this variety to be superior to all others in disease resistance and cracking. I can’t wait for that first Brandywine tomato caprese salad.
Check out the grid below to see what i’ve planted!
With Summertime heat in the Spring and a lack of rain, it’s getting weird before the season has even begun. The ground is parched and because of it, lawns are already going partially dormant. Hopefully we are getting some rain on Sunday to alleviate this issue. I had to water the onions we planted just so they stayed healthy.
The tulips are done blooming now but they were absolutely beautiful. Behind them, I have lots of iris about to bloom. I can’t wait to see what colors they are. They were planted 3 years ago and this will be the first year that they produce lots of blooms.
Our tomato and pepper seedlings are looking great. My dad spent a lot of time starting them and babying them. I love seeing them in their little rows at this stage. It is amazing to think about how much produce these tiny plants will eventually produce. There are 5000+ future bottles of hot sauce sitting there on that table along with countless fresh caprese salads and tomato sauce. I cannot wait for that first fresh tomato.
Once again we have beautiful tulips blooming.
We have to manage our tulips to keep them coming back. The first time they are planted, they are placed in our front garden. The front of our house gets too much shade for the tulip leaves to create enough food for next year. So after these are finished blooming, we have to dig up the bulbs and store them until it’s time to plant in the Fall again. We planted last years tulips out in the backyard garden and they all bloomed again. So each year we do this; dig up the old ones, store them, plant them somewhere more sunny. It’s a lot of work, but you don’t even question doing it when you get results like these.
I planted a row of broccoli and cabbage this weekend. You can never go wrong with those two!
Here we are, it’s springtime and we are planning the crop for the season.
First things first; cleanup. I spent the last few weekends cleaning up trash that litterbugs threw into my garden and then rototilled the land. It was important to rototill early this year because the early nice weather has created early weed growth. I’d rather have the weeds knocked down now while they are manageable.
I planted the lettuce already and it’s all come up. The large stuff in the front is spinach from Autumn and the rest is standard Black Seeded Simpson, Spring Mix and Arugula. Lettuce is very easy to grow. For a few bucks you end up with hundreds of dollars in lettuce. If you don’t have a small raised bed yet, go make one. You will thank yourself for years to come.
Shannon’s herb garden from last year is looking great. We trimmed it back heavily to keep everything compact. The mint and oregano are trying to spread everywhere….not on my watch.
The Date: October 20th, 2012
The Place: Prallsville Mill in Stockton NJ
The Time: Of Our Lives!
We’re really excited about our wedding, and if you know us, we’re already planning and planting a lot of DIY adventures that will be a part of the wedding. So far, these endeavors include brewing homemade beer and wine, growing an epic pumpkin patch, and all of our own flowers.
Keep checking back for updates. We will continue to catalog our gardening adventures and keep you in the know regarding our special day!
As far as after-wedding accommodations goes, we have booked a block of rooms at the Lambertville House 609-397-0200 http://www.lambertvillehouse.com/, which is where we (the bride and groom) will be staying. If the House fills up, have no fear, there are plenty of other hotels in the area, including the Inn at Lambertville Station, right across the street. Check out http://www.lambertville.org/ for more options.
Much Love,
Shannon and Chip
We had a ridiculously mild winter. I have a lot of concerns about it, mostly fungus/pest related. I fear that there was not enough cold to kill off these two problems. Oh well, all we can do is plant and hope for the best.
One positive that came from the warm ‘winter’ is that my Brussels sprouts and broccoli leftovers from Autumn made it through the winter. So here I am in March picking Brussels sprouts for dinner. We cooked them up with some Ely’s pork and our own homemade sauerkraut for a great meal.
I rototilled yesterday! We are getting ready for a new season =)
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Rototilling
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Beautiful Brussels Sprouts
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Made a great meal
Everyone has a few childhood memories they hold dear. Digging up sassafras roots in March with my mom-mom and pop-pop is one of my favorite childhood moments. For a few years now, i’ve been meaning to go relive that experience as an adult. I finally remembered to do it!
I am pretty good at identifying trees, so finding some sassafras wasn’t too hard. They are usually small scrubby trees and their young branches are green. Very few trees have green branches like they do. In less than 5 minutes, we dug up 5 saplings and cut the roots off. Unfortunately I broke the shovel in the process. No big deal, I’ll replace the handle.
To make the tea, we simply scrubbed the roots well and patted them dry. Then I used a vegetable peeler to remove the sap-rich outer bark from the roots…sort of like I was peeling a potato. I heated some water and poured it into a french press with the bark. After 5 minutes of steeping, we had our tea! We added some of our honey and admired our work….It was just as good as I remembered it =)
It’s almost spring planting time!
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Digging up the sapling
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I went too beastmode..broke the shovel.
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Cleaned the roots
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Sassafras Tea!
This has been an extremely busy month. Fallsington Day was a huge success…more on that later though.
Yesterday I went to clear out the top of the hives to prepare them for winter. I expected some Fall honey, but not this much. There must be 3 gallons of honey in those frames. It’s that good dark stuff that the goldenrod and it’s friends produce. I haven’t even checked the other 3 yet but I hope for much of the same. The hives are strong and hopefully, with my help, they will get through the winter.
The hot sauce is complete. We are ready to roll for Fallsington Day this Saturday and will continue to make the hot sauce until the last pepper is used up. That being said….it looks like we still have our work cut out for us. What you see below is a mix of mostly habanero and Bhut Jolokia ghost chilis.
A wheelbarrow full of peppers! This year was not forgiving for gardens. The consistent rain combined with the hurricane really devastated much of our garden. I can’t complain as I am grateful that we still picked a nice bounty. I just always hope for that perfect year. Fortunately, as you can see…. we had all of the peppers we needed for our sauces. They performed well despite the conditions.
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