Right. About that Garden.

I have been in it this year.  A few (*cough* threeorfour *cough*) times.
I have this really obnoxious thing going on with the garden.  If it looks too messy and overgrown, I get overwhelmed and don't want to be in it.  Makes sense, right?

With the endless winter and the craptastic wet spring and rainy early summer, the garden has been messy and late.  I have literally had to distance myself from it mentally and pretend it doesn't exist otherwise it would drive me nuts.  This year Brian has taken the lead.  Part of me would like to be more involved and make it more efficient and neat and productive but this year it really is just too much.  It was an exercise in futility to try to do any work in there with Luke awake and in there with me.  Toddlers don't much care for what is weed and what is vegetable and have no problem crawling right through the tender shoots you may have just planted.  If you don't keep them in the garden with you while you are working, you have to leave your work every 42 seconds to make sure that they have not bolted for the street.  Or so I've heard.

What about nap time, Mary?  Surely that would be the perfect opportunity to find renewal in the soil and rejuvenate your soul through digging your fingers through the luscious earth?  Oh, silly questioner.  You are wrong.  Naptime is sacred.  Naptime is when I get to sit and blog or read to the boys or eat something not crouched over the counter using my body as a visual shield as I curl around my special morsel of forbidden food caressing it like Gollum with the ring.  My precious.  Besides, questioner, you clearly do not understand that the hours between 1 and 3ish o clock melt my body into a pool of exhaustion and uselessness.  So no.  No gardening at nap time.  I've given in to the fact that our garden will be far from ideal this year and everything we get from it will be bonus.

But then the other day Brian brought in our first zucchini and squash and a few little peas!  So that was enough to get me just a tad bit excited for this year's harvest and I thought, hey self, you should go out to the garden and get some pictures if only to chronicle this year as The Year They Were Tired.

Not too terrifying in this pic...broccoli, strawberries, potatoes, zucchini, and summer squash

We always seem to do well with lettuce.  Which is nice but no one in our family really likes salad.  As long as we're being honest and all.

The strawberries did a little better this year but they're tuckered out now.  We got maybe a couple of pints in June.

But our first success with broccoli!  Enough to feed half of us at dinner one night!

Too lazy to even move the unused jars.  Man.  These are our cantaloupe and watermelon.  It would be quite the feat if we end up getting anything from these since they got planted so late.  Beans in the background and all around the perimeter.  Brian planted a LOT of beans.

We have a full bed just for potatoes this year!  Last year was our first try at potatoes and they were so fun and easy.  Plus, they're like a real food that actually feels like you're eating something so hopefully these will succeed and fill some stomachs.


Cucumbers...will we get any or will we not?  Time shall tell.

What?  you can't tell what that is?  A whole bed of cherry tomatoes.  I can't believe I'm even showing you these pictures.  I think there are more tomatoes planted somewhere.  Ask Brian.  There are also peas, carrots, and gourds that were planted.  There was spinach but that's gone now.


Brian also planted a patch of corn this year in our former weed patch.  We haven't had success with corn yet but I would be quite pleased if we did.  I think there are pumpkins planted in the back again as well.  See?  I don't even know.

The trees are heavy with fruit this year making up for our ONE pear that grew last year due to the late frost.  We shall have lots and lots of pears quite soon.


This is the apple tree that I tried to get Brian to cut down last year because it never produced anything and looked dead.  He bargained for a year wait.  Quite Scriptural, right?  This year, much to his pride, it's producing!  We may actually get a half bushel or so.  More beans in the background.


Oh, hey mama chicken.  She doesn't move from those eggs we gave her and eyes you suspiciously if you come too close.  I am really excited to see if this works.  We should hopefully have some hatching this coming weekend!  Updates on ye olde Facebook page, I think!

Hope you're having a lovely Tuesday!  If you need me I'll be out sowing and weeding.  Ha, just kidding.  It's nap time.


8 comments

  1. See Brian is good at it too! Oh do I miss nap time!

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  2. The garden, well I really relate.

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  3. Your not really trying garden looks much better than my trying really hard garden....

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  4. I love it! So much variety. Really, if it weren't for my husband our garden would never get planted and in years we have a new baby, not much gets done, but we still seem to get things! Looks great! -Genevieve

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  5. I hear you totally- I was the same way with the garden on Schurr Road. You're probably too young to remember, but that garden almost immediately got overwhelming to me and I never had the time to work in it, so it was always a mess & produced very little. Toddlers do NOT make good garden helpers it's true and nap time is indeed a sacred time to be guarded. A beautiful, lush garden full of wonderful vegetables sure sounds like a great idea but reality is another thing!

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  6. The garden looks great! those picturesque gardens in magazines have been photo shopped and probably have a staff manning them. Don't give up nap time - it is what get's you through the rest of the day. Remember some whole countries revolve around siesta!

    Grandma & Grumpy

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  7. I love it! We have very similar gardens, and very similar weather to date. My garden is smaller, but it's exciting to see what your's is doing, and to be able to say to myself that we're actually doing all right. Your garden looks great! And the pears! Last year we got 1 bushel from 2 trees - our trees are so full this year too! Good luck as you struggle to find the time for it all. I agree on nap time. Puddle of exhaustion. I typically garden right after the kids go to bed. Good luck!

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  8. I love this. The paragraph on naps time made me laugh, loud and long. Yes, sister. Whenever someone suggests I do some homeschooling during nap time, I'm all, "Whaaaaaaaa????" :)

    FYI, your garden looks AWESOME. We just moved into a place with a yard, but it's a pretty small yard and it's a rental, so I'm not sure about a garden yet.

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