We're still here.... just LAZY

Well, we are still here, even if we haven't posted anything in what feels like forever!  Life just somehow gets away from me and time is so precious.

Since our last post I ran my marathon. It was a pretty good race. I trained and ran with a good friend who I finally convinced to leave me at mile 20 (I tried to get him to scram and make his goal time at mile 15, but he stayed around).  I missed my ideal goal by 12  minutes, but still had a personal best by 5 minutes. Oh yeah... and we found out I was expecting a new addition to the family 2 weeks before the race.... I promised the hubby that I would take it easy and not push myself. And as the expected temperatures started creeping up for race day, I let my goal time slide because I definitely did not want to get over heated. So all in all, I think that it was a pretty good race!

The fools before the race - from left to right- Marvin, me, Gaby and Simon.

Well, we are still standing after!

So now I figure out what race I want to do in 2013 and start sweet talking the hubby into letting me go and leaving him at home with 3 little ones!


In the garden not too much happening, we are trying to get things out so that when we have company for Thanksgiving and Christmas we will be able to enjoy some of the lovely produce from our garden.


I ordered some Spanish Rosa and Korean Red garlic from Burpee Seeds and planted that out last week. Of the bulbs we received, the Korean Red was much smaller and had far fewer cloves per bulb.  So I concentrated on finding mostly space for the Spanish Rosa. 

On left Korean Red and on right Spanish Rosa

We are still getting about half a pound of cherry tomatoes from our single Super Sweet 100 plant.

And whenever we need some aromatics, I poach the garden for some lemon grass and lemon leaf.  It is really nice to be able to step outside and grab the herbs you need for dinner. Now if I could only remember that they are actually there.

And finally the peas are starting to do something. How come no matter how thickly I think I have planted the peas, when they finally come up they look so sparse? The ones in the container are doing much better than the ones in the ground.  We planted out 3 different areas of peas, since the kids love to eat them in the garden and this way we can have some for dinner and try out some pea shoots and tips.

After staring at the pea flowers for a week, I am finally starting to see some actual peas!

Look at all those flowers!

My side garden is a jungle. The big mess is the Yellow Brandywine, so far we have had 5 tomatoes from this one plant, and they were yummy.  I haven't ripped it out to give the other plants some sunlight because we have one more growing so far and I hope to share it with my in-laws for Christmas.... dreams.  And on the left next to the Brandywine jungle are 3 eggplants. They seem to be getting huge and have really been enjoying the hot temps we have had here lately.  Tucked under the Brandywine are my jalapenos. Steadily producing enough for the family and staying out of trouble, that's my kind of plant.

Side garden

Well, since we planted out the garlic last weekend, they have shot up! One of the blogs I enjoy reading is digginfood.com by Willi Galloway. A few weeks ago she wrote about planting garlic in containers, and since space is a precious commodity in my garden, I decided this was the way to go this year. We had 2 smart pots and a couple of other misc pots available, so I prepped them and planted the garlic. I can't wait to see how they do.  I even over crowded one of the pots so that I could have green garlic in the spring. Whoohoo!

Garlic shoots emerging

Harvest Monday - 4/11/11

What an absolutely wonderful week/weekend it was! No trips to the emergency room,the kids were well behaved, and we even managed to got somethings accomplished in the yard.

This week we harvested peas, radishes, and Swiss chard.  And we are getting very excited for warmer weather and a larger garden. YAY!!!

11 oz of French Breakfast Radishes

4 1/2 oz peas

5 3/4 oz rainbow Swiss Chard

 The whole family was involved in the yard work this weekend. While the hubs was out playing basketball, the kiddos and I stayed home since the run this week was not jog stroller friendly. So we got to work on some garden projects that have been neglected. While getting the soil ready for my fava seedlings, I found a couple of worms. And normally I'd just leave them to do their work, but I know that Ryle loves bugs and worms, so I let him play a bit.

Icky!

Getting heeby jeebies just watching him play with the worms.

 And now it's time to get those seedlings planted. I've really only had Fava beans once after hearing Martha Stewart talk about how wonderful they were (yes, Martha Stewart). So I found some at the grocery store and we looked up a recipe and tried them out. We were not impressed. But lately I have been hearing about how awesome young fava beans are grilled in the pod and how delish the fava bean leaves are.  Well, I thought I'd see what I was missing.

 And we got part of our bed fixed up and ready for soil. One of the posts was missing from out kit, so we are waiting delivery. Getting excited about planting lots of yummies! So.... what grows in partial shade?

 The cress is starting to take off. I can't wait, it's so versatile. I saw some cress at the grocery store in one of those living containers, they sell. You know what I mean?  Well, I sort of figured if they were meant to keep the cress alive and fresh until you could eat it, maybe I could plant it in a container and cheat my way into a cress plant. So I panted it, and immediately watched it die. That was depressing. By about a week later I saw a little bit of cress had started growing in the pot. And now there's lots o cress growing in the pot.  Hooray!  So now we have cress. hmmmmm!

Happy Gardening all!  Check in and see what other gardeners around the world are harvesting this week!

Harvest Monday 4/4/11 - and being an idiot....

Happy Monday!  It's a fantastic day outside and it really makes you appreciate digging in the dirt.

This week we had a little harvest, mostly peas and scallions. We actually pulled 3x the amount of scallions pictured, but the camera was MIA during some of the harvesting. These were grown by replanting the cut ends of store bought green onions. 

From replanted cut ends of store bought scallions

Peas, peas and more peas!  We do not have record of the stolen peas throughout the week, but I'm pretty sure that both boys at some time or another pulled peas off the plants. Well, at least they are eating their vegetables!

6 1/2 oz Sugar Snap Peas

 

 So last week I had a rather large to do list, and I did start it, I swear!  I managed to break up some of the soil next to the house that I am planning on making into a raised bed. Now I just have to get down and dirty to really break up the clumps by hand and remove rocks and debris.


Progress.... why do I always forget the before picture?

  My youngest son tries to sneak outside every chance he gets. And when he does, he usually ends up playing in the dirt. He was supposed to be playing with bubbles. And magically he has dirt in his hair, on his face and his hands.

Likes playing in the dirt



Much dirtier than Mommy



Did you notice the gauze on my hand in the picture above? ******WARNING --- the pictures below are gross.... please don't look if you are easily icked out*******

Because I have sissy hands that are unused to manual labor,  I should have worn gloves to till the soil in my future raised bed.  I was just so excited about getting out and getting started that I didn't think about it. Last time I do that. My hand felt like I was developing a blister, and when I looked down I had done this:

Blister

 Now... I'm allergic to latex. So you would think that I know better than to use a latex band aid, right? Apparently I'm not very smart. I slapped a band aid containing latex on it. Oh, I knew it had latex in it, but all of my latex free band aids were too small to cover the area. And after all, the palm has pretty thick skin, yeah? Um, the skin that I exposed was not thick, and that is the area that is now inflamed, blistering and hurting. I tried the cream the doc prescribed for me last time I had a reaction and it so far is not working very well. I spent 3 hours in the emergency room this weekend, seeing if they had anything else to help me. The physician's assistant thought it was an infection. Either a viral, bacterial or fungal infection and not a latex allergy...  Really dude?  I am allergic to latex. Signs of a latex allergy include: redness, itching, scaling, peeling, hard bumps, or fluid-filled blisters and oozing sores. But this person diagnoses me with an infection?  So I get to go see my doc this afternoon to see what's up.


Blister after band aid...

Fun times.... Anyway, happy gardening and I hope your weekend was better than mine!!! Bleck...

I'm grumpy

There's really no reason for it, I'm just grumpy. It's absolutely wonderful outside, my kids are mostly behaving and I just want to scream. Argg..... I am hoping that some down time with a good book and some gardening will help the grumps. 

So far we have gone as far as the planning stage of the side garden, now to actually acquire wood and soil for the bed before planting season passes me by. 

Enough griping already! Signs of spring are all around me.

 My potted peas are doing wonderful and we have lots of flowers that will soon be yummy peas. (and now of course I am contemplating purple podded peas.....)

 Kiddo's radishes are growing and being devoured. I need to do a second pot for them before he gets too far ahead of me.

 My tomato plant is huge for March.

And I can almost taste the fennel.

My first asparagus tip of the year has made it's appearance. 

And for my birthday, my boys bought me dwarf citrus trees!  (1 Eureka lemon and 1 Lime)

And now to get pots for my new trees and get some gardening done. Happy gardening friends!

Harvest Monday, October 25, 2010

Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne's Dandelions and is a great way to share what's coming out of your garden and see what other people are growing in their gardens as well! This week we are really just enjoying the garden (from the windows!).

This past week was very wet and rainy.  This is pretty unusual for Southern California, October is usually a very dry and warm time of the year for us (think wild fires!). So we stayed inside and hibernated, which was kind of nice. 

We harvested several handfuls of basil and flat leaf parsley (not pictured) and 2 3/8 oz of Fairy Tale eggplant.

2 3/8 oz of eggplant

The plants all seemed to enjoy the rain. Everything became nice and perky. Pictured below are the komatsuna on the right, the tatsoi hidden on the left, bunching onions and peeking out of the back is a ruby swiss chard. 

My pea garden (hopefully).  It's being drowned out a bit by the nasturtium growing behind the plastic bottles. But look closer....

That's a flourishing pea shoot growing next to that bottle! Maybe we will have some peas by early December. It would definitely be nice. The water bottles are protecting yet another batch of pea shoots that I am nurturing.

In the area where I pulled the corn we planted some fava beans. Since I wasn't sure if bunnies like fava bean seeds, I decided to go ahead and cover these guys up also to ensure that we don't get an even later start than this!

Bottle protected fava bean sprout

 They apparently grow amazingly fast because this is the same shoot 2 days later!! And I checked today, it wasn't nibbled to the ground, so yay!

Fava Bean sprout - 2 days later

I'm going to need some recipes for wild bunny stew by the way.  On the other side of the lawn I found some nibbles had been removed from my pin stripe eggplant and a tomato. Grrrrr!

Not cool Mr./Ms. Bunny. Not cool at all.

Harvest Monday October 4, 2010 and update on peas!

Harvest Monday is hosted by Daphne's Dandelions.  It's a great opportunity to see what other gardeners are growing around the world. 

Sometimes I forget how wonderful the things growing in the garden can be. I spend so much time fighting critters, trying to keep my house in order, and get in my "required" runs that the simple joy of the garden is often overlooked. But I am reminded by other bloggers who actually utilize their gardens!  That is the case this week. We are getting some more green beans from the Scarlett Runner beans and the Tatsoi and Natsu Rakuten are lush and ready to be eaten. After seeing other's harvesting their Bok Choy, Ryle and I rushed out to the garden and pulled up some Tatsoi for dinner. Good plan too because it was declared to be "delicious" by the only person we really have to please at dinner-time, Ryle.  He loves to eat Bok Choy and anything that has "green leaves - [that he can eat] like a giraffe."

I think this was 8 oz of Tatsoi

 

3 oz of beans

Some FairyTale and Gretel eggplants

Raspberries are almost ready

Bell peppers getting their second flush of flowers

Volunteer Bok Choy from my super producer this spring, can't wait to start harvesting off this guy

Finally getting some pea growth from containers

Peas - I decided to cover the peas I tried to plant in the ground with water bottles (with the bottoms cut off) to prevent the bunny from digging them up. And I am pleased to announce that this crazy scheme actually worked!  I checked and we actually have little pea shoots under those water bottles. I will probably leave them on until the peas are tall enough  to handle the abuse by the bunny. (I think the bunny has deflected his attention to Ryle's radishes).

Growing bottles, errr I mean peas under bottles

A pea shoot growing under the water bottle protector

The garden was sadly neglected the last few days with all of the running around we were doing. Friday we gathered at the beach with some friends and came home late with some sandy dirty kiddos. Saturday started bright and early for a group run, the kids and I actually managed to get out the door on time for a change; 5:45 am, packed up and out the door. Unheard of. Then goofing off with friends and then home.  The boys enjoyed some play-time on the slip-n-slide and then well deserved naps. Sunday we spent all day at the Miramar Airshow. Loud but very fun.

And after the hot weekend, we started the week cool and drizzly. Which of course makes me want to make (and eat) more pumpkin muffins. I just pulled the second batch out of the oven, and the smell is heavenly.  I really need the weather to get sunny again or my waistline is going to suffer greatly. We managed to give away more than half of the last batch to friends and neighbors, so hopefully this batch will also find good homes besides my belly. 

So, I'm off for a jog since I only have one little guy at home for an hour or so and I can go out with just the single jog stroller. It's the little things in life that make us happy, right? 

Happy gardening!