A Garden Update {August 2014}

This month of gardening flew by! I didn’t get to spend the amount of time I’ve been getting to spend in my garden due to the massive amounts of rain this month. Of course, I’m not complaining that I’ve not had to water the garden everyday, but I do miss just being outside with the sunshine beating down on my face.

A Garden Update for August 2014

You can go here to see what all we planted this year.

My snow peas continue to be voluptuous!

I continued to have peas coming out the wazoo throughout the entire month of August! They continued to grow and grow and grow. Honestly? We got tired of eating peas. We just couldn’t do it anymore.

How we’ve been using our snow peas:

• Crunchy snacks
• Sauteed in omelets
• Tossed in a salads
• Sauteed with various greens like Swiss chard we get from the Farmer’s Market

I was really grateful that snow peas are Whole 30 friendly.

Radishes are lovely and producing nicely!

We harvested the rest of the radishes and loved having them in our salads.

Herbs available anytime we need them is wonderful!

We’ve been using our herb garden exclusively this year. I haven’t had to buy anything from the store. We just snip off what we need at each meal, and enjoy the freshness and satisfaction of knowing we grew them ourselves.

My lemon balm plant never recovered from the grasshopper invasion. I’ll be sure to start drying lemon balm sooner next year!

We harvested our garlic!

We harvested our garlic and it’s been drying in our basement for a couple of weeks. It’s time to start using and freezing what I won’t use quickly. I’ll get on that this next week.

I’m excited to have some natural flu fighting remedies on hand this fall! Next year, I plan to plant MORE garlic since we use it so much throughout the year. I hardly planted enough to get us through a couple of months.

So, note to self – plant about five rows of garlic next time.

I have tomatoes growing on the vine!

I’m not sure we’re going to get any tomatoes from our vine this year. The weather is rainy and cold. I don’t think they will get enough sunshine love before the snow gets here in the  next few weeks.

I could have brought them inside, but I just didn’t have the energy or desire to tromp out in the rain everyday.

Next year, I’m going to put my tomato pots on my deck instead of out in the yard beside my raised bed.

Lettuce grew really well!

Our lettuce might have been slow to grow, but once it did start growing, it kept us in salads all month. The mixed greens came in handy during our Whole 30  Challenge.

However, just like the garlic, I didn’t plant nearly enough lettuce. So note to self – next year plant at least four more square feet of lettuce!

We started our compost bin!

We just started composting this week. We decided on a tumbler that we can move close to the back door when winter gets here. I’m excited to learn more about this free method of fertilizing my garden and getting my vegetables to grow more easily next year.

If there is anything I’ve learned from my neighbors this year, it’s that compost is the great growth speeder upper for those of us living in a short growing season. It’s good for the environment and good for our plants.

As gross as composting seems to me, I’m excited to do it and learn more of the science behind it. I’m a nerd like that. We got one of the rev

Strawberries were a nice surprise this month.

No we didn’t pull in pints of strawberries, but my boys got to enjoy a strawberry or two each time we went out to the garden. That was a fun, sweet treat!

I need to find a better home for them next year.

Carrots are looking promising!

Our carrot tops have been growing exponentially in the last few weeks. I’m anxious to see if we can start harvesting any soon. Thankfully they don’t mind the cooler weather we’ve gotten so early this year!

We have one bean on the bush right now.

With all the rain, I was afraid my beans would wash out, but I have a single solitary bean on the bush right now. I’m hopeful a few more are going to follow.

If I can get a day without rain, I’m going to get out in the garden and clean up the pea vines so my bush beans aren’t so crowded. We’ll see if they will give us a meal or two before it’s too cold.

As for our squash, and cucumbers?

The juries still out on how they will perform! I’m doubtful they will produce anything. I couldn’t get my squash or zucchini to do anything but flower.

All-in-all we’re really pleased with how our garden has grown so far. No it’s not what we expected. Yes, we’d love to say we didn’t fail at anything, but that’s just not the way it goes. You learn more by failing than by succeeding, if you ask me.

My kids continue to love being in the garden with me – my youngest especially! My oldest starting taking a serious interest in harvesting veggies and herbs with me, which was very fun.

I love that they are learning how food gets to the table, or even to the grocery store. There are so many teachable moments together as we tend the garden each day, and I look forward to creating even more memories in the future!

What about you? How’s your garden growing? Any tips for a newbie composter?

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