Luffah's, Luffah's, Everywhere Luffah's

Luffah gourd plant taking over the tepee and the bean trellis. You can see a smaller loofah hanging in the middle.
James and a loofah.
Pretty loofah flowers.
One big loofah. That is our biggest loofah yet.

Tomatoes

Finally one big tomato on the vine. Maybe, just maybe it will ripen on the vine. We'll see. May have to ripen on the counter. From my garden map this is supposed to be a Pineapple tomato.
One sad San Marzano tomato. I don't think it will get full size. Such a shame I had such aspirations for this variety. Will try again next year.
I pulled out my Sungold tomato plant. Look how long the roots are. Amazing!

Sorry its been so long - update on garden.

Sorry its been so long since my last post. Here is James and most of our pumpkin harvest. 4 cinderella pumpkins, 9 Musquee de Provence, and 4 batwing pumpkins. This is all from my half plot which is amazing! It's definately a pumpkin year for us. The batwings which are next to James' hand didn't turn out like they said they would lest I picked them too late, maybe they were darker and turned more orange over time, I don't know. They are supposed to be black on the bottom and orange on the top. Here is a pic of what they are supposed to look like. Oh well. It's supposed to rain this weekend, that is what has prompted me to pick all my pumpkins and squash except for the luffahs, which are just starting to produce. They say they need a long growing season and now I believe it. They didn't start producing until a couple of weeks ago, but they grow fast. Hopefully I will remember to get a picture of them soon. They are taking over the tepee and the bean trellis. They are pretty though. Constantly in bloom.
Here are my New England Pie pumpkins. They will be yummy! Oh, and final thought on direct seed vs. transplant are quite telling. The transplant for the new england pie was a smaller plant and produced only one pumpkin while the direct seeded plant was 3 times the size of the transplant and grew 4 pumpkins. So, next year I will be direct seeding most of my pumpkins and squash and I will start the loofah gourds and Mexican Sour Gherkins inside sooner than I did this year.
Here are my butternuts. There are 3-4 more on the vine still growing too. This is from one plant. Quite prolific. I can't wait to eat one. Will wait until the green goes away on them. They keep forever (atleast until about March), so we have some time before we dig in, well except for the one the stem broke off.

Musquee de Provence

I was trying to flip this one on to its bottom and it snapped off. Not to worry there are so many pumpkins in there I will have more than enough. I'm hoping it will turn orange. We'll see. I've never picked a green one before.

Garden as of 8/5

Large plot. We've been getting tons of beans lately. Add some garlic and butter. Yum! If you click on the pic you can see the tomato plant in front going crazy. Some of the other tomato plants are starting to catch up. Yeah! I hope they produce before it gets too cold.
Pumpkin plants are still going crazy. There are a ton of pumpkins in there lots of pumkin for the freezer. Good for pie and pumpkin cookies all winter long. Yum!

Watermelon. Grow, grow, grow!
Cinderella pumpkin. Big one for Jen.
Musquee de Provence pumpkin for eating. There are like 10-20 in there.
Zucchini. James actually helped me take this picture. He put the flash on and everything.

Garden as of 7/15

Large plot.
Small plot being taken over by the pumpkins. Remind me next year to put in one row of pumpkins in the big plot with LOTS of room to grow.

The vines are taking over. Yeah! Now it will be shaded enough for James.
Beans are going crazy. On the bottom right you can see my okra plants.
Look how cool that is.

Tomatoes finally turning color. Maybe they will be ready for pesto pasta salad on Saturday.
Cinderella pumpkin getting big.
I think this is a Musquee pumpkin, but with how much the pumpkin vines are intertwined I have no idea.
Happy gardener eating yummy strawberries.

New England pie pumpkin hanging in the tepee.
I think I have about 5 of them so far. Yum! Can't wait for Pumpkin pie.
Our first cucumber. At the top of the pic you can see a little guy starting to grow.
Little baby butternut squash. There are a lot of them on the vine. Yeah!

Putting by Zucchini

Look at all that zucchini. Making some bread today. Yum!

Ready for the freezer. This is one of the best ways to put zucchini in the freezer so it doesn't become mushy and yucky. You can add this to any recipe that calls for shredded zuke. I have it measured out in 2 cups for bread, but you can use it for pancakes and whatever else.

Still Comparing and Beans

It's just sad how the right one which was a transplant is so small and pathetic while the direct seed is huge and is sending off side shoots like crazy.
Lots of bean plant.
Another bean view.

The strawberries doing thier thing. We've been getting a few a day. They are yummy.
Our half plot. Yes, I put too many big pumpkins on the one side I know. Oh, well.

My First Canning Experience!

Yum! The four on the left are made with sugar. The four on the right are made with honey. I can see why it can be such an obsession.

Ok, well I had a brain fart and forget to say what I canned. Plums from my dad's overloaded tree. Wish I could go get more, but I probably won't be able to go up there until next week sometime. I don't know which variety they are, I think that went in one ear and out the other, if you really want to know I will find out for you.

Garden as of 7/4

So much greener lately. We finally got a sign for our plot.
Yeah, a pumpkin. Cinderella pumpkin. I have to go to the garden every day just to keep the plant from creeping everywhere except our plot.
New England Pie pumpkin hanging in the tepee. The vine supposeably will strengthen as the pumpkin grows, we'll see, its a small variety pumpkin so I think it will be alright.
Tomatoes, tomatoes, tomatoes. Yeah, for tomato's. After all my trouble with the transplant soil I thought I'd never have tomatoes. I need to go get some wedding favor bags so I can start saving seed. These are sungold tomatoes, I forgot, I can't save seed for them. They are my only hybrid. I can't wait to add them to pesto pasta though. Mmmmm.....