Hey all! It’s a new month and there are new things to do in the garden. Here’s what I will be working on this month in my Zone 6 garden: What’s on your to-do list?…
bountiful harvest
August 27, 2018Hi all! A quick post with a garden update on the veggies I’ve been picking from the garden. Not extravagant but considering how late I started and how little effort I’ve put in this year, it’s a bountiful harvest and I’m pretty happy all around. The tomatoes and peppers are winding down, and there are still veggies to come – more onions for sure! and hopefully cucumbers and more squash. Also, just yesterday I put in kale, spinach, lettuce and…
book review: woodswoman by anne labastille
August 21, 2018I just finished reading Woodswoman by Anne LaBastille. Published in 1976, this book was hard for me to put down. It is an autobiographical recounting of one woman’s life living alone in the Adirondack wilderness in a cabin that she mostly built with her own hands. Coming off of a divorce from a man she was married to for seven years, she decided that the solitary life amongst nature was her calling. She bought some acreage in the Adirondacks and…
a very still evening
August 18, 2018Isn’t is so strange when the natural world around you is so very still? When the sound of the crickets and tree frogs are the only thing that seem alive. There is not even enough breeze to move one leaf tonight. And it is really not all that hot. Not for August. It seems surreal, almost like a movie set. As if someone pasted a photo of the woods right outside my window. And there is no life to speak…
how to: 8 foot trellis for your climbing plants
August 13, 2018Hi all! Earlier in the summer we built and installed an 8-foot garden trellis in one of our raised beds. I gave you a peek of it back in June. The idea is to use this bed for those plants that climb and vine. This year I am growing cucumbers and squash in this bed. I was pretty late getting my seeds into the ground this year and will be happily surprised if they produce before the cooler weather starts…
daily harvest to date this year (in photos!)
August 7, 2018Greetings, my gardening friends. Harvest has been meager this year and many things have failed. But(!), isn’t that just the way it goes sometimes as a gardener. Not every year is stellar. This year, rather than notating in my garden journal what I pick each day, I am photographing it and posting to my Instagram, here. To save you the trouble of clicking over, here are all the daily harvest photos to date. This captures almost everything (like i said,…
bald-faced hornet nest
August 6, 2018We have quite the specimen in one of our trees right now. The man saw it while he was doing some string trimming and other sprucing for our cookout. He is way more observant than I am. Left to me this would have gone unnoticed, even though as the resident gardener I generally spend more time outdoors. We weren’t sure if it was a wasp nest or a hornet nest. As usual, I turned to the great google and I…
book review: french dirt by richard goodman
August 5, 2018I’ve spent this Sunday afternoon in the best way: finishing up a satisfying book while enjoying some shade outside in the garden. The book “French Dirt: The Story of a Garden in the South of France” was originally published in 1991. Knowing that gardeners love hearing about the experiences of other gardeners, I’d like to share my thoughts on this charming, memoir style book by Richard Goodman. The title alone is sublime – how could I pass this up? An…
good news from the doc & homemade tomato soup
August 2, 2018If you read yesterday’s post, then you probably know I recently had a follow-up MRI on my spine to help determine if there is further degeneration due to MS. According to my doctor this morning, there is not!! I am over the moon excited about this. The symptoms I am having right now are likely related to old nerve damage. When I got home this afternoon, more good news – a lot of tomatoes ready for harvesting. So, this… Became…
rainy days
August 1, 2018The rain is coming down hard and matching my mood today. My flowers and vegetable garden are loving it. I guess in a way, so am I. Rainy days are often the best, aren’t they? Especially if you get to be at home, just enjoying the sound of the drops. I’d kind of thought of doing a video garden tour this afternoon, but the rain changed that plan. Our porch has a nice big overhang and at least I can…
