This is what I came home to after ten days vacation (my community garden neighbors watered the plot and harvested some of the veggies). Slicing cucumbers, pickling cucumbers, tomatoes, chard, eggplant, jalapenos. The bouquet is dahlia, asparagus, lemon balm, mint. It smells divine. I also picked some parsley for the eggplant dish I have planned for tonight.
A little porch update in pictures: There will be tons of little 4 inch-long eggplants it seems. This is my first time growing eggplant in containers and I am very happy with the result.
The plants on my Southwest-facing back porch are doing well for the most part. We had plenty of rain lately and last week we had a couple of really hot days so those tiny chard and kale seedlings are finally catching up. I am very impressed with the potatoes and the lettuce.
Yesterday, when I cleaned out the basement, I found my shoe box with dahlia tubers from last fall that I had completely forgotten about. I had not watered them once during the past seven months. Surprisingly, two of the four plants were still alive and showed new, albeit anemic, growth. I planted them in the plot. Yay for more flowers in my garden!
I spent three hours in the garden today. What a beautiful spring day! I pulled some weeds, cleaned my rock & brick collection that I keep at the fence, and weeded out my stakes and supports. I thinned the spinach and the radishes and trellised the peas. I also planted: fingerling potatoes (finally!), more peas, more carrots, more Swiss Chard. I transplanted the cauliflower, parsley and lettuce I bought earlier this week. Towards the fence, I planted dahlias (Star Elite and Rip City), sunflowers, zinnias and cosmos.
I made a second backyard wreath about a week ago for a friend. This time I used thuja, yew and clematis seed heads to decorate the grapevine, plus a tiny brass ornament (the closure of a Christmas cracker). I am having fun with these.
Mums and parsley