Posts Tagged ‘summer squash’
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Sunday, August 22nd, 2010
Last week was really rough for me. I had a terrible time transitioning back into work. I was grumpy, sleep-deprived, anxious, and pretty miserable all around.
But I did manage to squeak out 4 great runs last week. And that makes me happy. I will build on that this week.
I also got an amazing haircut and am very happy I broke down and finally did it.
My head feels much lighter now. And I finally have my layers back!
I bought calimyrna figs for the first time on Friday, and they make the most delicious snack.
Craig and I dogsat this weekend for his sister’s pooch, and it was really fun to cuddle up with a dog. It was neat to have a little shadow.
I also harvested our first melons from the garden!
The watermelons kept popping out of their slings and finally came off the vine.
Organic cantaloupe and sugar baby watermelons!
We went to a fantastic housewarming party on Saturday night for two of our good friends, and we had a blast seeing everyone. I hadn’t been out in ages, and plus we had been away for 3 weeks. So it was reaffirming to catch up with our friends and just chill out eating summer BBQ foods and having tasty beers. We stayed out very, very late. But it was worth it.
Today we visited my parents and caught up with them and showed off vacation pics.
And tonight I washed our sheets, cleaned the kitchen, and made a batch of zucchini and summer squash soup for our lunches this week.
I am feeling more optimistic. This is good! This week I hope to tackle planting new lettuce and baby spinach seeds. And more sugar snap peas.
And I WILL run, of course. Now if I can just work on peaceful, restful sleep I will be golden.
Tags: cantaloupe, exercise, gardening, gratitude, housework, laughter therapy, organic, running, summer, summer squash, watermelon, zucchini
Posted in The Daily Balance, The Growing Season | No Comments »
i call it gardens of disgust
Monday, July 19th, 2010
Happy Monday! Hope you had a relaxing, rejuvenating weekend.
There are so many things I want to write about right now. My mind is in a jumble, and I am not sure what to write about first. Usually I would write about all the things we did or accomplished or avoided doing over the weekend. But, and sadly, first and foremost on my mind is the state of my garden squashes. Disclaimer: Usually when I write about the garden, I am happy. Thrilled! Bursting. Today, not so much.
My squashes are ill. Sick. Dying. I know I sound dramatic. But, alas, it is true. And if you spend as much time as I do nursing the garden each day, then you might be just a tad bummed out by this latest discovery.
My squash have been invaded by squash vine borers. A grody garden worm pest that basically bores into the squash vine and sets up business within your plant, robbing the vines and developing squashes of hydration and livelihood. It’s icky.
And it’s gross because no one wants to imagine wormy things taking over their squash plants. And I’m at a loss because my fellow gardening blogger, Nourishing Words, had warned of this problem about a week ago when she saw it happening in her garden. And I was all, “So sorry to hear!” instead of closely inspecting my own squash patch. I even wrote 3 days ago about how I thought my squashes were thriving.
Big mistake.
First warning sign was that my squash plants were wilting. I thought it was the heat. I mean, it has been 90°F at least each day last week. Second warning sign was that I had leaves actually yellowing and shriveling on my plants. Again, I thought it was the heat. Third warning sign was I saw squash blossoms just falling off and looking likes they were molding? Ewwww. I started thinking squash vine borers. But I didn’t know for sure.
So I picked my last “healthy” zucchini tonight.
And when I twisted it off the plant like I have so many times before, I was greeted by the most fowl white grubby-looking larvae on the end all squirmy. Can’t get that image out of my head. Not what you ever want to see on the end of your beautiful zucchini.
I know, super disgusting. I won’t say anymore. And I didn’t photograph it. I had to resist the urge to scream, drop the zucchini, and run 100 yards away. Check out Nourishing Word’s post to see more in-depth detail of things to watch out for.
Gardening when all is good is amazing. Gardening when there’s a pest or a fungus or a blight sucks. What’s even more frustrating is being an organic gardener. I use organic soil and compost. Organic seed. Loving care. And still the pests come. I would not turn to chemical pesticide. But it is sort of mind-blowing to step back for a moment and ponder in awe how farmers hundreds of years before me dealt with pest after pest. When a bug or a disease meant the difference between feeding your family or starving. Between making a living selling crops or going without. And when you see it that way for just a moment, you can open your eyes to how the pesticide industry was born. Dog eat dog world. Or pest eat crop world.
Aye.
I have to remind myself that I am lucky to be experimenting with organic gardening and that this is all part of the adventure. And not to swear too much while I’m busy reading a million Google pages on what to do about squash vine borers. The prognosis is grim. My plants will probably not make it. Here’s a last look at my squash bed as of today.
Oh how looks can be deceiving. Darn squashes.
Nourishing Words suggested using Captain Jack’s Deadbug Brew, an organic treatment that features a healthy dose of spinosad. The crappy part is that I’m having trouble finding it locally. Went to a bunch of places today, and no luck.
I could order Captain Jack’s Deadbug Brew online, but by the time it gets here, my squash would be done. I have a few leads, so I am headed out tomorrow to try to track down this brew. Even by then, I fear it is too late for my squashes already. Once the larvae get in and burrow and take over the vines, it is really tough for the squash plants to recover.
Not to mention GROSS! Did I say that already. GROSS!!!
Tags: gardening, organic, squash vine borer, summer, summer squash, zucchini
Posted in The Growing Season | 11 Comments »
progress and proliferation
Friday, July 16th, 2010
It was just a little over 2 months ago (yikes! already!) that I planted most of my organic veggie and flower seeds. And so far I have been quite encouraged by what I’ve been able to harvest: cilantro, green onion, radishes, broccoli rabe, garlic scapes, lettuces, baby spinach, sugar snap peas, zucchini, and beans.
Everything else is still a work in progress, but coming along with a hit or miss here and there. I’ll get to my misses in more detail in a future post, but let’s just say that my carrot tops and peppers are being obliterated by some sort of munching pest. In fact, I think my carrots might be done for. I wasn’t paying them any attention when perhaps I should have been.
Not gonna dwell on carrot misfortune right now. It’s Friday! And I want to focus on all the great things happening in the garden!
Here’s a good example of excellent garden cheating. Had to do it with my corn. I originally planted 8 seed groupings of two, but only 3 plants came up.
So I broke down and bought some corn starts to supplement the corn that either failed to germinate or got eaten by chipmunks. I prefer to blame the chipmunks. They are still burrowing deep holes between the freshly planted new stalks.
I hope the newer starts will still produce even though the corn I planted from seed is much further along. I think we’re in good shape. Unless the un-mowed lawn keeps taking over. Then we’re in trouble. This weekend! This weekend! Craig, my most bestest favoritist person, will mow this weekend!
All the rain we had the other day coupled with frequent watering is helping my cucumbers along.
Craig says it’s in that looks-like-a-pickle stage.
I am definitely liking the trellis action this year. While it has given my cucumbers more growing space and it’s keeping them from spilling out onto the lawn, the watermelon and cantaloupe, however, are consuming the trellis and still going full steam ahead anywhere and everywhere the vines can go. This weekend I am going to have to go hunting for another trellis for the cantaloupe.
And there she is: one itty bitty baby growing watermelon. Let’s see how long I can keep this up.
Finally after waiting and waiting, I have a summer squash starting to grow!
I see more buds, so I hope the growing is just beginning.
We’ve picked 3 zucchinis so far, and I hadn’t seen any others successfully growing, so I was starting to get worried. Sometimes they start growing their little zucchini nubbin and then they turn yellow or rot. I’m sure there’s perfectly good reasons for why this happens, but I almost don’t want to know. However, after the rain I spotted new, good growth.
Hope these zucchs continue to stay healthy.
And, of course, I will end again with more flowering zinnias. They are a dwarf variety and they are pretty cute. I’m a little bummed that the flower stem part is only about 2″ long, so it kind of makes it hard to cut them for a bouquet. I suppose I could put them in a teacup? The colors are vibrant and new shades keep blooming.
Pay absolutely no attention to the giant weed right in the middle. This weekend! This weekend! I WILL weed this weekend.
Tags: beans, broccoli rabe, cantaloupe, cilantro, cucumber, gardening, garlic scape, gratitude, herbs, lettuce, radishes, spinach, sugar snap peas, summer squash, watermelon, zucchini
Posted in The Growing Season | 3 Comments »
squash blossoms and
purple potato flowers
Wednesday, June 30th, 2010
I could have titled this REFLECTING ON JUNE, but I am so excited and inspired by the plethora of new flowering veggie plants in my garden that I couldn’t help myself. After a wonderful and rather dry spring, my plants that I have been growing from seed are starting to take off. I have been a bit concerned about their small size, but I think a lot of that has to do with growing directly outdoors from seed.
My efforts are starting to pay off because my potatoes are flowering, and so are my squashes!
Good morning squash! I will head off to work while you do your thing.
Squash blossoms are so beautiful. They have this amazing deep, vibrant yellow color that I wish I could replicate on a bedroom wall somewhere. “Mix up the squash blossom yellow, please!”
Did you know you can pick the squash blossoms and eat them? I know… it seems a little strange. I have actually never done it, and this is my 4th year growing zucchini and summer squash. But I always read about yummy recipes with squash blossoms in them. Sometimes freshly picked, sometimes stir-fried, sometimes fried… but they always look yummy. Maybe I will get up the nerve and actually pick one or two to eat this year.
But they are so pretty to just look at!
I am still not sure if this first blossomer is a zucchini or a summer squash, I really don’t remember what I planted where. It was a windy, rain-threatening day when I was out planting the seeds. Soon I will see the start of an actual squash, and then I will know. And I will photograph to share with you.
In the foreground is a cucumber plant. Starting to vine out!
My cucumber plants are lengthening which means I need to trellis them. And I need to figure out a taller, sturdier trellis than my sugar snap pea experiment. Because, sadly, my sugar snap peas have gotten to the end of the trellis ladder and have nowhere else to go. I think they may be at the end of their flowering journey for this round. Sad.
Next time I will get a taller trellis. Next time I will give them more growing space. All things you learn along the way.
Which brings me to my reflections on June. I didn’t reflect on May, but I need to take a step back and gather my thoughts. June was an inadvertently stressful month as we really got into pregnancy talk. The real deal. The what ifs. The actual what are we doooooing???? We did not get pregnant this month, but we had a week of uncertainty and it really took over our thinking. Now we are definitely thinking about the future in much more concrete, ACTUAL terms than we were previously.
I joke with Craig about the whole P90X workout fascination. No, I’m not planning on doing P90X. I’m doing PRE-PREGNANCY 90 DAYS EXTREME. As in, get my butt in pre-pregnancy shape over the next 3 months. Running. Lifting weights. Medicine ball. Sleeping way more. Stressing way less. Eating berries and whole foods. Laughing. Traveling. Enjoying. Relaxing. Being good to my body. Getting rid of bad habits. That’s my P90X. I was mortified at the thought of being pregnant because my body and my mind were not in the place I wanted them to be. And while I’ve been repeatedly told and reminded that it will never be perfect, I know me and I know that I have to be in a better metal/physical/spiritual place.
So I am so glad I have time, and this month has given me a lot to think about and improve upon. I’m not beating myself up. I’m just being realistic. You get out of your body what you put into it, right? And for the past few months I haven’t been treating my body… or my mind… particularly well. And I deserve better. I already know a lot of what I need to do to feel good. I need to run. And run CONSISTENTLY. I need to worry less about things I cannot control. I need to forgive. I need to let go. Blah blah blah… on and on.
I need to get real about what I want, that is for sure. I have to be more honest with myself, hold myself lovingly accountable. In the middle of a work week I’m not necessarily my own best friend. I’m clawing my way along trying to get by. I’m going to have to try a little harder to keep myself active, put nourishing foods into my body, not pop open a bottle of whine (pun intended), and GO TO BED at a reasonable hour. It shouldn’t be so hard, but when you’re in that cycle/routine it can be.
On the positive side (cause I always seek the positive… really I do try!) June was a lot about starting to eat right from the garden! Radishes first. Then broccoli rabe. Then lettuces, baby spinach, and sugar snap peas. The harvest so far has been amazing. I’ve never grown lettuces in so many colors and shapes and varieties. Squiggly and wavy deep maroons, vivid forest greens, bright yellow-limes. So yummy all of them.
And the sugar snap peas are straight out of garden bliss. Screw paying $4.99 a pound for sugar snap peas from Guatemala at the supermarket! You can EASILY grow them from home from seed! And I paid $1.49 for the entire organic seed package. I planted 12 plants, gave my sister a bunch of seeds, and I still have a huge amount of seeds leftover to plant again in the fall. And home-grown sugar snap peas are unlike anything you’ve ever tasted! It’s a small miracle that any of the picked pods ever make it inside to the salad bowl… they are that good!
While I could go on and on about garden veggies… June was also about hanging out with my nephews and really delighting in their amazingness and reaffirming just how unbelievably awesome children can be. Between soccer games, bouncy ball games, ice cream fieldtrips, overnight stays, and surprise work visits, I really had a chance to bond with my nephews this month. And I also got to feed and burp my baby nieces. Granted they are less interactive than my nephews at this point, but it is amazing being around so many kiddos. It has been such a delight and encouragement for me.
June started with garlic scapes shooting up from the garlic stalks in my garden, curling this way and that. The garlic scapes are now long gone (in my belly!), and in their absense I’m enjoying an incredible wave of potato flowers.
Do you think purple flowers means purple potatoes?
I have no idea how long this parade of flowers will continue, but I hope it will be around for awhile. I love the colors and shapes of these flowers. I love that summer is here. I love coming home to extra hours of sunlight, warm breezes, and the activity of birds, squirrels, neighborhood cats, and even the dreaded chipmunks in our yard. Summer is such a gift. It is filled with delicious scents when you go running and take in BBQs and blooming flowers. It is easy to stay up late when you don’t get around to making dinner until after 9 p.m. It’s just so reaffirming to have a whole other post-work shift when the sun is still up and the outdoors is calling.
June, I will miss you. But here comes July with even warmer temps, thunderstorms, fireworks, fireflies, our first wedding anniversary, drinking a cold beer with a freshly cut lime on the screened-in porch, farmer’s markets, home improvement projects, vacation planning, and who knows what else.
But for now I am so content to delight in purple potato flowers.
What a beautiful shade of purple. Slightly lilac. Slightly violet.
Tags: gardening, gratitude, potatoes, summer, summer squash, zucchini
Posted in The Daily Balance, The Growing Season | No Comments »
mid-may garden delights
Tuesday, May 18th, 2010
This past weekend was simply gorgeous. The weather was warm, super breezy, not humid at all—absolutely perfect weather for being out in the yard and garden.
I worked diligently to clear out the dying tulip stalks in the front garden. I clipped back my quickly growing chrysanthemum stalks so that they wouldn’t get too leggy. And I did some serious deweeding in the front bed.
Vacant land! I planted asters and dahlias here.
I've never attempted to grow annual flowers from seed.
I also planted sunflowers, asters, dahlias, and zinnias in our side garden bed alongside the house. The front of this bed is where our lettuces and baby spinach are growing.
Speaking of baby spinach, could the little leaves that are now forming be any cuter?
Our radishes are also coming along quite nicely. They should be ready to start picking soon. I was going to thin them out, but I decided against it for now. Because they are an “early” variety, I won’t mind if some of them are tiny.
In addition, I broke down and planted summer squash, zucchini, cucumber, and corn this weekend. The technical 90% frost date is May 20th for Southern NH, but I just couldn’t take it any longer. Plus, I’m feeling a wee tad of grower’s guilt that I didn’t start these seeds indoors a few weeks ago. I meant to do it, but I got busy or lazy or apprehensive. Next year! Next year I vow to start a bunch of seeds indoors to transplant. Heh heh.
Two years ago I grew acorn squash in our garden, and it was delectable. I was in love with them. We had a bumper crop of acorn squashes with their dark black green and golden outer flesh.
I heart acorn squash. Especially stuffed acorn squash. And grilled.
I saved the seeds and they’ve been hiding out in my upstairs closet patiently waiting to come out and play. Last year I didn’t plant acorn squash because I ran out of room. This year with the addition of our new raised garden bed, I have the room. So out the seeds came!
Hope these buggers are still good!
I also “broke” in my new Fiskars trowel this weekend. Finding a good garden trowel is like striking gold. I’ve spent more than enough money buying garden trowels, only to quickly destroy them the moment they hit a rock or tough root. They bend quite easily and snap. This trowel I scored from Home Depot for a sweet $0.99. And it’s awesome. Hard, hard plastic. I highly recommend.
Craig did a thorough lawn mowing which helped to make our yard seem so much more hospitable. We are in serious need of a weed wacker/edge trimmer. However, I went around and clipped the tall grasses along the borders of our garden beds and fence with garden sheers.
These grasses, once dried, will make great garden hay for mulching our potatoes.
After four years, we invested in a garden hose reel to contain the untangly mess of our long hose. It took two of us to get it put together and hung, but I love it. The design of our side bed has really come together!
To top it all off, we finally grilled for the first time this spring. Organic chicken thighs and skewers of green peppers and red onions on top of salad.
I can get used to this. And yes, those are pretzels on top of Craig's salad.
The man likes a crunchy topping.
Tags: acorn squash, cilantro, cucumbers, flower seeds, gardening, herbs, lettuce, organic, radishes, raised garden bed, summer squash, sunflowers, zucchini
Posted in Household Management 101, The Growing Season | 1 Comment »