Kindergardens

Kindergardens was a bit delayed this week, which is a-okay with me. Perpetually behind is the story of my life.

Pictures of your garden at sunrise. Ha! Considering I am more of a night owl than an early bird you are never going to see pictures of my garden at sunrise. I think the last time I saw a sunrise was when I worked in the bar and was just getting home at that hour!

So I have to settle more for 730 ish. It's the best I got. :)

black petunia



basil? In the carrots.... Alright who put this here?



Moonflower, that is eating the basil. I never got around to putting up a trellis for it, so it kind of sprawled out rather than grew up. But that's fine, because it's about to bloom!! It's supposed to bloom only at dusk. Hopefully I can save some seed since I have big plans for it next year!



me watering the watermelon



tomatoes









squash blossom, I think these are beautiful flowers!



Anyone know what this guy is? He is a moth of some sort, but completely white.

Happenings from the top of the hill

A look at what's going on up at the top of the hill.

My girls love riding the bus to school.  Love it!  So every morning they wait at the end of the driveway to be picked up.  The bus is always late, sometimes by 15 minutes.  But that's another post altogether! 

Some days we pose....



Some days we ignore mom...



Some days we dance...



Some days we make funny faces...



Here's the bus!



First day of school!





Swim time!!





Making cool tie dye swirls on fabric with Sharpies!









Diggy Jr.!!!



Homemade mac and cheese! (the only kind we eat) This was my Granny's recipe. She made this for us as kids and taught me how when I was older. I remember her telling me the most important thing was to "salt the noodles". So I always make sure I do!



Tomato tart. Possibly the best thing I have eaten all summer!

Back to school outfit

I started making the girls some school outfits.  Not in enough time to actually complete them before school started of course.  But school outfits nonetheless!  When the Ottobre 4/2011 arrived in late July KK spent an hour pouring over the pages and telling me which outfits she liked.  Which was most of them.  Most of the older girls clothing was very 1980's!  She picked out this outfit straight away and asked me to make it first.

As KK gets older it gets harder to find patterns that she thinks are cool!  Tunic and leggings always work, so does anything with purple and she will wear skirts as long as they have leggings underneath.  Characters are out, so are things that are all pink. 
Pattern: 
Ottobre Design magazine 4/2011
jeggings- #29
tunic- #37
both in size 134 with a bit of added length

The jeggings are made from the pajama jean material that I found in JoAnn's clearance bin.  It only has 3% spandex so they are a little less stretchy than I like but KK thinks they fit just fine!  I even bought jeans topstitching thread and topstitched them to look like real jeans.  Otherwise they would have been just leggings.  And what's the point right?! 

The tunic is a striped knit that has pieces cut in different ways so that the stripes face different directions.  She loved that part of the shirt the most.  The center front is just a square of black interlock and the hem band at the bottom is also black interlock.
They really do fit her, I promise! She just had them turned up at the cuff like they did in the magazine.





Fake pockets!  Although the back has real pockets, I forgot to take a picture of them.





These are some little iron-on things she found in the clearance bin at JoAnn's that she had to have. So we stuck them on this shirt.

Kindergardens

I am not even sure what week we are on?!  Last night we had a huge storm come through our area.  I woke to the house and windows shaking from fierce wind.  I immediately thought we were in a tornado, living in tornado alley and all.  I ran to the girls' bedroom and was about to wake them when I stopped to figure out why the tornado sirens weren't blowing.  So I flipped on the TV and found the news channel.  The first thing I heard the weather man say was "this is not a tornado.  There is no need to take cover, just make sure you stay indoors". 

I sat and watched the news for a bit longer and determined that we were just in a severe storm and it was straight line winds that were responsible for shaking the house!  They reported this morning that the wind was blowing between 60 and 75 mph!  Enough to cause havoc in my yard!  So this week's Kindergarden post is dedicated to the plants I lost...

Tree in the front yard.





debris in the street



Anyone want to play a game of pick up sticks?





Somehow this piece of lattice blew around and landed perfectly on the wrought iron fence!



Poor pepper plants. I think some can be righted again with support but some are snapped at the base.



Zucchini plant has seen better days..



Look at the poor tomatoes! 4 plants fells over, cages and all. In fact, one of the cages was uprooted completely from the ground.



The pool, after I spent 20 minutes skimming the top for leaves. All the spots on the bottom are leaves also.



In other news though, I did manage to capture a cool picture this morning too! Look at these ants! Diligently working this morning on the okra flowers!

Kindergardens

I know I just did a Kindergardens post, but I am trying to get caught up!  Running behind.  Story of my life!

This week is just a tour around the garden.  Not even that great of a tour.  We have had much needed rain the last couple days so not a lot of picture taking going on.  Our July precipitation total was a couple inches below normal.  Thankfully it has cooled down from 112 degree days, back down to a more reasonable 95!  The rain is like a bonus!!!

I'm not lying about that 112 degrees either.  About 10 days ago, we made it up to 112 degrees which almost broke the record for the highest temperature ever recorded in our city.  I think 114 is the highest, but trust me, I doubt you can tell the difference between 112 and 114 anyway.  Both are stupid- melt your skin- kill the plants hot.  Luckily, I managed to keep my garden alive through 2 weeks of over 100 degree temps by giving it a good water every. single. day.  I hate to see my water bill next month. 

Isn't this the cutest little heart shaped tomato you have ever seen??!! It's a rosso scillian, an heirloom variety that is supposed to be good for canning. We shall see! Now that I have buckets full of tomatoes I plan on making salsa in the next couple days!



A german pink tomato. Also an heirloom variety. I was so proud of the guy. Big tomato and last year my plant didn't produce any tomatoes! But alas, it was not meant to be. This guy got a bug and it rotted out a few days later.



Banana pepper




Bell pepper that has a weird bottom!



Another bell pepper variety. Last year I bought a surprise bell pepper plant from a local grower and it produced these pale pale yellow bells that were delicious. Got one from him again this year, and look at my luck! Same kind! I just need to find out what kind it is..



A day's tomato harvest



How I kept these alive in the hanging basket, I will never know.



Love these red zebra tomatoes!



Ants on the okra flower



After all the work is done in the yard, we sometimes just jump in here to cool off! Kind of ironic that all my grass is dead and my plants are wilting under the heat of the sun and no rain, when I have 17,000 gallons of water 25 feet from the garden.