Kindergardens

Last weeks Kindergarden challenge was to look at the colors that are growing in your garden.  So I put together a few collages of the most prominent colors in my garden! 

Let's start off with green.



Those are red zebra tomato, watermelon, zucchini and peas.

Yellow



squash blossom, grated fels naptha soap, flowers in the fairy garden and cucumber flowers (back when my cucumber plant was alive!)

White



flowers in the fairy garden, bell pepper blossom, onion flower and pea blossom.

Purple



onions, mexican heather, salvia (both from the fairy garden) and hosta flowers. Although these are kinda pinky white, but also purple. And since I needed another purple picture, I declare them purple!

Orange and red



Snapdragons, early girl tomato, coreopsis (I believe) and cherry tomatoes.

Pink



All flowers from the fairy garden plus a fairy house.

Brown, perhaps these photos most accurately describe the garden right now. With all the rain we have had lately though, I suspect things will perk right back up!



Grass, shrew, dead cucumber plant and some bug.

Happenings from the top of the hill

Some recent photos from the top of the hill.

An onion that's taller than Theo!



Same onion compared to KK



The making of watermelon rind pickles











And then I forgot to take a picture of the final pickles!!

chopped up chocolate for homemade brownies!



Rainbow cupcakes that KK made.



all frosted!



The makings of chicken parm, all from my garden!



The birds are attacking!! Not really. My mom bought the girls a bag of birdseed for the bird houses they made. Well the kids liked playing in it and they threw it all over the yard. So now we have birds gathering for a free meal.





Good thing the cherry tomato plant produces so many tomatoes! Nin is always sneaking them!



Some hairbows that Nin made and photographed herself!



Some sewing tags I bought for little boy clothes!

Whats that? A sewing related post...

I have been sewing, I promise.  Just not a lot.  Here are some recent items.

Hairbows.  Lots and lots of hairbows.  I made a bunch, the girls made a bunch and then we invited Trisha over and she started a bunch and then made me finish them!









4th of July



These are some of KK's









A tunic for Nin.

Ottobre 04/2011 #28



I also made 5 matching July 4th outfits, appliqued with their initials.

Girls are in Farbenmix Roxy's and the boys are in an Ottobre shirt from 03/2006. All appliques are from Planet Applique. These are the best pictures I was able to get!!







Finally, a set of 4 burp cloths for a custom order.

Kindergardens

Last weeks Kindergarden post was dedicated to animals in the garden and how they are incorporated.  I have two animals in my garden.

The first is the elusive KK-rex.  She only comes out of hiding on sunny days and being the Virgo that she is, she likes things neat and orderly. 

She is most often photographed doing this...



Our second animal is Nin-osaurous. She is a wild child who likes to draw on walls with Sharpies and has perpetually bruised shins.



Just kidding! We have no animals. No dogs. No cats. No chickens. No fish, even. We do have several wild animals that pop up every now and again though. Let's see, there is Diggy Jr (the offspring of the infamous Diggy), a fox, wild turkeys that have layed eggs in our yard. And this ugly guy.



You know what that is? A shrew! Ugly little bugger ain't he? He showed up in our neighbors yard last year. I never got a close look at him though. I did, however, get to see the damage he inflicted on my carrots and watermelon.

I do have a more current topic to complain about though, other than the lack of animals in my garden.

I could have easily called this post, What happens when you have 106 degree heat everyday for 10 days. As you may know, much of the country has baked under a heat dome for weeks now. As of Monday this week, it had been over 100 degrees everyday for 10 days. Tuesday, it cooled off to 97. And today the predicted high is 107! So I put together a litle slide show of what happens to your garden in 106 degree heat for an extended period of time.

A sea of dead, brown crunchy grass. Just at my house. My neighbors like to water their lawns and they are nice and alive and green. To me, its a waste of money. Because you know what happens when you water your grass? It grows and then you have to mow it. I use the term, you, very very loosely. Ok, ok, you caught me. I shouldn't even use the term you. That should read, my hubby has to mow. I'm just being honest here. I don't mow. I hate to mow. I have mowed once in 13 years. And I don't even feel guilty!



Squash, shriveling up



peppers wilting



Poor pathetic cucumber. Dead.


Volunteer whatever is also wilting under the heat



tomato tops



Hopefully next week I will have more to talk about than made up animals and ugly shrews.

Kindergardens

Look at me being mostly on time for once in my life!  This week is really just a tour around the garden.  There is so much growing and blooming right now! 

The fairy garden is looking rather lived in at the moment.  The houses are dirty and unkempt.  Just like mine! 





The snapdragons keep on blooming!





On to the veggies..

Cucumbers. We have already picked 3 (and devoured 2).



Pattypan squash- picked one the other day and fried it! Yum.



Also fried a couple of these..



I plant zuchinni in the same place every year and it always overtakes everything..



Lots of peppers everywhere. Big ones, small ones, banana, jalepeno. Big plants, small plants and everything in between. 15 in total.....





Twins!







I renamed this plant, the volunteer whatever who is eating the okra..



My onions are popping up out of the ground! They remind me of a passage in the book, Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.



potatoes blooming



baby watermelon



bigger watermelon! Only problem with this guy is that he is growing on the wrong side of the fence! The vines decided they wanted to grow through the fence to the neighbors yard... Kenny Rogers better not steal my watermelons. P.S. my neighbor is really named Kenny Rogers. Not the real Kenny Rogers or anything, but I'm sure you figured that out.



Tomatoes! Everywhere, every size, every color.

Red Zebra



Almost ripe early girl.



More almost ripe early girls



German pink. I'm so excited for these! Last year the plant grew great, but there wasn't a single tomato on it. So I'm looking forward to seeing how pink these get!



Sweet 100 cherry tomatoes. This plant is so loaded with these that the cage is falling over already!



Rosso scillian. I love the folds on these! They are supposed to be very meaty with not a lot of seeds so they are perfect for canning.



My lone volunteer tomato plant that is growing very close to another. It has one tiny tomato on it.



Finally, have you ever seen the flower on an okra plant? Beautiful! I have never grown okra before so I was amazed by the flower!!







It's about to be that time of the summer where you bring in buckets full of veggies everyday!