My Vegetable Garden

So, it’s been awhile, hasn’t it? What’s been going on? Well not much to tell the truth. We’ve been busy with life and I guess I’ve been ignoring The Witch’s Island a bit too much. Thanks to those of you have kept in touch anyway.

The vegetable garden in August 2012, just before the harvest started.

It was a fantastic season for the vegetable garden this year. Lots of sunshine and heat, the plants loved it. Everything produced very well and we had so much that we couldn’t use it all and ended up setting up a table at the end of the driveway to give away the excess. The neighbours seemed to appreciate the gesture and we even received a nice thank-you note from one of them.

The onions were huge this year.

In my last post I mentioned that I had bought most of my seeds from Heritage Harvest Seed. Well their stuff worked great. We planted some of everything I listed except the Steeve’s Caseknife and Jacob’s Cattle beans. There just wasn’t enough room to get those in so they will have to wait until next year. Just about every single seed from Heritage germinated and grew into healthy plants. I always plant more than I intend to grow because there are usually some plants that die but these ones beat the odds. I had so many starters that I was begging my friends to take some. I still ended up putting some healthy little plants on the compost heap. What a shame, but I’ll know not to start so many next spring!

That's one BIG Tomato!

Just about every single seed from Heritage germinated and grew into healthy plants. I always plant more than I intend to grow because there are usually some plants that die but these ones beat the odds. I had so many starters that I was begging my friends to take some. I still ended up putting some healthy little plants on the compost heap. What a shame, but I’ll know not to start so many next spring!

Another thing I learned was that four rows of tomatoes are way too many tomato rows! Even in a poor year it would have been too many and it prevented me from putting in some other things like more beans. Next year I’m going to keep it down to just 2 rows.

Even the ceramic owl seems surprised that that
 tomato weighs almost a kilogram!

I taste-tested all the tomatoes as they ripened but I never did really manage to find a favourite variety. There was obvious differences in size and shape but they all tasted great. I guess if I had to pick I would choose the Bonny Best, Uncle Joe and Sylvan Guame varieties but they were all fantastic!

We used as many of the tomatoes as we could. I made mustard pickles, hot dog relish and even some home-made spaghetti sauce and I ate a lot of cheese and tomato sandwiches this year! I'm going to miss them this winter when all I can get are hot-house tomatoes from the grocery store.

The rest of the garden turned out great as well. It looked pretty, too. Everything was so lush and full that it was hard to get down the rows to do the weeding. I guess that's a good problem to have!

The Red Peanut beans ripened very early and we put them into the potting shed to dry and then shell. we had about 12 or 15 plants (half a row) and they produced a total of about three pounds of dried beans.I haven't eaten any of them yet but we will be baking them this winter. Mmmm...

All the tomatoes from Heritage Harvest Seeds did very well and were
heavy producers.

This was the first time I tried planting Asparagus Peas from Vesey's. The description sounded intriguing:  

"Tasty and attractive addition to your garden. Small winged pods taste similar to asparagus when steamed and topped with butter Red blooms make this plant attractive as well. Low growing and spreading. Continues to produce pods throughout the season. Can be started indoors or planted outside once all chance of frost has passed" 

The plants were very attractive and they were still producing blossoms and fruit right up until the end of October when we cleaned out the garden. They were unusual to eat and were best when they were very young. I will probably put them in again next year just because they looked so nice.

The Asparagus Peas were still blooming late into the year.

So besides the garden, what was I doing this summer? With all the beautiful weather I spent as much time at the beach as I could. The new beach tent worked great and went up and down easily and quickly. It made it so much more comfortable the the old umbrella could have.

I also started geo-caching again and even hid one of my own for the first time. It's a fun hobby and it gets us out of the house and exploring in out of way back roads.

Hubby put the final touches on the gazebo. He added power outlets and a couple of strands of rope lights and then panelled the privacy walls with some nice pine boards. It's a beautiful place now to sit in the evening and watch the world go by.

I guess that that's enough news for now. I'll save the rest for the next time, hopefully it won't be six more months before I write again, but, just in case, Merry Christmas! Haha!

Here are a few more pictures, enjoy!

These are the edible portion of the Asparagus Peas. They look like green
beans with wings and they do taste like asparagus if you cook them right.

We dried the pods in the potting shed and then shelled the beans. They do
indeed look like red peanuts!

We stripped off most of the foliage late in the summer to encourage
all the stragglers to ripen.

The Sylvan Guames were not only huge but they were also very meaty
and had very few seeds.

Here are five more varieties. There were definitely differences in texture,
size, shape and the number of seeds. 

These are Uncle Joes. We used this variety while they were green to
make Vera's Mustard Pickles. 

Forme-de-Coeurs were nicely heart shaped as suggested by their name.

The Forme-de-Coeurs were beautiful inside as well.

The Bisons were a good size for sandwiches.

Harbingers produced early and had lots of fruit.

The Silvery Fir Tree tomatoes had very distinct foliage on the plants.
The tomatoes were very tasty, too!

 These are Black Hungarian peppers. They produced very well.

The Matchbox peppers were very hardy. They were one of the last things
to come out of the garden this fall.

The Red Peanut beans were harvested when the pods turned bright red.

The Banana Spiders were back this year. They seem to be around whenever
the weather gets very hot and dry.

The gazebo was FINALLY finished this year! It got some
 interior panelling, electricity outlets and lights.

Holiday Time!

I have 1 week left out of my three week vacation and the time has just been flying by. We have done lots of interesting, fun stuff and have spent a ton of money. I said I was on vacation right?
I bought myself a new bike!!!! I got one that fits my frame size with lots of accessories for serious bike travel. I can pack great lunches, throw in some beach clothing and away we go. We have been riding the trails and loving every minute of it. My legs are very sore but I guess I have just been that out of shape. There are lots of very steep hills in our area so my new bike gears are getting a work out also.

Here’s my new bike on the day it came home. I got all the accessories to go with it, too. I got a bottle holder, a trip computer, a kickstand and a carrier rack including a soft bag big enough to carry lots of stuff.

On its first day we took a ride around the block to see how it would go. I didn’t realize that it was that big of a block!

We have also been out for the maiden voyage in the canoe we bought from a co-worker this spring. The day was beautiful, sunny and calm and we paddled around for about 3 hours. I even got out into the middle of the bay without getting scared. I’m just getting so brave!

What a perfect day to go canoeing. The water was just dead flat for the first 2 hours. We were able to travel around the entire bay and check out some of the homes that can’t be seen from the road.

We paddled right out into the bay and under the bridge just to see what was on the other side. Well, okay. We knew what was over there but we did get to see under the bridge!

We have visited lots of restaurants and sampled some of the finest foods out there. I’m glad to be exercising or I’m sure I would have gained 10 pounds easily.

I’ve had lots of time to fly my kite, build beach art and play Rummoli.

I found this funky looking piece of driftwood at the beach and decided that he looked like he wanted to dance so I propped him up and gave him a stage.

The dancer looked so good that I made him a dance troupe to back him up.

Of course, every artist needs to sign her work!

We’ve played lots of Rummoli this summer but this was the perfect evening to play outside. Needless to say that I won again!

There’s something so relaxing about flying a kite. It just hangs up there fluttering in the breeze.

I’m leaving you with some great pictures and hopefully I’ll get back on track financially and will have more blogging time in October. Oh wait that’s Halloween Pumpkin season, the Witch’s favorite time of the year!

No, this crab is not sun tanning. I assure you that he is quite dead and I’m okay with that.

We’re not sure what kind of birds these are. They might be semipalmated sandpipers but that is just a guess. They were taking a siesta on a nice warm rock until we showed up.

We’ve been able to spend a lot of time at this beach this summer. The weather has been crappy all year but it has been perfect ever since I started my holiday.

Now that’s a summer meal! Fresh oysters and corn heading off to the BBQ as a side dish for smokey chicken wings, mmm.

This red fox came out to greet us while we biking down the trail. He was quite happy to pose for pictures and even brought a friend out to play.

We had a great ride on this afternoon. We rode along the trail for 8 or 9 kilometres until we got to this fishing village. We found a small dockside café and had a bowl of mussels and a beer and then rode back again.

Being on vacation means that there is lots of time to make breakfast and one of my favourites is blueberry pancakes and fresh fruit, peaches in this case.

Summertime Picture Post

So, where has the Witch been for the last month? Well, I’ve been a bit of a beach bum. Yes, you read that right. I purchased a new bathing suit, a bikini no less, and we have been going to the shore every chance we get. Even I, who is deathly afraid of the water (there are CRABS in the water, you know!) have been in for a swim. We have just been in the water, on the beach and under our umbrella while the winds were blowing so hard I literally had to hold on to keep it from blowing away! But it has all been fun and I’m loving it, when we get any sunshine that is. I even had a wardrobe malfunction with the new suit (Hubby was surprised) but sorry there are no details I’m going to share.

Here's me trying to keep my beach umbrella from blowing away again.

Look at my brave Hubby, out there wading amongst the CRABS!

So now you know why the Witch has been derelict in her blog posting. I decided the summer is too short to waste inside on the computer so it’s off to the beach we go. Well, okay, we have also been busy with the gardens, and of course the MOTHER!*//%** gazebo. What’s that Hubby? It’s almost finished? Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha… what’s that?.. oh… you were serious… sorry!

Anyway, for now, I’m going to leave you with a collection of pictures which I hope you all enjoy. They are just a random collection from the past month or so.

Also, we are trying out a few changes to the design of the Witch’s Island so please be patient as we gear up some new stuff. Let us know how you like them.

Enjoy your day everyone, I’m heading to the beach again and I’m going to try to keep my swim suit on this time!

These shorebirds were having a field day running back and forth. I don’t know if they were feeding or just playing!

Some black headed gulls on the beach at low tide.

I found this message painted onto a rock while I was hunting for driftwood. They were obviously talented people but who goes to the beach with their paintbox?

The sky has been looking ominous for most of the summer. This particular system was very intense but not the worst we have had this year.

The vegetable garden was doing pretty good back in mid July.

By early August it was doing even better. The carrots, the beets and beans have been on our dinner menu almost every day for the past week.

My gazebo has finally got some stairs so now I don’t need to crawl in. Here are the stairs just minutes after Hubby finished building them (Please don’t tell him that I let it slip that it took him over SIX hours to make them!).

Here are the stairs again the next morning after being treated with the water sealer. We used Thompson’s brand and it did a great job on the cedar.

The final bit of construction prior to adding the siding was the window casing and now that is all done, too.

Okay, Hubby. You did great getting all that finished. Go and get that beer… Hubby? Hubby? All right, now where did he get to?

The flower gardens are doing pretty good, too. The lilies have all come out in bloom at the same time and they are just a riot of colours.

Here’s a close-up of one of the pink ones. They are huge, about 6 inches across and they smell wonderful, too.

The grapes are doing great this year. It’s going to be our best harvest ever as long as we get to them before the birds do.

The farmers have planted a lot of canola this year and when it blooms it turns this intense colour of yellow. So beautiful!

That’s me standing out on the back deck admiring all our hard work.

As another summer storm builds in the evening sky I will say see you later.

One last picture of me staring down the world’s ugliest Llama. That is all.