It figures, I gave up on the garden and it just won't stop. I could have harvested at least 3 more go rounds of beans if I didn't let them get gigantic. I haven't had the heart to rip out plants that are still bearing tomatoes. But the only time I have spent in the garden lately is playing with my little buddy, Ryan:
I did take a few minutes between chasing him around (man 3 year olds have an insane amount of energy) to see if there were any interesting items to photograph, or at least one that would stand still for me. Apparently the stevia actually has pretty little white flowers when it blooms:
And that's all I've got. I am going to try really hard to get home from work tomorrow in time to do some gardening before dark because 65 degrees is just too nice of weather not to take advantage of in late October in Connecticut! It may still be another few weeks before we get a frost, but there won't be too many more days I want to be outside more than I want to be warm and toasty indoors.
This time of year the setting sun filters through the burning bush into the living room window and I ache to capture it, but I just can't:
Granted, I took that photo with my employer supplied Blackberry Torch (OMG it is so much fun to use!), but the photos I took earlier in the week with my real camera of all the birds loving the burning bush didn't turn out much better. Tonight I ventured outside to see if I could do better without the dirty window, bad indoor lighting, and limited angle. I think I did:
Well I think I got pretty close, but it's much more beautiful in person.
There was one last project hanging around the garden that just had to be taken care of...the harvesting of the Yukon Gold potatoes:
We put out a tarp and lifted and tipped over the container onto it:
We carefully went through the soil on the tarp and forked through the hole in the ground. All the soil from the containers went into two garbage cans with covers for the winter:
I took some time to go around and gather up the tomatoes still on the vine. We had one of the Brandywines on our salad tonight, but it was barely a step above a supermarket tomato:
The full harvest, well minus two tomatoes that we brought inside. The potatoes on the right are from the right-hand container above, the left from the left-hand one. I think maybe it wasn't sunny enough where we had them, so we're planning a sunnier spot next year:
I did enjoy getting my hands (well my gloves) into some potting soil again. That lemon grass really needed to be potted up or it definitely wouldn't successfully overwinter in the fish container. I was relieved when I pulled it out to fill the container with potting soil to see that it was sending new roots out:
I roughed up the roots and got it into the container and I'm quite pleased with the result:
Completely randomly the husky cherry tomato in the driveway is growing like mad and if the first frost holds off I think we'll get a bunch of tomatoes from it:
The first frost looks like it will hold off for at least the next 10 days, but there's no sign that the trees in our yard are going to drop their leaves any time soon. We always end up out there in the freezing cold raking -- ugh:
We finished up our projects for the day and headed back inside. And Lee, love of my life, set out a snack:
We shared it and I headed off to a chick flick with some girlfriends. I can't imagine a nicer Sunday.
Let's try a quick experiment. Close your eyes, wait read this sentence first and then close your eyes: Picture a family during the Great Depression. Was the photo in your mind sepia-toned? Plain old black and white? A friend recently posted a link to images by photographers of the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information. Reportedly they are some of the only color photographs taken of the effects of the Depression on America’s rural and small town populations. Click over and check out all 70 of the photos the Denver Post is hosting on their photo blog, but here are some of my favorites.
Garden adjacent to the dugout home of Jack Whinery, homesteader. Pie Town, New Mexico, September 1940. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Russell Lee. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress:
Children gathering potatoes on a large farm. Vicinity of Caribou, Aroostook County, Maine, October 1940. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Jack Delano. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress:
Children stage a patriotic demonstration. Southington, Connecticut, May 1942. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Fenno Jacobs. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (my mother was in neighboring New Britain not quite a year old):
At Beecher Street School. Southington, Connecticut, May 1942. Reproduction from color slide. Photo by Fenno Jacobs. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress (my cousins grew up in Southington, but I don't think this school was still in existence by the time they came along):
And I love the victory garden poster behind the seated girl. Now close your eyes and picture the depression, have your images changed to color? Mine have.
It's been raining here all week. I want to get outside and get some garden chores done, but everything's just too wet. I had a friend over today and we went out during a break in the rain to see the garden, I reached down to pull a dead leaf off the strawberry plants and shrieked. I almost grabbed the praying mantis:
Yes, she's clinging to the sides of two of the ceramic pots. Not the best photo I've ever taken, but she seems to be sticking to the garden along the fence. Hopefully I'll get another chance when it's not so dark and rainy since this isn't exactly a prize-winning photo. However, I do hope this is a prize-winning photo:
I entered it into RAW's October contest, the theme of which is Purple Power. Check out the gallery, there are some interesting photos already, strangely, quite a few are bee and flowers pics. Now back to playoff baseball, ironically not in a rain delay!
Before last week I only had one memory of seeing a praying mantis in person. I was a little girl, maybe 7, and we found one on the sidewalk in New Haven outside my babysitter's house. But last week I went outside after a few days of rain to see how the garden was faring. And there it was -- a praying mantis on the basil chowing down on a still wriggling bee:
None of these photos are perfect because it was silly windy:
So you can see just how big the mantis was:
This may be calendar-worthy:
And to show you how difficult it was to get a decent photo:
And then on Sunday I went outside to escape the never-ending football on my TV (love having SS1 come over and hang out, but I can only take a few hours of football before I get bored) and found the mantis over on the wire shelves along the fence. I love this photo, I just wish I hadn't cut off the mantis' tail:
And predictably my camera battery died so I couldn't try for a better one. I just hope the mantis gives me another chance if the rain ever stops. I took this photo to show the one new, blue bloom on the hydrangea, but it's kind of tough to see with the yellow of the siding behind it, but at least the beans on the netting look awesome:
I don't know if you can see it, but there are nasturtiums growing int he raised bed again. I don't know if they're self-sown or somehow remnants of the plants that I pulled (though I can't imagine how that would happen):
Another surprise, well actually two, the husky cherry tomato is getting huge all of a sudden for no apparent reason. And that bush under birdfeeder was cut down to the ground early in the season, but it came back. I can't decide if I want to keep it or will try cutting it down again:
And the wildflowers are finally looking half decent with all the asters in bloom:
Downright beautiful up close:
It's been quite chilly here, all our windows are closed, socks on, hoodies & sweaters worn all day (not just for the cool mornings), and the throws are out of the ottoman and covering us on the couch. I refuse to turn on the heat this early in the season, but sitting around in a 64 degree room is a little bracing. I imagine the poor tomatoes outside are even colder, especially at night. I don't know how many more of them are going to ripen if October is going to be this cold!