July 16, 2007

Garden Update



I had a good weekend garden-wise and completed the following tasks:

1) Harvested most of the beets - including the golden beets. I can't believe they worked out.
2) Pulled up all the arugula which bolted long ago.
3) Planted lima bean seeds and new Beet seeds where the arugula and Beets used to be.
4) Weeded (of course)
5) Watered
6) Cooked all the beets and the beet greens - I put the red ones and golden ones in a container together with a paper towel in between so that the golden ones wouldn't get red but, that worked for about 5 minutes.
7) Made my first small jar of pesto for the season (from basil given to me from someone elses farm share though)



I have also made the following discoveries and decisions:

1) The "bee balm" that was given to me isn't bee balm but, lemon balm. It smells good but, has no crazy, fun flowers on it.
2) The general layout of the garden seems to be working and I am very pleased.
3) The seedlings from the women's shelter really were just so-so this year. The basil is just now starting to look ok. The eggplant didn't grow at all and the tomato plants look healthy and are growing now but, I've only just started to get flowers while most of my garden neighbors have big, green tomatoes on their plants and they're about twice as big as mine.
4) The sink needs something new in it. It's basically a bunch of weeds now with one california poppy. I'm thinking it might be the perfect place for mint (or maybe the lemon balm) actually.
5)Some of the plants near the sink -- like the lavender -- are too crowded and shaded. I need to move things around a bit.
6) The purple coneflower looks great and the black-eyed susan is enormous and should be blooming very soon. I need to remember to divide it though otherwise it's likely to take over completely.