Gray Day Garden Walk

We seem to be in the midst of a few gray days here.  Again.  (You'd think we'd be used to this since it's been this way NEARLY ALL SUMMER!  Plus we've been warned of possible frost tonight . . . down around 30°.  If the sky was clear I would be worried, but with this heavy cloud cover, I truly don't think we will see frost.

I'm not going to bother covering anything left in the garden.  Whatever will be, will be (Suffering garden burn-out, are we?)

I've been reading your blogs detailing all the things you've been making with your abundant harvests of tomatoes along with pictures showing every surface in your kitchens covered with ripe and ready tomatoes, so I thought I'd share a photo of my tomato harvest.

These are the first ripe tomatoes we've had this season.  (Fer Pete's sake, I can't even grow a crop of cherry tomatoes this year!)

Above is one of my little pie pumpkins.  There are few of them on the vines this year, and they show no signs of maturing.  Maybe I can use them for decorations though.  Green decorations.

The jack o' lantern pumpkins are more prolific and very large . . . but certainly a long way from turning the appropriate color.

I've been delighted to see that my red kuri squash (a winter squash) might actually turn out to be edible.  These are nearly the color they're supposed to be when harvested.  (Picture right out of the camera.)  I just wish they wouldn't get so big.  (Never satisfied, am I?)  These are about three-quarters the size of a basket ball.  Ones just large enough to serve the two of us would be much more convenient.  But when they are this big, I bake the whole thing, use what we want for a meal and then puree and freeze the rest to use in place of pumpkin for pies or other pumpkin desserts.

These seeds were labeled "Mixed Gourds" which I thought would be nice for fall decorations.  The only fruit I've been able to find on the vines is these little white pumpkins.  Hmmm, who messed with my seeds?

The potato vines aren't exactly standing up and saluting anymore but they're far from dead so I do hope we get some more good growing weather for them.  I've stolen some spuds from two plants and they're nice sized already.

I try to plant only heirloom seeds so I can learn how to save my own seeds which could come in handy some day.  But this is the problem we face with our short growing season.  I have lovely, large bean pods on this planting of yellow wax beans, but as you can see the bean bushes haven't died down yet nor have the pods matured enough to dry and give me seeds fit for saving.  The plants will get killed by frost before they dry properly.  And I really can't plant the beans earlier so they would start maturing and drying sooner in the season.  Nope, they go in as soon as the weather and soil are warm enough to keep the seeds from rotting before sprouting.  Yep, the short growing season is a real challenge up here.

So is the very chilly mid-September weather that threatens a frost for tonight!  (But, hey, I'm handling it.)