Note From The Bad Blogger

'Tis harvest season for the garden and you all know that doesn't leave a lot of hours for much of anything else. Seems I'm either out in the garden harvesting while trying to keep up with late season weeds or doing a little fall planting or, mostly, inside preserving like a crazy woman.

I'm not complaining because with all the wacky things we've all been experiencing with our gardens, I'm very grateful for anything the garden is giving me this year.

I've been managing to sit at the desk long enough to pay bills before they're due and sort the mail into stacks to be dealt with later, but am feeling more than a smidge bit of guilt for my lack of blogging and my inability to answer correspondence in a timely manner. (Yes, I need a flogging with a wet garden weed.)

We got one and 3/10ths of an inch of rain overnight and it's still coming down steadily. I so wish I could share this blessed rainfall with those of you still struggling through drought.

My first thought on this dark, drizzly, cozy morning (mmm, smell that coffee!) was to spend it at the desk in an effort to get caught up on everything that's been getting shoved to the "when I have time" pile. However, my dear husband who knows what I need more than I do (or am able to admit) has threatened to lock me in my quilt room or handcuff me to my recliner with a good book if I don't agree to do it on my own on this fine "inside" day. Yeah, I need a day of rest. Down time. Time out to re-energize and relax.

And that's what I'm going to do today. I may even have a second latte.

Change of Plans

NOTE: I started to write this post around 8 o'clock this morning, but somehow got sidetracked. (I know none of you can imagine how this could happen!) Now here it is 3 p.m. and I'm finally getting it up.

* * * * * *
Looks as though those of us in this area can stop being concerned about drought! Around 4 a.m. this morning we had one heckuva rain storm that dropped 1" of rain on us. This has been happening frequently enough that we're finally getting well hydrated. I only wish those of you in other parts of the country were getting your share of the rain, too. I know it's desperately needed.

I had plans to pick three kinds of beans this morning and get them processed but the garden is so wet I'll not be doing that. Hoping the heavy rain didn't knock too many of the ripe raspberries off the plants last night. Once they're ripe, they come off so easily.

Our temp is only in the 70s (hooray!) but the sky is overcast and the humidity is high both inside and out. (In the above picture, I was trying to take a shot that showed the heaviness of the air, but I think a much more talented photographer than I am is needed for that.) When I wiped the table off this morning after breakfast, it was still wet a half hour later!

Yesterday most of the day was spent making juice concentrate. (Yep, I'm still on the homemade juice kick.) I made a single batch of blueberry concentrate and two batches of raspberry. Unless I end up with an over-abundance of blueberries, I think that's all I'll make this year until we find out exactly how far the concentrate goes and how much we consume over winter.

Glad to report I've moved out of my waking in the middle of the night routine and have been sleeping straight through. Last night I finished up the last batch of juice later than I would have liked and found myself hitting the wall and wanting to be flat out in bed before I wrapped up what needed to be done. I stumbled around for another hour or so before making it into bed. I have no idea how I did it, but apparently when I drew back the bed covers I pulled down the fitted bottom sheet also, and crawled in on top of the mattress pad. (That fitted bottom sheet is tight, too!) I had no idea I had done this until hubby came to bed and knew something didn't feel right. Good grief, that's one I'll wonder about for a long time!

Funny how itchy my fingers are to get those beans picked and processed, but I don't think it will be happening today. When I have a plan made, I've always had trouble changing horses. Don't know if that's a personality weakness or strength. So far I've used the day to get caught up with desk work . . . and there's always the disaster called my closet I could/should work on. And a couple hundred other non-garden related things to do. And I do have that Netflix video I could watch . . .

Tired

I've been awake the past two nights from about 1:30 a.m. to 4:30 a.m. Can I blame it on the (almost) full moon?

Tonight I am feelin' tired. My wagon is draggin'. (It's a produce wagon. Haha.)

'Tis the time of year when I begin to fear the garden and harvests from the garden are taking over my life.

I'm so grateful our house stays relatively cool inside. But it's way too hot outside.

It's so hot outside that I had to pace myself all day so I didn't pass out between the beans and squash.

Not much energy to expend, but things had to be done.

Currently blueberries need to be picked every other day.

Raspberries need to be picked every other day, sometimes every day.

I picked and processed shell peas again today. I may get one more picking and then they will be done.

I got the first picking of green beans today.

I could have/should have picked yellow beans this afternoon, but I ran out of time . . . and gas. Have I mentioned I'm tired? And it's so hot out there. I promised the yellow beans I'd get to them tomorrow.

After a hot shower and fresh jammies, I think I'll feel better. Maybe I'll even have enough energy to make my list for tomorrow . . . and crawl into bed. And sleep straight through the whole night. I hope.

Start Of Week, End of Month

Two more days and the whole month of July is gone, gone, gone. Is this summer going by fast or what? Even though a lot of us have been bemoaning the crummy gardening season, the over-abundance of heat and humidity and are ready for this summer to be history, there are still many things around here that need to get accomplished before nasty weather arrives making it too difficult to work outside . . . or inside (painting, polying) without windows wide open for good ventilation. Guess this all means I need to shift into a higher gear and sprint (shuffle faster) toward the finish line.

Hubby and I painted inside the garage yesterday. He stayed with it nearly the whole day but I only worked there 'bout half the day. I had peas to process and freeze, raspberries to pick and raspberry juice to make.

There are now ten servings of garden peas in the freezer. Many thanks to my daughter for helping me shell the peas Saturday night. Not a bad job at all when you have good help and conversation to speed things along.

I had nearly a gallon of raspberries and I hope I didn't waste them. Since Papa Pea loves canned raspberries for the juice left in the jar(!), I decided to try to make raspberry juice so he can guzzle as much as his little heart desires.

Combining a few recipes I found on the good ol' Internet, I made what is supposed to be raspberry concentrate. For a delicious (hopefully) raspberry fruit juice drink, it's to be diluted with three or four parts of water. I got just short of 6 pints of the concentrate. The pint that was a smidge short is in the refrigerator and we'll sample it this morning with breakfast. Fingers crossed it's good stuff.

We had a couple of storms roll through yesterday afternoon. Our rain gauge collected right around 3/4" of rainfall. Then overnight we got another 7/10ths of an inch. We were getting mighty dry again so all of this moisture is good to have.

Saturday I planted two beds of fall crops. One bed of broccoli and another of kohlrabi, lettuce and chard. I still want to put in some radishes, which I love, but will wait a while longer before planting those. If I could find enough room somewhere I'd plant some more shell peas, too.

Even though a lot has been disappointing in the garden, I can't complain about my kohlrabi. Kohlrabi likes to grow in cool weather and the faster it matures (usually around 45 days), the more tender, crisp and good-flavored it is. Mine that is just coming mature now was planted April 29th right before it turned really warm up here. So it has been growing in not just warm but very hot weather. It should have been ready to eat around the middle of June. Here it is the end of July and it is just big enough to harvest. BUT darned if the stuff isn't sweet and tender and we're enjoying some almost every day. Go figure.

The recent rain has brought our temperatures down a little which is a welcomed relief. Cooler temps are in our forecast for the next week and I don't think anyone will complain if that actually comes to pass.

POSTSCRIPT: We did try the raspberry concentrate with our breakfast this morning. It didn't look thick to me so I made two sample glasses: One mixed with two parts water and one mixed with three parts water. We both agreed we think we can go with even more water so I'll try four to one next.

And the flavor? Lip-smackin' good! Score one for our side. I think I've got some good raspberry juice here. Maybe I should try making some blueberry juice next? (Heck, maybe I should finally buckle down and learn how to make WINE with this luscious fresh fruit!)

Life Is Just A Bowl Of Berries

Oh, num-num-num-num! The strawberries may be over and done with but now we have blueberries and raspberries. And we've been enjoying eating them fresh a couple of times a day.

After our classy (not) dinner tonight of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, we each had a bowl of berries with half cream, half milk. Papa Pea chose to mix blueberries and the luscious golden raspberries.

Me? I stuck with my favoritest . . . red raspberries. Can't beat 'em.

Sure, I work pretty hard at different times of the year to insure we have as good a crop of berries as Mother Nature will allow. But it's all worth it when we sit down to fresh berries that were on the bush less than an hour ago. Mmmm-mm!

A Discombobulated Day

Ever have one of those days that didn't go in the least bit the way you planned it would? "Course you have. Keeps life interesting. Or makes you tear your hair out. It's all in the way we handle it. (Handling it in the "better" way is sometimes more difficult than others.)

The good part of this day was that it drizzled lightly on and off all day. The rain gauge shows 4/10ths of an inch now a little before 7 p.m. More moisture (yay!). We'll take all we can get. Wish I could route some of it to those of you who still need it so badly.

Another day when I didn't get out to do the garden tour to blog about. Sigh. I will get it done one of these days. Just so I'd have a picture or two to include with this post, I tritzed out through the wet, wet grass and took these three shots.

This is a beautiful, healthy looking mound of pumpkin leaves. I can't figure out why it's staying so "all together" and refusing to send out vining tendrils.

The red kuri squash planted at the same time is running all over the place.

My experimental corn is doing very well. It's tasseled out and even has little ears of corn forming! I know this probably is far behind those of you growing corn down in the Banana Belt where you don't have any trouble getting yours to mature, but for us up here in the North, it's lookin' good.

Tomorrow is mapped out to be a very busy day. Hubby and I have errands to run in the morning including going to look at some black dirt we may invest in. The new raised beds we are putting in are deeper than the previous old ones and although we'll add compost to them this fall, some more dirt wouldn't hurt either.

Early afternoon will find me driving about twenty miles down the road to get some upholstery sample books so I can start making forward progress thinking about living room furniture.

Tomorrow night is Girls' Night Out for catch-up time with some friends. I'm pretty sure I'll have to fit harvesting blueberries and raspberries in the day somewhere, too. I haven't checked carefully, but some of my shell peas look as though they might be filled out enough for picking also.

Even if some raspberries would have to be sacrificed (by more rain that is forecast), that wouldn't be the worst thing because we still need the moisture. We'll just take whatever comes tomorrow and deal with it. In a good way.