Queens of the Summer Garden

Early spring, as I tuck 15 different tiny seeds into little pots, I start dreaming of the ripe, sweet goodness of these Queens of the Summer Garden!

This summer heat, regular pruning, and water has produced some of the best ever. Here's some of my favorites.

Tomato Cour di Bue

a favorite Italian Heirloom, and now my favorite for heart shaped romantic slices

Seed from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds

Beaverlodge Plum

Seed from Territorial Seed Company

Northern Delight
seed from Territorial Seed Company

Sun Gold Hybrid

absolute sweet gems!

Seed from Territorial Seed Company

Striped Roman

a long funny fruit with a silly nose at each end

Seed from Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds

Black Cherry

sweet and wonderful color

Seed from Abundant Life Seeds

Green Zebra

tart and zesty

Seed from Renee's Garden

Eureka Botanicals Lavender

A couple weekends ago, we visited our family farm: Eureka Farm. We were fortunate enough to catch the fragrant purple field just before harvest.

Avril enjoyed the hummingbird sized bees and grasshoppers.

If you ever need lavender oil, feel free to contact my folks at Eureka Botanicals.

Favorite Flowers of June

Today was a day in the gardens. Our giant Paul's Himalayan Mist rose is in full bloom over the garden fence. The fragrance of this rose is truely intoxicating. The wash of light pink blossoms with large clematis flower laden vines makes a stunning backdrop to our garden room.

One of the last drooping peonies.

Betty Boop rose always brings a smile to my face, as her colors start vibrant then fade to a muted pink and white.

I love to watch as this Impressionist Rose turns more golden as the summer days lengthen.

One of my favorite and most hardy roses, Hot Cocoa is just starting to open it's dark burgundy blossoms.

I adore cabbages, how they reach outward with such force, then curl tightly inside themselves.

These Euringeum Sea Holly blossoms are a stunning spiky mass.

T-pees of purple pea blossoms will soon turn into purple pod peas. Can't wait for this yummy snack!

I just love the spiked texture of these golden clematis seed pods.

Even the spinach is blooming. So, I harvested a bushel basket of spinach leaves and feed the stems to the chickens. Time to make a pan of spanekopeta greek spinach pie for dinner!

Moss Mobile

I stopped to get gas the other day and couldn't resist taking a picture of this rig!

The owner proudly told me that she works with kids and they just love Moss Mobile of course. The kids are also excited to see what else is growing besides succulents... as she pointed to a small mustard weed plant.

This proves succulents really can grow just about anywhere!

Not sure I'll be planting up the grill of my minivan with succulents anytime soon. I think I'll stick to keeping them in my strawberry pots ;-) But it certainly brought a smile to my face.

What's left in the garden soup

Today we woke up to an inch of snow! Enough already! It didn't take long to melt off or prevent us from heading outside to enjoy some sunshine and do some gardening. Boots on, we tromped out into the fresh spring air, to plant a cherry tree, a gooseberry bush, two tree roses and some Merion Blackberries.

Molly and Avril also helped clean up the veggie garden. It was fun to find some colorful, edible treasures left over amongst the winter tattered veggie beds.

Freshly washed beets, carrots, scallions and leeks ready for the soup pot.

Avril singing and stir'n the veggies in the pot.

Saute chopped leeks, scallions in 2 Tablespoons butter and two large circles of Olive Oil.

Add chopped rainbow carrots and four Yukon Gold potatoes.

Some shakes of Salt and Pepper.

Cook until wilted.

Add two boxes chicken broth.

Boil until veggies are tender.

Use stick blender to puree and further cream the soup or leave chunky, your choice.

Delish!

lucky four leaf

Just before dusk, Avril and I went out to find our lucky four leaf and hunt for leprechauns and fairies. We didn't see any magical little people, but did pet some visiting dogs and came across a patch of lucky four leaves. May this luck we found travel from us to you.

seedling smiles

One of our favorite things to do this time of year is start seeds indoors. Years ago, Matt built us a fantastic grow stand. It has four lights and three shelves to hold the flats. Just last weekend we set everything up and got four flats of seeds going. It was only days before we started to see our first sweet little greenies.

It is hard not to want to start everything all at once. But years of having far to many lanky plants that can't go outside yet due to cold weather, have taught me to sequence the seeds we start indoors. We started this month with flowers and plants for pots that take a while to reach bloom size (coleus, geranium, verbascum, salvia, petunia, stock and nicotianna sylvestres). Then next weekend we'll start Cole crops: broccoli, cabbage and brussel sprouts. Next month we'll get the hot crops: peppers, eggplants and tomatoes seeds tucked into little pots.

Aidan started some heart shaped strawberries... they are setting their third leaves now! He is already talking about what he's going to make with his little berries. So cute...

Geranium seeds germinate quite well!

Stock is such a wonderful fragrant flower, can't wait to tuck this little babies into pots and smell their blooms some day!

sweet & soft pussy willows

The ground may be covered with snow, but now is the time to cherish one of the harbingers of spring: Salix discolor or Pussy Willows. The sweet soft little catkins are irresistible against little fingers and cheeks. These cuttings I picked off a huge bush near a wetland field, are starting to root in the vase. They will go out into the ground in a sunny location on our property once the danger of frost has passed.

I also learned recently that Pussy willows are dioecious. Meaning there are male pussy willow trees and female pussy willow trees. The buds, or catkins, on the male pussy willow trees look different from those on the females. The male catkins are showier, and it is the branches of the male trees that we seek for their catkins. The catkins of males yield numerous tiny staminate (stamen with pollen) flowers later in spring. I must have picked these branches from a male tree, as they are starting to produce pollen in the vase.

Melting snowflowers...

I couldn't resist photographing some of the little lovelies peaking out of the melting snow.

Big Bamboo...

I so want this on our property...
A couple gardening friends of mine let me in on a secret location of this amazing grove of large cane golden bamboo. It is amazing! I can't wait to knock on their door to see if they might spare a specimen.

Sweet little seeds...

February is my favorite time to organize seeds and order from colorful seed catalogs.

Here's my must order suggestions from my top two favorite catalogs:

The Cook's Garden

Custom lettuce mixes for spring and summer, sweet pea Matucana, Zinnia Old Mexico, radish d'Avignon, Speedy bush bean, nasturtium Peach Melba, and kale Lacinato.

Territorial Seed Company

Cucumber Mexican Sour Gherkin, Flashy Troutsback lettuce, spinach Bloomsdale Savoy, Love Lies Bleeding, Sun Gold cherry tomato, and sweet pea Late Spencer Choice.

This year I'm also trying some new things: French Sorrel, Rose Fin Apple fingerling potatoes, and a purple shelling pea called Blauschokker from Abundant Life Seeds.

The Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds catalog has beautiful close up photos this year. I can't wait to try out some of their increadible heirloom squash and pumpkins but they have over 100 to choose from so it hard to decide which one. These two for sure!

http://rareseeds.com/seeds/Squash-Winter/Rouge-Vif-d-Etampes

http://rareseeds.com/seeds/Squash-Winter/Jarrahdale

I keep all my seeds in a metal container organized by months (February to Fall). Cut up file drawer folders and make tabs organized by when to start in the cold frame, direct sow into the garden or when to start inside under the grow lights.