Hard Work is Paying Off!

Thought I would share some updated photos of the garden bounty around here.  The squash have literally taken over my garden, and I have been getting about 2-3 zucchini and 2-3 yellow squash daily.  My tomatoes have started to ripen on the vine too!  As soon as they begin to turn red, I pull them, and bring them inside to finish ripening in a sunny window.  I have been saving the tomatoes in the refrigerator, and hope to have enough tomatoes to can this weekend!

The sunflowers are doing great.  The smaller variety have bloomed out and the weight of their blooms is causing them to droop a bit.  I think I'm going to have to get some string to tie them up, so that they can hopefully continue looking toward the sun, and ripen the sunflower seeds.

Just a few days ago, we had a trio of storms come through.  For three nights in a row, we had three storms that hit around 1 a.m. On the second morning, when I went outside, I saw the damage from the storm. It had shredded the plastic all the way from the front of the greenhouse to the back.  As I tried to pull the plastic back over, more of it shredded, and it is very brittle. Unfortunately, I think this brand of plastic wasn't able to hold up very well. I was hoping it would at least make it for one season.  Looks like I'll be trying to figure out what to do to cover my plants when the frost hits... which really could be any day now.

Yes, I'm going to have to get busy deciding how to keep my plants covered very soon.  This morning the temperature outside was a crisp 38 degrees!

Here is a picture of one of the larger zucchini we have pulled from the garden.  It is as long as my son's arm!  This zucchini ended up in the food processor, and we were able to get 8 cups of shredded zucchini from this fine fellow!  Not bad!



One of the largest, prettiest strawberries I've grown this  year.  My strawberry plants are happier now that the weather is cooling down somewhat, and are beginning to produce again. 

Here is a close-up view of my beautiful sunflowers.  I can hardly get close to them, because of the wasps, and the honey bees vying for their attention.

Here you can see a honey bee just wallowing all over the sunflower seeds.  As I zoom in with the camera lens, he completely ignores me, content to happily continue his busy bee business.

He was an industrious fellow, much unlike the nasty wasps flying around.  All they do is flit and zoom, and cause trouble.  I love honey bees.  I wish I had more of them, and far less of the nasty wasps that have invaded us!

A picture of the blooming sunflowers from a bit of a distance.

I love how these cheery sunflowers always have their faces turned to the sun.  They even move throughout the day to follow the sun as it moves through the sky to the western horizon. 

I have finally begun to see okra take off in the garden!  Yeah!  We'll be enjoying this okra quite soon in a big pot of steaming gumbo!

With the cooler weather upon us, I'm sure the okra won't be quite so happy, but I continue to be hopeful that the tomatoes, squash, okra, and peppers will be able to continue to growth for a few more weeks before the cool fall weather arrives!