Sunday garden tour

I didn't have as much time to spend in my garden as I'd have liked today, but I did stop to enjoy it, just before sundown. Wanna come on a tour?
I picked the first tomatoes today--"Juliet" grape tomatoes. They were tasty. My challenge for the day was figuring out what to do with the rowdy Brandwine tomato that has outgrown its stake and made it fall over. Tonight, it's strung up with twine, tied to the fences. A little sketchy, but mmmmm, those tomatoes are gonna taste good!

And, as you can see, the corn is more-than-knee high, and it's only the first of July, so things are looking good. The chard won't stop growing. The squash and pumpkin are flowering and making fruits...

My surprise is the pot of calla lilies you can see way over on the left (just an edge in the top picture)--Matt planted the bulbs back before Iraq, when we were in the condo. The whole pot looked rather dead, but I decided it might be worth watering. And, by grace, it's in bloom!

Bonus points to anyone who can identify all the edible things growing here. (I counted 11, but I have some advantages. Like I know what I planted.)
The passionflowers on the fence keep blooming--I was afraid they'd quit by now. I like 'em because they don't like to show their faces in the morning any more that I do. (They're an afternoon-opening flower...)
The sunflowers are growing tall--this one's over six feet, and glorious-looking. I love sunflowers.
And, for kicks, I thought I'd throw a craft project (a little bit o' garden art) into the tour. Here's one of my recycled wine bottle lantern prototypes, hanging in the backyard. It's not glowing, but you can use your imagination...
Now I'm back to dehydrating things for our backpacking adventure...

how my (kingdom of god?) garden grows

Last evening, I hung my new collage creation on the fence in the backyard. I've been so delighted by my subconscious choice to plant a vine and a fig tree back there, and how this means I'm living into Micah's vision of the good stuff. Swords into plowshares and all that. No more war. Instead: vines and fig trees.

I used one of the nasty boards from the pile behind the shed--a piece of old trim that we tore out of the house. With all that ModPodge on there, it the grain looks pretty. New life, I suppose.

Now, I'm inspired to make another, but need to figure out what it should say or depict...

In other backyard news, I fashioned a set of four marshmallow roasters, with bent wire and bead decoration on the handles, too. They're hanging on a lovely holder. Now, the next time folks gather around our recycled brick firepit, and we want to make s'mores, we don't have to rummage for more wire hangers. They're already there and waiting.
Last weekend, I tore out most of the things that had been growing through the "cold season." (One has to write "cold season" with a little irony when she lives in San Diego.) So, I have lots of bare soil, waiting for things to sprout through it. But this corner, home to rhubarb, four tomatoes, strawberries growing full-tilt and some carrots I really ought to harvest, is GREEN. In the pot is a "yuca"--manioc. I planted one from the grocery store to see what would happen. It's growing!!
I continue to wait in anticipation for summer tomatoes. (If you remember those newspaper-pot tomatoes of long ago--they've gone back to the soil. But, thankfully, others grow on.)
And, a columbine plant is blooming. The poppies are still lovely. And, happily, the shortage of bees hasn't come to my yard. They're happily pollinating away here.

(Do you think Matt would let me keep a hive? He didn't go for the keeping-chickens plan...)

Thank God for growing things.

garden impression

My crafty project for the week was making this concrete casting of a rhubarb leaf. (Not as tasty as pie, but it was fun to make...) I'm hoping it will hold water and be a sort of a birdbath. Plus, I'll always have a nice, big leaf in my garden.
I don't have any deep reflection on it.

I did, however, eat some tasty rainbow chard leaves out of the garden today. Matt first declared, "That isn't awful." Then, changed his opinion of sauteed chard to thinking it'd be fun to eat again.

I looked up the nutritional benefits of chard, and I think that if we eat a cup a day, we can definitely have ice cream, too.

gardening & revolution

I pass this house on my way to the freeway--just a few blocks away from our house. I'm a fan of the gardening revolution.

Turns out, there's a whole guerrilla gardening movement; rebellious, hopeful souls who dare to plant growing things in the abandoned places of empire.

Gardening is so good. It's relaxing. It connects me to this place. It reminds me of my place in cycles beyond my control. It recommits me to tending and cultivating things of beauty. It means I don't have drive to get my groceries, and no one has to use oil to drive them to the store. It means my food tastes really good. And, I love watching my neighbors stop to look at what's growing. My favorite is watching parents show their kids what vegetables look like in the natural state.

It definitely makes switching out "yard" for "garden" worthwhile. Of course, this place didn't even have "yard" when we moved in. It just had "pavement..."

Today, our first fruits of the season. (I'm being technical about this, and going for "fruit." This is a juicy and sweet switch-up from the lettuce, chinese cabbage, broccoli and chard that have been growing...)
They were the tastiest strawberries I've had in a long while. And no one had to work in miserable conditions for too little pay which being exposed to toxic pesticides to grow 'em.

Hooray for these five strawberries.

What a glorious alternative to concrete.