What did you do in the garden today?

[chickengr]

I got sooo tired of autocorrect that I turned it off. Any typos on the phone are mine.

Yeah, so it's faster not to have to type out words, but I know what I want to say. I don't want some tiny little device in my hand to think for me. I am Old and Set in My Ways.

I turned it off too but it ignores me. cheap chinese thing. I use my laptop.

 

[Swiss]

I have 3 trays of cucumber chips in the dehydrator. They smell great & tasted super while I was laying them out on the tray (lol) - I hope they're good! I do like regular dill pickle chips & squash chips, hopefully these compare.

I keep reading about cucumber chips. What do they taste like?

 

[NewBoots]

Way behind again

I'm going on a daytrip to Vermont to celebrate my 70th birthday in a few days. It's not all that far away, but I've never been. It's one of my bucket list items. Really looking forward to seeing an actual covered bridge and eat Ben & Jerry's ice cream. Sorry, I have a low bar for excitement these days. Have a great day everyone.

That sounds like an awesome day!

We've visited Penny 4 times now are are going to bring her home on Friday. She didn't bark at us today and has even started to look to us for protection from her fears. Yay! Her eyes are so hopeful. People who did this to her and made her so fearful are just beyond my understanding. I've taken pickles and candied peppers with us on our visits as gifts for the workers and volunteers at the humane society.

I have cucumber spears soaking in salted water waiting to be dill canned, as well as a couple pounds of green beans waiting to be dillied. Put a big jar with pickled eggs in the fridge this morning. Made 8 more pints of bread & butter pickles last night. I'll need to go to the farmer's market on Wednesday to see if I can get some pears to make more salted caramel pear butter since I just gave away my last jar. I have a patio table about half covered in ripening tomatoes and more peppers to pick.

Oh and our next door neighbor (who I honestly like but is crazy as a ****house rat) has Covid. Was still going to karaoke night at a local bar, never masks, won't get vaccinated and has had symptoms for days and only now is staying home. They live with her husband's very elderly parents and whose husband has a fragile heart but I have zero expectation of any scales falling from any eyes. Sorry, had to rant there a minute.

 

[karenerwin]

We got a nice heavy rain today!!

 

[Sueby]

I keep reading about cucumber chips. What do they taste like?

Cucumbers. LOL, seriously, they taste much more like cukes than I thought they would. I think when you dehydrate something it really intensifies the flavor of it & this certainly did with the cukes. I also added dill so they taste like dill & cukes. They're good, but not the best thing I've ever tasted. I enjoy they yellow squash chips much more.

 

[Wee Farmer Sarah]

Good morning gardeners. Back to work after my mini vacation. Vermont is lovely and the town of Brattleboro looks like the setting of a Hallmark movie. LOL! We will be returning for a little "Leaf Peeping" day trip in October. On the return trip I reminded DD that another bucket list item is coming this winter - snow tubing at the nearby (to me) ski resort. I stopped at the local Farmers' Market on Sunday and picked up some nice Roma tomatoes, more cucumbers to make dill pickles and to my surprise, tomatillos. I'll be using them to make salsa verde. The Roma tomatoes are getting canned as whole tomatoes. Today I've got the laundry going, fed the chickens, picked SM tomatoes, some pole beans, a few lima beans and 6 pounds of peaches. Today is all about canning tomatoes and prepping the cukes for their saltwater bath. I already started freezing some of the peaches, but it will likely be Thursday or Friday before I make the peach preserves. Still only one butternut squash. I just hope it stays healthy. The okra plants, the lima bean plants and carrots are all doing well. The bell peppers are trying to make a comeback but the jalapeno and poblanos are great. Oh, btw: no sign of Ben & Jerry's but the Brattleboro public transportation is a small eco-friendly bus painted in a dairy cow motif. Sooo cute. Have a great day everyone.

 

[WthrLady]

Busy morning.
Work started at 5am with roaring thunder and blinding lightning.
We slept on the deck until midnight due to the AC being out. When the mosquitoes found us, and the lightning two hours away woke us up, we went in, but left the French doors wide open.
So here I sit waiting on the repairman who can come anytime between 7am and 7pm even with my special emergency plan that gets them here in 24 hours.
The dishwasher and laundry are done. I have 7 trays in the dehydrator and the stove is clean and vacuuming accomplished.
I'd go cut things down in the garden sunflowers etc, but sometimes the phone doesn't ring out there. So I think I'll just update the blog today.

Get down and dirty today.

 

[Sally PB]

I took Freya on a tie out with me to the garden this morning. She fussed for a little bit, being on the other side of the fence, then mostly settled down. She's such a good puppy!

I pulled up the bean plants. The deer ate them down to stems, so there was no point to them being there anymore. Sigh. I also pulled some weeds and encroaching grass. (Encroachment! 5 yard penalty! It's more like 20 yards to the compost pile. Can you tell it's football season? I'm a football fan by marriage.)

I picked all the Early Girl tomatoes that are turning/approaching ripe. The plants are dying back, so before the woodchuck takes bites out of any more, I'll get them inside and safe. I'll have to buy at least a bushel and a half of 'maters, probably, to get enough canned. We need about 30 more quarts, plus some for salsa.

 

[NewBoots]

Finished the dill pickles last night and now I'm nuts to try them. I assume I have to wait at least 2 weeks to open them.

I picked the crab and regular apples this morning once I was done watering. More than I thought really.

I have a bunch of fully ripe tomatoes on the kitchen counter that I think I'll make into salsa or maybe just can whole/chunks. Here's my ripening tomatoes outside. I have to pick them early or the chickens, snails, and slugs will get them.

Time to can some apples, some for pies and the crabs will be pickled. I might make some sauce too since I can see there's some worm damage to the crab apples so I'll have to cut that out.

 

[Sueby]

Love the harvests! Best time of year!

So I'm so bummed, my big patch of Sassafras trees is dying. They started wilting 1-2 months ago, now the leaves are all dead & dropping. I've read it could be the Asian ambrosia beetle. I emailed the UConn Extension & will see what they have to say.
They were so pretty last year.

Picked a good basket of stuff from the garden today. It's very nice out, no humidity now. Have some spinach artichoke chicken thighs in the crockpot, can't wait for dinner!