This Year's Garden

Each year how the garden will do is an unknown.  Some years turn out better than others.  This year, actually, was better than the last couple of years.

There had been a lot going on so we were a little late getting the garden in this year.  Blaubeere, who is  much more into gardening that we are, had given us a number of things that she's had success with and we put them in.  It was looking good.

We were only a couple of days later than normal.  By mid-June it was all in and growing nicely.  Couldn't be too late because our growing season is not terribly long in this part of the county.

But by the end of June things were coming along quite well.

We were getting more blossoms on more plants, always a good sign.

We were getting enough rain that we didn't have to go out and water so often.  Rain seems to be better for gardens that watering.  Maybe its the more natural distribution of the water.  I dunno.

By mid-August we began getting stuff, produce type stuff.  Blaubeere had given us some blackberry bushes that put out fruit this year.  That was nice.  Not a lot but it was promising.

We also began getting tomatoes and zucchini, which Brombeere really likes.

As the summer progressed the blossoms continued to grow and turn into stuff.  More and more tomatoes.

Pretty soon we were getting enough tomatoes that Brombeere was beginning to feel hard pressed to keep up with them.  She likes tomatoes but didn't want to have to can any, summer was already busy enough without adding that to the mix. 

We even got a few currents from the current bush Blaubeere had given us.

And the rains kept coming.  Not too much, but at a good, steady pace that was good for the garden.

Every couple of days Brombeeree went out and brought in more tomatoes.

They were the star producer this year.

Then it was getting close to the time that we were leaving for a couple of weeks.  We had checked the long range weather forecast and knew that it would probably freeze before we got back so she went out and picked everything that was far enough along to ripen in the house.  That turned out to be a lot.  Since Schwartzbeere was going to be home while we were gone, Brombeere charged him to eat enough tomatoes that none spoiled.

Unfortunately, Schwartzbeere is not as big a fan of tomatoes as Brombeere and when we got back there were a few spoiled ones in the boxes.

But there were still a lot of good ones left, plenty enough to keep Brombeere happy and feeling like she'd done really well with the garden this year.

So by late October it was time to trim everything back and get the garden space ready for winter and all the snow that we usually get.

And then it snowed.  But the garden was really good while it lasted.  This year was much better than many of the other summers we've tried to keep a garden.  Brombeere was happy with it.