Ugly Winter Garden

I thought it was about time for a little winter garden update and it's ugly, that's all you need to know. It got super cold so much earlier than I expected and most things died.  I covered a few things like my artichoke plant which I am hoping will produce more next summer, and my cilantro because I'm not ready to give it up just yet.  Everything else was on it's own.

 Luckily my carrots, beats, mustard spinach, swiss chard, and daikon radishes all still look good.  Guess what we'll be eating this week....

 My potatoes on the other hand died....way too early.  So I figured that was the end of that and decided to dig up what I could.  By that I mean I was hoping to find as many potatoes as I could before my back gave up and I froze.  Why is it soo cold out? and why is it so hard to dig up potatoes?  Well here's what I found and there's a huge possibility there's more out there, but I gave up.  

Our mandarin oranges are also starting to ripen which I'm pretty excited about.  Now if only the lemons would hurry up...

Fall is finally here...

Fall is here, but it sure doesn't feel like it.  Okay maybe a little, it's been in the 90's instead of the 100's.  I have been pulling out old plants from summer and starting some new things for fall, like pumpkins.

...this guy will not be ready for Halloween, maybe thanksgiving?

...the plants have taken over my yard...

...this big guy is fully grown and just starting to turn colors..fingers crossed he's ready soon...

...in this bed I'm starting carrots, beats, cilantro, and acorn squash..

something keeps eating the leaves on my seedlings, hense the jars...

...in this bed I'm experimenting with potatoes...

 ...I finally have peppers! I have poblanos, pasillas, and jalapenos ....

...I am also trying to grow mini white pumpkins, but something keeps eating them...

that something is white and fluffy and named Leo...

Besides gardening I have done a tiny bit of fall decorating.  I have very limited storage space and most of it is taken up by Christmas decor so Halloween and other holidays sorta get the short end of the stick.

...I reused some old flowers and this container I saved from an edible arrangement..

I knew I would use it someday...

...have you tried the pumpkin spice latte M&M's yet? so good...

...the only little pumpkins that survived Leo...

I have also brought home a few vintage treasures...

...I think Morty has his eye on that Coca-Cola tray...

...I found the sweetest little ironstone dishes...

...Rose bouquet Made in England by Johnson Bros...

...so pretty they had to come home...

...silk prints with gilded wood frame handmade in Florence, Italy...

I should have some of the dishes and the pictures up on etsy in the next week...if I can part with them...

My summer so far...

Blogs are a tricky thing and I have no idea how the great bloggers manage to churn out posts weekly if not daily.  I have been keeping busy this summer, which means I should have things to blog about, but I seem to get caught up in the doing and forget to do the writing.

One thing that needs my attention every day is my garden.  Things grow surprisingly fast out here in the desert, I imagine its from all the sunshine.  I can barely keep up, but I really enjoy spending hours out there, except for the days when it's 115 degrees out.  Those days I curse the garden and say desert gardening is the dumbest thing ever.  This year was sorta a giant experiment and I have learned ALOT.  I cannot wait until next year to try some new plants and new ideas.  My cute little garden turned into a jungle in a hurry and I have been researching tons of ways to keep it under control next year.  I have also been planning out what I will plant this fall and winter.   

...see it's a complete mess, but it gives me veggies so it can stay for now.  My cucumbers over grew the trellis I gave them and have now started climbing up and pulling down my sunflowers....

...for awhile I had more summer squash than I could eat, but they have slowed down and now I finally have acorn squash and cucumbers.  I grew two kinds of cucumbers this year, armenian and pickling.  I was able to make a small jar of refrigerator pickles but other than that the armenian ones have way out produced the pickling.  I'm hoping for at least another little batch of pickling cucumbers so I can attempt to ferment them.  

I took a small break from the garden to travel back to Ohio for my brother's wedding and to visit family.  The wedding and the bride were absolutely gorgeous and it was in such a beautiful church. 

It was such a fun time getting to see everyone.  

While in Ohio I spent some time with my grandma and the older I get the more jealous I get of her little farm.  As a kid I grew up thinking living surrounded by farms was nothing special and that most people experienced this.  How wrong I was.  I am very grateful for the childhood I had in her garden eating more of every thing than I picked and being surrounded by her animals.  I now dream of having my own little piece of land someday.  

...Malaysian Ayam Serama Chicken...smallest chicken breed in the world..

...even poultry deserve to have a pretty house..

My other hobby this summer has been dyeing.  

If you have ever eaten at my house you know I am a huge fan of cloth napkins.  Paper napkins rarely make sense to me.  You buy them over and over just to throw them out.  It's a waste of money, bad for the environment, and not as pretty.  I have a large collection of napkins that we use on a daily basis.  Most people's response is.."but isn't that just more laundry?"  No, it's not.  I keep a basket in my laundry room that holds dirty kitchen towels, napkins, etc.  Whenever I do a load of bath towels, which we all have, I throw them in.  No extra loads.  What about kids? "You can't use cloth napkins with kids" you say.  Well I am super messy and I promise you that a cloth napkin cleans up and absorbs so much more than a little paper napkin. 

Oh yeah, before my little tangent about napkins I was talking about dying.  Well to go one extra step and make my cloth napkins extra green and good for the environment, I buy vintage napkins.  Yep, old used napkins.  Most come with stains or look a little sad so I decided to start dyeing them pretty colors. 

I may have gone a little over board and now have too many napkins....

Please visit my etsy shop if you would like your own pretty napkins.

Expanding my Garden in the Desert

I wanted to share with you my "garden" progress...

A little while back I shared with you my plan/dream for some raised beds...

My growing space has been very limited and I was only using pots around the yard and these large planters.  Ever since we moved here our yard has been a work in progress and every year we add and improve.  This year we built some raised beds and I am so excited about them.

We wanted to spend as little money as possible, make them as eco friendly as possible,  but still make them strong enough to last a good while.  So here is what we came up with...

First we took a little trip to Home Depot.  Well, we actually we started off at Lowes, but they were unable to cut our wood for us.  Apparently they can only cut wood that is 1" thick or less, so boo on them and good to know for the future.

We were super happy to find the wood we wanted, and that we were able to have it cut to any length we wanted at Home Depot.  We picked up 8- 2" x 12" x 10' boards and had them cut in half.  We also picked up a couple 2"  x 2" x 10' boards and had them cut down to fit in our car.

We used the smaller boards for corner pieces and screwed everything together.  The boxes ended up approximately 5' x 5'.  

Next I painted everything with Raw Linseed Oil.  I bought natural untreated boards because I didn't want any chemicals seeping into the soil, but I was worried they wouldn't last very long.  So after some research I decided to use an old method of wood protection,  Linseed Oil.  Raw Linseed Oil is Flaxseed Oil which they sell in the vitamin section, so I figured it was pretty safe.  I bought the raw untreated version because there are some linseed oils out there with chemicals in them so that they dry quicker.  So make sure you read the labels before buying.  This oil does take along time to dry, but since I live in a desert I wasn't worried.  I left them to dry in my garage for about a week and after that they were still slightly greasy, but I'm not sitting on them or anything so it didn't bother me.  I just brushed it on, it's basically like painting on olive oil.  

Once they were somewhat dry we moved them to the backyard and into place.  We quickly discovered our yard was not as level as we thought, which is probably our fault.  So we just dug out some dirt under the high parts until everything was level.  

Here is Leo inspecting the new beds...

Now we were finally ready for some dirt!  I was so excited until I realized how stinking expensive and heavy dirt could be.  We ended up buying the cheapest dirt we could at our local nursery and just amended it ourselves.  

I could not wait to get some of my plants and seeds in...

 I still want to make this area a little prettier.  First I want to remove the grass between the beds because I feel that will be a nightmare to keep mowed.  Then this fall I want to add an olive tree to the middle for something nice to look at.  I think this summer will pretty much be one giant experiment.  Each box gets a different amount of sun so I still need to figure that out and figure out how much I can fit and grow in each.  Hopefully I will only have good updates this summer, but you never know.  Fingers crossed!

My seeds are here!

This may be the most exciting part about gardening! or is it when they start to sprout? or maybe when I get a veggie?  Well I guess for me there a lots of exciting parts, but this is definitely on the top of the list.

What's more exciting than getting seeds in the mail?  Seeds in cute packaging!

Out west our summer starts early so last night I planted a few seeds inside to give them a little head start before I plant them outside.

Not only do I garden because it's fun and I want fresh organic veggies in my back yard, but also because I'm cheap.  I prefer to start my plants from seed to save money and I start them in any container I can find.  I then label the containers with paint so I know which seedling is which when I transplant them outside.

Every year I try new plants and keep the ones that did well the previous year.  Gardening in the desert is always an experiment, every year is different and every year I encounter a new pest.  Here is what I am planting this year and I will keep you posted on how they work out.

These guys have done great in the past and get to come back:

Greencrop Bush Beans - My Grandma grows these back east and loves them, so last year I tried them                                         out here and couldn't believe how well they did. 

Basil- Italian Genovese

Cilantro/Coriander

Parsley- Moss Curled

Bachelor's Button- multiple colors

Marigolds- multiple colors

Cosmos- multiple colors

Cherry Tomatos - Lizzano

Mint- This stuff grows like a weed so I always keep it in little containers.

Thyme- A few plants actually made it through the winter this year.

Oregano- Comes back on it's own every year and grows like a weed.

New for this year:

Basil - Thai, Red Rubin, Lemon, and Cinnamon

Eggplant- Long Purple - Last year a friend of mine grew these Long Purple/Japanese eggplants with

                                        great success.

Cucumbers- Armenian Burpless 

Chile Peppers- Pasilla Bajio and Ancho/Poblano

Yellow Summer Squash- Cube of Butter

Green Summer Squash- Cocozelle - Last year I grew a different variety and it did alright so I'm

                                      going to try a slightly different one this year.

Mustard Spinach-  Supposed to be hardier than spinach, so I am hoping it can take the heat.

I am hoping to have everything outside and growing sometime in March...

Is it Spring yet?

Today was an absolutely gorgeous day, it is spring right?  Winter's over?  I really wish it was.  I received my favorite seed catalog, Botanical Interests, in the mail the other day and I have been dreaming about what to plant this year ever since.  It was so lovely out today so I spent most of the afternoon cleaning up and doing a little pruning around the yard.  I love to garden and work on our little yard, except when it is the middle of summer, then I will tell you I hate it and it's a stupid idea.  I have small pots every where with herbs and flowers, but my main section is in the very back of yard behind our garage.  I have a few planters that I fill every year with different veggies and it's a constant experiment.  If something works it gets to come back next year, if it can't make it through the heat, gets too buggy, or takes too much water or work it gets kicked to the curb.  I currently have a pomegranate bush, rose bush, blackberry bush, hydrangea,  6 cabbages, and some garlic.

But this year I want more.  I want more space and more veggies.  I want to add a large raised bed with a little olive tree in the middle for a little protection from the sun.  I just hope the Mr. is on board since he will be in charge of building the raised bed.  This is what I have in  mind...

Don't be jealous of my drawing skills, it took years of practice to become this skilled....

I will keep you posted on the progress of my little plan, but for today I will have to settle for something a little smaller to satisfy my need to play with something green.  

I have had this jasmine plant sitting on my counter for almost a year now and he needs a little help.  I love this little guy because when these flowers bloom it is amazing, the smell fills my entire kitchen.  The only problem with him is that he is a bit ugly and out grew the little trellis he is growing up.  

So...I ordered these super cute topiary frames from Factory Direct Craft on Amazon to spruce this guy up a bit.

It was incredibly quick an easy, I just pulled out the old moss and trellis and inserted the new frame into the dirt.  I then carefully wrapped the vines up and around the metal frame and secured the vines in place with some raffia.

It will take him a little bit longer to completely cover the frame, but I enjoy having something green to play with in the house.  I threw some new moss on top of the dirt and he was all done with his little makeover.  Now back to daydreaming with my seed catalog...