Garden Meal Variety

I've been trying to blog about this since last Friday. But life gets in the way sometimes. Anyways, Friday night, I made dinner in the crockpot. And while the meat was store bought (I'm not up for killing any cows or anything yet), everything else for the meal was out of the garden. All the seasonings - everything. I didn't take pics of the whole meal, because as you know (or maybe you don't) when Brenna gets hungry you better feed her. So I didn't have the opportunity to take pics of everything else. But you get the idea. It's such a cool feeling to have a real homegrown, homemade meal. We also added fresh tomatos to the salad too. And while we're on the subject, everything is going strong. Soon, we'll be able to add a fruit to the table too! The watermelon and cantaloupe have really started to vine out and now it's about controlling them. The fruit trees are doing great! I'm sooo sooo happy with them! Here's a pic of the oranges that are soon to be ready! (and there are TONS of oranges on the tree)And the plum tree is really blooming out now. It has put out many flowers, but I was really waiting to see a fruit pop up.And there it is!Which makes me really happy - since we were told this was a self-pollinating tree, but does better with a companion. I was concerned it may not bear fruit without a spouse. But it did! And hopefully there will be more to come from that!

And the apple tree is going strong too with the green leaves and some flowering. And the most exciting news - the other apple tree has got its first leaves! Yay! I was REALLY getting worried about it. I just knew it wasn't going to make it. It has been just a stick for so long, while its friend was going strong. Rex came over though and noticed the variety is a later bloomer and gave me hope and sure enough, just the other day, we noticed the first few leaves coming out! Woo-Hoo! Maybe we will get some apples after all!

Other pictures - the jalapenos are going a little bit crazy, with 6-7 per plant. We have to make sure to keep them pulled off as they reach their potential to keep the plant from weighting down.

And we've had some rather large bell peppers as well.

I didnt take pics of the spinach, herbs, onions, or tomatos again. But we have really got to get a handle on all that. If I'd have known just how well the garden would've done this year, I wouldn't have planted quite so much. I have to keep giving away spinach and cilantro and parsley. The tomatos I am actually having to cut back and keep groomed. It is insane! Just in time for the watermelons and cantaloupes to take over I guess. :-) But it's great! This is definitely our best year for gardening so far!