August Gardens

Things out in the garden grew and grew. Then they started to look tired from all the smoke. Somehow I managed to grow about sixteen pumpkins. The sun was hot and bright when I took these photos.

I put all my herbs in the garden by the fence but I just can't get enough water to it. I have a new plan for next summer.

You can see those tall yellow flowers. I can't believe how lush it all is. It is a habitat. We started to have a mouse problem. They came because of the chicken feed and stayed because of all those German tomatoes. I would find half eaten ones down in the dirt. They were hard to get too so I know it wasn't my youngest.

Every year about this time I start to plan for next year. What is going to get moved, what makes me happy, what worked and what didn't. One of these years I am going to start an awesome garden journal. 

You can see some of the massive pumpkins. They were everywhere. I loved it and hated it at the same time. I loved knowing I would have enough for my porches to decorate with all fall, and enough for baking and making pies. I didn't like how the pumpkin plants grew and grew and grew taking over everything else in the garden. They were also the first plants to get the powdery mildew that the cooler weather of fall brings. They had vines everywhere that looked scraggly and yellowed. I could't pull them out as they pumpkins needed to finish off. I told myself that I am going to plant them next spring out front in the bare section of our lawn but I think my freezer will be too full of pumpkin to even bother. You have to have a reason to go to the pumpkin patch once and a while right?

In the picture with the pumpkins you can see some leaves hanging down in the top corner from our peach tree. It bloomed and my kids picked off all the baby peaches. At first I was mad. Then I learned how to prune the tree and accepted the opportunity to make the tree stronger and better next year. Peaches bloom on new growth. So that means the growth from the previous summer. Since they picked all the peaches off I was able to prune it to the right shape (which I had neglected to do the first year we had it). Now it is growing big and strong with lots of new growth. All that new growth will be great next spring providing many many more peaches. I have to do the same to my Quince.

We have this bean tee pee. It grows out of control. It is fun and functional.

I always like to plant a pumpkin behind the bean tee pee and let it grow across the patio. It gets going before the beans and then the main plant gets a little swallowed but the vines get lots of hot sun on the concrete. I like the look but my kids are a little hard on it with their wagons and bikes.

We started to gravel the pathways. I listened to logic put down a weed barrier. Yeah, that failed. The kids and the dog dug it up and shredded it. So I had to go out and pull it all out. I love the gravel look but think we might have used the wrong kind. Everyone said to use the pea gravel as it is soft for kids and dog paws. It is getting all over and it is hard to walk in. Its a little like walking on the beach in the dry sand. In my next garden I think I will use the chip gravel. I think it looks more natural and compacts down allowing for easier movement over the top.

I love flowers. These beds need some late summer pop. I am not good a buying things for my garden. Every year I tell myself that I will buy this or that to balance it out as it seems to bloom most in the spring. Then the year passes me buy and I never do it. I am good at getting what I can get easy and cheap. Beggars can't be choosers I guess.

Photo bombed by a crazy pup.

She loves it out there. We all do.