Garden -July

Well the garden this year has been a struggle.  We have had a serious drought here in TN and that combined with the fact we got the planting in 3 weeks late, some of our veggies haven't done so well and others are just plugging along.

2nd planting of green beans

Our first planting of green beans did really well.  We had lots to eat and also to freeze for the coming winter months.  Our second planting isn't as large as the first but is coming along well so far.

Some of the herbs are doing well also, including the parsley and basil which I will soon pick and dry.

Our pepper plants and tomato plants are doing great.  We are freezing the excess peppers we have left over that we haven't ate.  The tomatoes are so delicious that none of those get into the freezer.  We have just been eating them.  Not wanting to be without fresh tomato sauce, I have been going to the farmers market and buying some tomatoes in bulk.  1 box (60 tomatoes) for $10 that I have been turning into sauce and canning for the winter months.

Thai peppers - extremely hot!!

Chili peppers

Banana peppers

Cherry Tomatoes

Our watermelon is doing good also.

See the 2 little watermelons?

We also planted some cantaloupe when we did the 2nd planting of beans & corn.  They have sprouted and are growing so hopefully we will have cantaloupe too this year.

Some of our veggies haven't done so well.  Cucumbers completely died.  Thankfully we had lots of dill pickles left from last year.  I did go buy a 1/2 bushel of pickling cukes at the farmers market to make some dill chips and then also some Bread & Butter pickles since we were out of them.

Corn has done awful, our first planting went to seed which means it did grow but didn't get any ears on it.  So we did put in a second planting, they are about 7 inches high right now.  I also have picked up 3 dozen ears of corn at the farmers market that Jamie & I cut off the cob and froze.  I've found a local farm that will be harvesting their corn shortly and I'm hoping to get an additional 12 dozen ears to freeze for the rest of the year.

Zucchini's are doing okay.  Yellow squash has done awful, we haven't even gotten one yellow squash yet.

Gardening is definitely harder this year than lasts but hopefully next year will be better.  We will make sure the tiller is in working order before hand, this was our hold up for planting late this year.  We will also be able to compost the whole garden. 

In the meantime, we are enjoying what we are getting to eat and I'm loving going to the farmer's market every Saturday.  Lots of yummy things to see and try.  We go over to the large one in Cookeville so their are lots of people there selling.