Thank the Lord it rained in Austin

~Last night in Austin we had quite a rumble in the skys . It only lasted about an hour but the sky dumped quite a bit of rain on central Texas. I love walking through the garden the morning after a good rain.~The lakes are all down so I have been keeping the watering to a bare minimum to stay alive.
Once going the tomatoes and the okra can carry on with once a week of deep watering

okra with stewed tomatoes one of my favorite summer sides....I will share my recipe later
but I am fearful we are gonna loose our beans, cukes, and summer squash soon. I am gonna try frying some blossoms with the tender baby squash whole. I have seen a recipe for this but it is alluding me right now.
...With the crazy triple digits (temp wise)we are in the middle of ;A big water dump will help keep our little gardens going a bit longer.

~I don't know a thing about corn, but we planted some because Burger wanted to. The corn has been quite magical with its crazy alien tops and all the lady bugs that have taken up residence in its tops..... but now,I think we have an actual piece of corn in there

speaking of little aliens in the garden....
~On a final note I have a few pest questions. Can anyone tell me what these mini beasts are called? are they bad? we are havin' the darnedest time figuring it out...
Also the squirrels are getting my green tomatos any remedies ? I am might have to get me a pellet gun ...the tomatoes are that important!!(although my shot is pretty bad)

In the garden after the rain...

~We had some beautiful rain followed but a rare cool front in central Texas over the past week and it has made the garden a wondrous place the last few days.


....We have started harvesting cucumbers ,
~I love a budding cucumber plant they can be so ferocious
~We will probably be eating our own green beans by next Wednesday.

~I am still struggling with something chopping off my tomato flowers?? GRRRR
....and I think squash is on this weekends menu.
~I have quite a few more flowers this year than last , we planted zinnias, red sunflowers marigolds, and nasturtiums from seeds. These mums are hold outs from last year. I have found that in central Texas my mums are perennials...is that how they are everywhere?

I wonder....moo

From the garden and beyond...

~Well we have been fighting a summer cold 'round here for a few weeks . First burger than daddy then burger again! ...and all this sickness right in the middle of the swine flu scare. So needless to say blogging time has been a little scarce. But today we have not had a fever and are in much better spirits. ~I have been meaning to post a little about our summer garden's progress, so we a re a little beyond these photos now but what the HEY,. These photos are from the past few weeks.

~ Here we have little decorating in the garden, makes it fun for all.
... the first tomatoes guarded closely by the brain.... Bush beans are such spunky little seedlings!... We also have sweet corn, cukes, okra, and an assortment of late summer lovin' flowers, all seen in this blurry rainy photo~ It has been raining steadily for a few days(good for the garden...not the sick burger), so we have been staying inside, painting,
....photographing and trying not to go to crazy.
~ more sick days photos
...Daddy took this beautiful photo of the leek flower we had from our market leeks.
...This cut from a Lantana, came from a plant that popped up in the back yard all by itself.
... My good ol' boys.

....rarely seen, but heard quite often.

...This is one of my early sewing pieces, they are at least 12 years old . My Dad's old lures encased in lace and tulle....random I know but I love them, and often forget them

first seedlings

It is HOT in Texas

"Oh I miss the summer"! I vaguely remember (through the hot hazy humidity in my brain)how I pined for the oh so hot days where we splash merrily about in the cold spring waters of deep eddy... I forgot about the miserable car ride to get there( which we have not brought ourselves to make with gas at 3.86 a gal here) and the fact that if you don't get outside before 10:00 you can forget about doing any yard work or playing with anything but the hose. I also conveniently forgot about the vicious army of mosquitoes that set up camp on our street 9-10 months out of the year.( really)


However I am beginning to remember delicious capresse salad made from my own organic tomatoes, and sweet icebox pickles that dondacinda makes us from our loads and loads of cukes! We have beautiful plants that we started from seeds.


Marigolds,


Tomatoes (These are brandy wine tomato leaves, they are huge!)Cucumbers,
broccoli( which we had for dinner tonight!)
bush beans(we already have enough beans for dinner later this week!),

squash(i have a great recipe for squash flower soup I will share in a few weeks)
yumyum squash flowers


peppers,and soon okra and sunflowers. Oh and of course basil( i must have lots of basil)

this is our beautiful dill plant that is flowering now ( my sweet neighbor gave me seeds at the end of last summer)
Needless to say the summer garden prospects are making me very happy


We are also discovering how wonderful it is to get really really dirty with our finger paints and then hose ourselves down for a long while till we are too tired to walk too the house.
(precursor to naptime)burger is getting very,very,tired eyes(love those tired eyes)


pretty pretty burger pictures, we call the finger paints yellow( all of them or maybe he means the act of finger painting not sure)

finger painted mama



Daddy found a family and pet safe insect yard repellent(cedarcide) that seems to work as long as there is no rain. We got a 10# bag at the natural gardener for $15 that covered our entire back yard( its is pretty big). I put it out in the morning then a few hours later went out with no spray and got no bites(this is unheard of w/o some sort of spray). Unfortuntely it rained that evening and the rain rendered the granules ineffective. Luckily it does not rain in central Texas during the summer very often. So we will rebroadcast the stuff and update you on it's effectiveness.
Bring it on texas summer we are ready(i hope) for you.