I'm baaaaaack. Maybe.
This post brought to you by my (very) occasional contributions to Lehmans, here's the link.
I'll put my original further down, because this post is actually about my realization how freaking awesome my editor is.
When I submit something, I send it as a draft, with the understanding and expectation that things will be changed. And by that I mean the kind of change between the Lord of the Rings book and the movies. That's what I'm expecting when I send stuff over.
What I get is something much, much better.
When I see my contributions on the Lehman's Blog, I have caught myself thinking 'hey, that person sounds sort of like me, only better and funnier and she's writing about this thing I have done and that looks almost like my picture...pause...read a bit further, check the tag line...hey, that's my article. AWESOME'.
That's what a good editor does. They take the original voice and they amplify it and make it clearer, without distorting it. I have that editor. And she rocks :D
Here's what I originally wrote for the article linked above, make your own decisions:
May 19, 2014
For us this year so
far has served as a reminder that we are not in charge of our garden and how
things will work out.
Despite months of
planning, re-arranging, re-planning and, let’s call it, dreaming about the
perfection that will be this years garden, we are now officially 3 weeks
behind, we have harvested a grand total of three (you read that right, 3)
radishes, and they were minuscule, because everything is either languishing or
bolting to seed before setting full roots.
 |
| Bolting Radishes |
The peppers and
tomatoes went in on May 19, 2014, the latest I have ever planted anything, and
it’s because I didn't want the poor little plantiwuzels (totally a word) to
freeze in the ground, but I had to get them in, because they were starting to
not like being in pods.
And don’t even get me started on the sunflowers just poking their little leaves out, because those are the support system for the cucumbers, so those JUST got seeded out. Slackers all around me. I NEED cucumbers and cherry tomatoes, fresh from the vine, for my continued happiness. Does Nature not understand my needs here? And no, buying them is not the same, I have been forever ruined for hothouse produce. Starting to get scurvy here and rapidly going through my last little stores of pickles from last year, this is completely unacceptable. Where do I lodge a complaint? Just kidding, this is actually what makes gardening fun, having to adjust and go with how things run, not really having control. And there is a core deep happiness and sense of thankfulness and accomplishment when I pull one of the canned jars from last year or the year before off the shelf. That is something that no one could ever have explained to me, that sense of ‘YEAH, we did this, despite torrential rains, despite season-long droughts, despite insect invasions that had me picking bugs for days. Nothing quite like it :D
Potatoes, lettuce, peas, carrots and radishes, cucumbers vining their way up an ornamental trellis: PRETTY. Delicious. Win-win.
I do plan my garden to
basically give me a 2 week break in the middle of summer, because we go on
vacation, completely non-negotiable and we are not in charge of when that
happens. Having everything come into fruit just as one leaves for two weeks is
frustrating at best and definitely heartbreaking, so after doing that for a few
years I started checking the days to harvest and planning the garden around
those dates. Apparently I learn by pain association <wink>. And note,
that’s me planning, not how things actually work out, because never fear,
nothing will go as planned :D
With this years spring
showing me whose boss I will definitely have to do some serious juggling and
shifting of plant dates and even some re-arranging of where things will be
planted, because the radishes that were supposed to be gone by now are still in
situ where some of the peppers were planned, so those guys have to move and
that will create a ripple effect in my plan, because they have to go where the
corn was scheduled to go, which will have to be bumped by a few weeks (thank
goodness for long growing seasons), which means the beans will be bumped along
with them. To give a concrete example of one that didn't work out for me: The
buckwheat I put in as early as I could only poked their little baby leave up a
little bit before they all drowned (and were immediately replaced by
dandelions, grump).
The carrots are
clinging to life with a ferociousness I never thought I’d see in a humble
carrot, because they have now been drowned, parched, nearly frozen and munched
on by slugs, the letti (lettuces? Oh, if only I’d paid better attention in
English vocab) is pathetically small, but at least they haven’t drowned (I was
worried there for a few days) and they are being little troopers about not
bolting (see above about the slackweasel radishes), so I am actually really
impressed with those little guys, can’t wait to eat them :D
 |
| Carrots, trust me |
On to further happy
news: Despite being broiled, frozen and drowned ourselves and see-sawing
between fanning ourselves and lighting fires in the fireplace to warm up the
house, the garden is ready. Broadforked and augmented with compost, weeded,
desluggified (it’s a word, trust me), because those little suckers will
actually drink cheap beer (no, I’m not letting them drown in home brew),
sprinkled with crushed eggshells and diatomaceous earth and now it’s all about
the weather forecast. So here’s hoping that it’s accurate and I didn't just
plant almost 200 seedlings, only to have them all die in a late frost. Pray
with me :D
June 15, 2014
Done at last, done at last, goodness gracious, we are done
at last.
With the spring/summer planting.
A whole month behind schedule.
My schedule that is, because as we all know, *I* am not in
charge and there is simply nothing I can do about that and it’s sort of
glorious, isn’t it?
Here’s where we are as of today:
Carrots(Dragon, and I simply can’t wait to see them in all
their red glory :D) going strong and
being all bushy and looking inviting. Make you just want to nibble, don’t they?
Grow, grow, we want to eat you!
 |
| Carrots, told you to trust me |
Little Potato cucumbers, these guys are being sprinkled with
diatomaceous earth regularly, so that nothing nibbles on them when I’m not
looking (as are all the other plants, that’s the little whitish specks you see
in all of my pics)
Three head lettuce, this is one of the last ones around,
because we ate the rest already and only left a few to go ahead and bolt, so we
can seed save them for the fall planting. And they are kind of pretty when they
bloom, so I get double duty out of the deal. Can’t complain about that, now,
can ya?
It is for that reason that I plant a lot of lettuce in the
front of my house, where one would expect to see flower beds. I know that I get
strange looks when I am out there, harvesting lettuce and herbs for dinner with
a big ole colander, but I just can’t bring myself to waste all that space on
things I can’t eat.
Note to self: Don’t plant corn in the front flower beds, it
doesn’t look right.
Lazy Housewife beans, also pretty and can vine their way up
an ornamental trellis. Or, as in this case, be in the garden and be purely
functional. That is something that is on the list, pretty trellises for the
garden, it just hasn’t happened yet. It just so happens that the beans really
don’t care what they climb. I’ve used sunflowers, corn, sticks, a discarded
porch swing frame, the side support of my clothes line, you name it, beans will
climb it. Hooray.
The only limiting factor for me is what I want to have to
look at in my yard all summer, so I strive for pretty. That garden is supposed
to feed more than just our bellies, after all :D
Last, but definitely not least: Black Cherry Tomatoes.
I’m
informed by a reliable source that these are delicious and candylike (me, I am
that source, I had them last year) and will not make it into the house. And
since the hubbin flat out refuses to eat raw tomatoes of any kind, they will be
mine, all mine. And there are 11 plants, so maybe, just maybe I will be able to
dehydrate some or can them for the winter, because these things are sooooo
jummy, and dehydrated they are like
tomato raisins (tomaisins?). I would show you a picture, but there aren’t any,
because I used up all my self-control to put a handful into the dehydrator,
there was none left for taking pics before devouring them.
I have limits. A lot of them. I embrace them and when it
comes to delicious, homegrown foods without preservatives (OK, salt in some
cases), I see no reason to restrain myself.
That’s all I have for now.
Happy Pinching.
P.S.: Tomatoes LOVE used coffee grounds, and eggshells, so
don’t throw those out. And the coffee grounds and eggshells also act as a
deterrent to some pests, so there’s another win-win.
