February 2015

2015 seems to be all about the snow. I'm kicking myself for not planning ahead to keep snow clear around the new hoop house. The important thing is to keep the snow off of the very top.

I'll be sure to use the snow blower to make a large trail all around the hoop house next year.

February 2014

Many Blue Jays have flocked to the feeders for the first time ever in 2014.

January 2014

We had snow on consecutive Saturdays, January 18th & 25th. Not much, just enough to make driving difficult at about 2 to 3 inches.

It's been very cold this January. On 1/3/14 it was -4.8 F and it dipped to -4.9 F on 1/22/14.

The best thing to do on these frigid days & nights is to sit at the dining room table and read all of the seed catalogs that have been sent thus far since December.

:)

December 2013

Here're a few photos from December 2013.

I brought in the rest of the firewood on December 7, 2013 using the old trusty Agway tractor & trailer.

I also saw these fox prints in the snow that same day. This track is that of a red fox.

This is what the Chevy Trailblazer looked like after driving home from work in a snowstorm on December 17th.

So these are all of the catalogs received in the mail in the month of December! Wow, I have a lot of reading to do!
:)

November Photos

I've made 2 more gallon jugs of cider since this first one pictured in last month's post.

I built a screened-in set of shelves to protect the garlic, shallots and onions from mice.

Here's a look with the screen door opened.

My Christmas cactus beginning to bloom on November 10th.

The first snow dusting of the season on November 12, 2013.

Garlic, Shallots, Potato Onions and Onion Sets All Planted

That's right, this is the first ever season of me planting fall shallots, potato onions and my small onion sets in addition to getting 1094 cloves of 19 varieties of garlic in record time!

 Part of the reason I planted so much garlic, so fast was because of my self-made garlic dibble:

Perfect spacing makes for easy planting. Simple as that!

This was also an incredible apple harvest year. I have done my best to use as many apples as possible from my small orchard to make apple butter in early October.

And then I made hard apple cider at the end of this month...

September Photos

 I have about half of the garlic processed while the other half is still hanging in the rafters.

 This was the first and largest zucchini that I saved for seed.

I let it sit on the shelf for 2 weeks and all of the white turned a bright yellow.

The aging after harvesting gives the seeds time to plump-up.

 I made garlic cookies for the first time this year! 

They have a complex taste both sweet & garlicky at the same time.

 On the last weekend of the month, I made my crock pot mushroom soup.

I began harvesting apples on 9/28/13. There're 20 pounds pictured here.

August Zucchini, Yellow Squash & Cucumbers

This summer has been very good for the summer squashes. I've had an abundance of zucchini and yellow squash.  

 This yellow crook-neck variety is prolific this season!

 I made my first zucchini breads on August 25, 2013.

With all of the bridge work going on this year, all of the ground hogs are gone!!!

This little rabbit is the only wildlife that I have seen all summer.

:)

July 2013

I harvested the red shallots in mid-July. These were the spring-type of variety, I've since ordered a fall planting variety which will be planted in October.

June = Garlic Scapes, Strawberries and Firewood

The garlic scapes are ready to pick around the last week of June.

I've also been harvesting small dinner amounts of Oregano.

I'm very impressed with Gurney's Whopper strawberries. 

This is only their first season and I've gotten 2 quarts so far.

Bannish Lumber always calls in the last week of June. 

I ordered 2 cords this year and I still have 2 cords from last year.

May Post

May is all about transplanting and sticking all of the tomatoes, peppers, herbs and direct seeded cukes & squash into the greenhouse for a tropical atmosphere.

The extreme heat & humitity will jump-start all of the above mentioned plants and make them ready for mid-June and early July garden set-outs.

April 2013

This has been a warm and dry April as compared to most. I'm not complaining though! I have gotten seeds planted very early in the season for the first time ever, as well as getting all of my spring plantings of yellow onions and red shallots into the ground.

I also planted some new things like Salsify, Rutabaga, Parsnip, and Beets.