With some nice, warm weather, the garden is really starting to take off. So are the weeds:). I’ve been spending hours in the garden, trying to keep it under control. I’m still planting a few things and I’m weeding as often as I can. We do a mixture of raised beds and a large in-ground patch of garden.

I’ve been thinning the carrots and beets. It’s not my favorite job, so I’m just doing a little bit each time. On the right are the tomatoes. We have Glacier (extra early), Oregon Spring, Oregon Star, Carmello, Fantastic, Roma, Roma Cordova, Sart Roboise, Queen of the Night, Sungold, Sweet Million Cherry, Yellow Pear, Long Keeper and a few more.

Some melons have actually come up. I’m amazed. They often don’t. I’m trying a kind called Ng Ogen and Oregon Delicious Canteloupe.

The cabbages and broccoli are getting larger.

We have several different kinds of cabbage. We have Quick Start, Copenhagen, and a mixture with all colors and sizes. I’ve planted a cabbage in all the blank spots where things didn’t sprout all over the garden. We will have a ton once they head up.

We have Romanesco broccoli and a Hybrid Broccoli blend growing.

I have a few peppers blooming.

There are Jalafuego Jalapeño, La Bomba Jalapeno, Ancho, Lola (a long green kind), Blot (a striped sweet), Yellow and Green Bell, Carmen (long red), Anaheim, Jimmy Nardello, Yellow Hot Hungarian Wax and Serrano. There may be more, but that’s what I can remember. I use them for salsa, cooking and I freeze lots of little diced pieces to use in the winter. I have canned some pickled ones in the past, as well.I add a jalapeño to my dill pickles sometimes. They are in wire cages because I find it helps them to not topple over once they are loaded with fruit.

In the background, you can see the pathetic patch of Blue Lake Bush green and Carson yellow bush beans. We have filled in the gaps with new seeds and I noticed just this morning that some of those are coming up already. Rob put some netting over them to keep the crows out!

There are some pole beans coming up. I planted mostly Blue Lake Pole and a few Purple-Podded Pole. Some are on a wire panel, and the rest are against the fence at the back of the garden. The ones that were planted a little later are still in the ground, but the first ones are growing rapidly.

I also got a small patch of corn planted. I’m excited to see if it works. I bought an short-season variety.

I’ve been cutting lettuce for a couple of weeks now. You may notice a few peppers in the midst of the lettuce. They will grow once I remove those heads. I do a lot of succession planting in all of my garden areas.

The Maestro shelling peas are in full bloom now. I look forward to picking and processing them before the full garden comes on. The last couple of years, I have been replacing the pea patch with a fall crop of cabbage and broccoli and plan to do the same this year. We will start those baby plants a little later.

I have lemon cucumbers up. There are a few Muncher slicing cucumbers up, but not many. I did add a few more seeds a couple of nights ago. The pickling cucumbers are not up, so I re-seeded them. Except, of course, the volunteer pickling cucumbers that have burst up where they were last year–right in the middle of some zinnias and dill seedlings….:).

Last evening, I finally got to cleaning out and planting my 2 raised beds on the side of my house. That place gets very hot, due to it’s location and the concrete driveway it’s by. I planted Dragon’s Egg cucumber, Lemon Drop and Sugar Baby watermelon (got to keep trying even though watermelon is sketchy here), Purple tendril sugar snap peas, a yellow climbing snow pea, some Honey Drop Peppers, Jenny cantaloupe, the Long Keeper tomatoes, and some extra basil plants I had. I added some Drunken Frizzy Headed lettuce and called it good for now. There are strawberry plants in parts of those raised beds and I left those, of course. You may notice all the unusual varieties—our daughter Lovana bought most of these seeds and I planted them. How exciting to try some new, different varieties. We will see what we like!

Veggies are not the only thing I grow in my garden! My helper is looking a little sheepish because he just pulled up (and is possible eating) the 2 onions we were saving right where he is standing…they clearly aren’t there any more. Some broccoli is no longer where it once was, either. And, just wait until the cherry tomatoes get ripe–he loved them last summer. There is no worm or bug that is left alone. He also keeps taking his shoes and boots off and sinking into the soil like any good thing that wants to grow. Water is liberally sprayed around with the hose, and we have had to rescue little onions from being washed away. Another favorite activity is dumping weeds into the compost. He fills his little bucket and begs to dump it in the heap. I just have to watch that the lettuce isn’t an easy bucket-filler:). Life is not boring around here and I have to stay on my toes at all times! I love that he has this opportunity to play in the dirt along with me.

I’m so grateful for the opportunity to garden. Rob’s first job on returning from Bangladesh was to set up the sprinklers in the garden. I was watering with watering cans and a hose while he was gone. Once he popped that water on and the garden was soaked several times, it grew even more quickly. Some things seemed to double in a matter of a couple of days.

I spent quite a bit of time, while doing that watering, thinking about ladies all over the world, specifically some I recently heard about in Kenya, who walk for 2 miles to bring water to their vegetable patches. I felt such an appreciation for how easy I have it here and the abundance of water here in the Pacific Northwest that allows me to grow such a large, prolific garden. I spent a lot of time feeling grateful and blessed and praying for those who have it harder than I do in so many ways.