Blair constructing the mini greenhouse
Homemade seed flat for all of our veggie starts
I just love Butterball's expression in this one!
The neighbor cat, Chris, likes to hang out with us (and roam inside our house for food). It's OK. We like him a lot.
Using some hardware cloth for more exact seed spacing
Butterball inside the greenhouse squishing our seeds
Seedlings!
Two compost bins - ideally one ready for use and the other to add to
Transplanting the cabbage, broccoli, and tomato seeds to a deeper flat
Butterball and Chris having a "conference"
Gotta love that beautiful compost
Butterball getting in his veggie serving for the day
Butterball in the greenhouse AGAIN
Maya checking out the greenhouse now (copy cat)...
Butterball providing moral support to Blair as he double digs the beds
Sifting compost with hardware cloth
Adding a layer of compost to the first "double-dug" bed
Starting to add our transplants to the bed!
Golf balls helped us measure out spacing in the first bed.
Beets
Seed potatoes
Me planting the onion sets
Bed layouts
Bed No. 1 complete - lettuce, beets, broccoli, cabbage, carrots, onions, red and yellow potatoes
Our backyard was quite messy through this process.
Beginning to prep Bed No. 2
Existing raised bed on the other side of the backyard - our "control" group
More onions and some garlic
The "I'm not looking so hot" herbs - cilantro and rosemary
Costoluto Genovese tomato plant - from a community garden transplant sale
The finished "control" group area - two tomato plants, lavender, rosemary, cilantro, onions, and garlic
Radishes and marjoram from volunteering at the Town Lake demonstration garden
Butterball sunbathing with the tomatoes
Tomato planting tip: Plant the tomato on its side to get more of the stem underground and establish a better root structure.
Bed No. 1 looking awesome!
Volunteering with Green Corn Project at Metz Elementary
Cilantro and rosemary looking better. Planted two new pepper plants in between the herbs.
The Costoluto Genovese hits 4 ft.
The other tomato plants are just over 2 ft.
Purple hyacinth bean vine sprouting
Onion flower
Broccoli
Cabbage (and carrots to the right)
Yellow and red potatoes
Zinnias (for companion planting) and zucchini
Butterball sleeping on garden duty
Bed in front of the house
Bees pollinating the anacacho orchid tree
First attempt at growing some succulents
Volunteering with Green Corn Project
Something is trampling the potatoes...
...and munching the cabbage leaves.
First jalenpeno sighting
From the garden - potatoes and beet greens with garlic
Citizen Gardener graduation ceremony at Barr Mansion
It was also a local food potluck. :)
We brought the maple-glazed roasted carrots you see on the left side of the plate.
Graduates of the permaculture design class
All from the garden. I especially love the carnival carrots (weird shapes and colors).
Our first tomato is getting big!
Zucchini
Butterball's new hiding spot
Beautiful beets
One white beet?
A side effect of using compost - things growing that you didn't plant
Tomatoes on a log
CSA box from Johnson's Backyard Garden
All tomatoes from the garden! With heirloom varieties, you really get some interesting shapes and colors.
Probably our biggest homegrown tomato so far (and a stupid face from Blair)
Gazpacho making
Finished gazpacho!
Homegrown Brandywine
Veggie sloppy joe
Roasting eggplant, tomato, and garlic to puree and use as pasta sauce
Summer squash gratin, recipe from Stephanie
Turning the compost
Mystery melon
My new favorite picture of Butterball
We think it's a Christmas melon (aka Santa Claus melon).
A lazy effort by Butters to scratch the tree
Sweet mid-air action chasing a grasshopper
Purple hyacinth bean vine
We also noticed some catnip growing in our garden (that we didn't plant). The cats went crazy over it.
And then they just zoned out...
Catnip brings them closer than I've ever seen.
Harvesting the Santa Claus melon
Bored on a week night - Melon montage with Blair
Some small onions from the garden
Second Santa Claus melon from the garden
Clearing the beds for the fall garden
Double digging the beds again to prep them
Finding lots of rocks in our soil
Blair's prize for today
The rock graveyard - all dug up from the backyard
We took turns double digging. It's hard work!
A close up of our rocky Austin soil/clay
The beginning of our late summer/early fall garden - eggplant
Corn from seed
Yellow pear tomato
Front to back: summer squash, beans, catnip, cucumber, Yellow Pear tomato, Brandywine tomato, corn
Front to back: jalepeno, eggplant, beans, corn, dead patio tomato plant, cherry tomato plant
A better look at the dead patio tomato plant and Butterball creeping around
Corn
Good-bye Costoluto Genovese (still deciding what to put here now)
Blair working on the compost piles
Butterball being cute
Yes, that's a bird feather. (We found it in the yard, not on a live bird.)
Chris, the neighbor cat
Butterball is having a word with this snail
Eggplant
Bean plant
Young corn plant
Yellow squash
Cucumber
Jalepeno plant
Veggie enchilada stuffing
With hatch green chile sauce (chiles from Kathy and Rob's trip to New Mexico!)
Homemade Sunday lunch with our friend Daniel
Butternut squash risotto
Harvesting our first squash
Caught "red pawed" in the catnip
Now we know why nothing grows in that one spot...
Chinese cucumber
No words. Just funny.
Cherry tomatoes
Jalepenos
Lettuce seedlings
Beans
Anaheim peppers
Minorcan Datil peppers
Grandma and Papa down in Austin visiting
Grandma models some yellow squash and Chinese cucumber from the garden
Papa models some beans and peppers
Dad's KU garden gnome (in his own garden)
Yellow pear tomatoes
Chard Mac and Cheese
Sterilizing jars to get them ready for pickling peppers and cucumbers
Seed flat for winter transplants
Connor, the neighbor cat
Sage transplants
Lettuce transplants
Curried red lentil, kohlrabi, and couscous salad
Bean soup with chard
