Long time, no blog...and this one will be a doozie...

I can't believe it's been two and a half years since I've blogged.  So here's the chunky on what's going on in my garden:

Garden:

We've gotten most of our garden in at my grandmother's house.  This year I am going to try planting herbs and some flowers between our tomatoes.  I have wanted to for a couple of years but never have. 

We are doing 3 rows of tomatoes.  A full row of Celebrity tomatoes.  They have less acid and family members can eat the vegetable soup we make with these tomatoes without indigestion.  We did a full row of Better Boys and then a mixed row.  My grandmother wanted a German Queen and a German Pink but we ended up with a German Queen and German Johnson.  My sister and I call them butt tomatoes because they are so wrinkled at the top and look like a butt more often than not.  We also have 4 super sauce tomato plants.  I hope to make some spaghetti sauce this year.  Also, I'm a little behind on getting them started, but I have some Snowberry tomatoes - they are awesome.  They are white cherry tomatoes and they taste a little more on the fruity side.  Very delish!

We are doing a full row of okra.  However, what I planted 2 weeks ago hasn't come up yet.  So my dad is going today to get some seeds and get some plants started on the heat pad because it will be cool here the next few days.  We use Clemson Spineless okra - I can harvest them bare-handed, but still use scissors - my dad uses disposable latex gloves when he harvests to keep from itching.  I am hoping this year if we start some true Clemson Spineless I can save the seeds and use them in future years. Once the okra gets started, I will probably put some crookneck squash plants in amongst them.

The row of Better Boys and mixed row of tomatoes are in my grandmother's back yard, along with the row of okra - I call it the lower garden. In the front of the house, across the driveway is a 5 row garden - I call it...the top garden - shocker, I know! 

Row 1 closest to the driveway is Bush Blue Lake green beans (2 lines for the row) and sunflowers in the middle of the row.  I am going to have to go back and re-plant some of the beans as some aren't coming up.  I will do that this weekend along with weeding everything.  I actually enjoy weeding - it is very cathartic for me - almost as though I'm pulling my internal "weeds" at the same time. 

Row 2 is colossus peas with Silver Queen corn in the middle of the 2 lines of peas.  These colossus peas are years in the making for us.  A friend of my great aunt and grandmother sells the peas in shell.  We got some and my grandmother and I were going to dry some to use for seed.  I had colossus peas and 3 other varieties of peas and beans I had dried and kept separate.  The day I was shelling the dried peas to put the seeds away for the next spring, I dumped almost every single one on the floor in my living room.  I could have cried right there because they all looked alike.  Luckily, I had 2 hulls of colossus that I hadn't shelled yet.  I took the seeds from those 2 and planted them last year in a little spot in our garden.  My grandmother got one little mess off of it, and every other bit was saved for seed.  I ended up with a jelly jar full of seeds...yay!  So this year we have a full row of these peas...which is lucky for us because our "supplier" hasn't had these peas again and isn't planning them this year, either.

Row 3 is potatoes in the middle and peas on either side.  This year I was actually able to use our very own seed potatoes from last year!  I brought the last of the potatoes to my house to can up last year, and there was about 3 gallons of potatoes that I never got around to canning.  I put them in a vented basket (cheapie from the Dollar Tree) with a paper towel in the bottom and sat it in front of a vent in a little nook area between the kitchen and living room.  There they sat for months - sprouting a bit, and shriveling, but not rotting.  In March, when we broke ground to plant potatoes, I brought these back to my grandmothers and planted them...and I still have some left.  I am thinking I may try a tire tower at my house. 

The peas on Row 3 are really just for seed for next year.  I have some Tiger Eye beans and some Orca Beans.  I also tried to plant some White Acre peas, but they didn't do at all.  I was getting desperate to find some seed and ordered off of e-bay.  Biggest waste of $7.00 - only about 1/3 germinated and then of those that I got in the ground, they all died.  I may try to order some from a seed company.  I just hate ordering one kind of seed and paying the shipping.  White Acre peas are a favorite food of my mom's side of the family from south Georgia.  We always had them for a few meals when we would go to visit and my uncles have kept up the tradition.  When we celebrated Christmas with that side of the family, we had hamburgers, hot dogs, cole slaw, and white acre peas. 

Row 4 is the row of Celebrity Tomatoes.  There is also a crookneck squash plant at the end of this row, as well as at the end of rows 1 and 2. 

Row 5 is the back row and backs up to a wooden fence that separates my grandmother's property from the subdivision next door.  We have taken cattle panels and made an arch between the fence and the row so that vining plants can grow up it.  Right now, all we have is picking cucumbers and burpless cucumbers but I plan to get a couple of Banana Melon plants and maybe a watermelon.  My concern is with the melons cross-pollinating.  I also want to do some gourds.  I have bushel gourds, dipper gourds, and louffa gourds started at my house and plan to transplant them soon.  I also have four cayenne pepper plants on the end of the row. 

There is another little garden spot near our apiary (bee-yard) and reed bed.  I have onions and strawberries inter-planted there.  The onions seem to be doing pretty good but the strawberries - not so much.  I may have to re-plant them. I started with bare-root strawberries and honestly am not too familiar with them.  Maybe they'll pop through soon?  On the other half of that bed, I have four zucchini plants and a tabasco pepper plant. 

The last garden area at my grandmother's is the well-house.  It is 2 cinder blocks high and we have arched cattle panels over it, too.  We typically grow pole green beans over it.  We are running a bit behind getting them planted this year.  Beside the well house is a small garden plot (about 2 feet deep by about 10 feet long) and I have Jalapeno pepper plants and will be transplanting tomatillos there soon.  There's also a crookneck squash plant there.

I have tried to space our squash plants out this year.  The last few years, squash bugs have killed every squash plant before we get much off of them.  Fingers crossed we get **something** this year.

As for the garden at my house, I don't think I will have one this year.  I was looking at it last night and I'm not crazy about the soil or where it's currently located.  So my plan for this year is to get my yard straight and start planning - move the raised bed where I want it and work on amending the soil. I did clean out the blackberry bushes and they are going gang-busters...I hope I can beat the birds to some of the berries this year.  I haven't checked the blueberries.  I have a feeling they may not be getting enough sunlight.  I might need to move them or cut more trees.

Bees:

My dad picked up our new nuc just over a week ago and it's doing great.  He split our hive that we had left, too, so we have 3 hives now.  I think this weekend we may do 2 or 3 more splits - there are lots of queen cells.  The bees are truly a learning experience for us.  Our only goal this year is to get all of the hives through the winter.

I will update this weekend with pictures of everything!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all...we have pretty much wound down here.  Hubby went to bed about 7:30 (he did watch some TV at first but was snoring soundly by 8:30).  TJ wanted to sleep downstairs watching a movie, but as soon as the movie was over, he wanted to sleep in his own bed.  He has had one big sugar rush today.  We have pretty much let him have whatever he wants...cookies, candy, etc.  Tomorrow starts the hard work...

He is in first grade.  His teacher just retired and he got a new teacher.  Teacher #1 seemed to have a lot of problems working with TJ.  I don't know if he just didn't get along with her or what.  But he would not behave...long story short, we had several meeting with the school and finally went to see a psychiatrist - who put him on meds for ADHD.  We tried it...adjusted several times, and T and I just weren't happy with how it was - or more importantly - was not affecting TJ.  He was still having lots of problems at school.  We had significantly cut his sugar...no sugary drinks, natural peanut butter and jelly for his lunch, no sugary snacks, etc.  He seems to have made some improvement.  Teacher #2 has actually given him E's several days in a row.  (E is excellent and with Teacher #1, he only got U's - unsatisfactory).  So we are hopeful.  

We have switched to Smucker's Natural Peanut Butter...only ingredients are peanuts and less than 2% salt.  I can live with that.  I didn't realize how many peanut butters added sugar.  It was a major shock when I was standing in Publix reading the labels.  TJ really likes grape jelly, but for the last couple of months, I have been giving him seedless blackberry jelly that only has sugar, pectin, and blackberry juice in it.  I know it has the sugar, but it was just about the only one I found that didn't also have the high fructose corn syrup in it.  I have recently found a blueberry jelly that is sweetened with grape juice, so it has no added sugar in it.  It is made by St. Dalfour and says it's an old French recipe.  I hope this year I can make up some jelly myself so I know what's in it for sure.  Anyone know of any sugar-free (no artificial sweeteners) jelly recipes?

Surgery update:  I have lost 66 pounds.  It is sad sometimes that I can't eat as much as I could.  Today at my grandmother's for Christmas lunch, I got full before I even got to the dressing, much less the dessert table!  So I do have to be more selective about what I eat.  I am not doing as well as I should be about what I eat.  I drink sweet tea (a no-no) and eat things that are on the "avoid" list.  So I guess when we get TJ back on the wagon this week, I will be getting back on, too.  But 66 pounds gone is awesome I think.

Garden update:  I got garlic, white onions, and yellow onions in the ground this fall.  They have sprouted some when it was warmer weather earlier, so when it gets cold, they will die back.  From what I have read, that is okay and the onions/garlic will still grow like they should.  We did put a bale of mulch hay on the row so they are protected.  

I have decided I want to do a herb garden.  I think I am going to do it here at my house.  We have a space in our front yard that had juniper shrubs and boxwoods that we pulled out.  So I think I am going to use that space with some tires to contain each plant.  I will update when I know for sure.  I do want to plant some healing herbs as well as cooking herbs.  I am also wanting the garden to be as GMO-free as possible.  It will be a little hard since my dad does the tomatoes, but I want everything I plant to be GMO-free.  Last year, I planted a hybrid corn - Silver Queen.  This year, I have found a couple of heirloom sweet corns I want to try.  I haven't decided for sure which one will actually be planted, but I'm getting it narrowed down.  

I hope everyone has had an awesome Christmas!

Kelly

Vertical Sleeve Gastrectomy Scheduled...

So I have a date scheduled for my vertical sleeve gastrectomy - September 13!  We are still waiting for insurance to send their approval, but the surgeon has me down for the 13th.

I am nervous, scared, excited, all rolled into one.  Part of me keeps thinking I should be able to lose this 170 or so pounds on my own...and shouldn't do the surgery.  I think that it is the best choice for me though.  I start my liquid diet on August 30 - a week and a day from now.  It's weird to think that I have a week left of eating the way I am now.  I told hubby we are going to eat Mexican on the 29th.  I guess it will be my food funeral of sorts. 

So starting the 30th, here is what I will be able to have each day:
4-5 servings of Bariatric Advantage High protein meal replacement
Broth
Crystal Light
Water
Sugar Free Jell-o
Sugar Free popsicles
I can have 2 servings of dairy daily which are no sugar added fudgesicle or 1 cup skim milk.
I could also have decaf tea or decaf coffee, but no sugar or creamer, so those are out for me.

So this Saturday will be my last "Waffle House" excursion with my dad for a few weeks...after surgery, I can order just an egg or just some grits and be okay I think.

It's a big step, but I have a lot of support and I am ready.


GARDEN:

So I have been horrible about updating the garden progress.  We had an okay harvest of corn, but every ear had a worm on it...ugh.  We are still getting black eyed peas and lima beans, but neither have produced enough to can up.  We have canned tomatos and soup and that's about it.  Our okra is really starting to bang it out, so we'll probably be canning some of that up. 

Hope everyone has a great day!

Our first tomato!

We got our first tomato last night from the garden!  It's from a "volunteer" plant (one that came up on it's own where we had tomatoes last year).  It's about an inch and a half in diameter.  We also got 3 zucchini, 3 burpless cucumbers, and a bunch of crookneck/straighneck squash. 

It looks like the black eyed peas have started to grow...yay!  They actually may grow taller than the okra soon. 

The zucchini is growing great also.  We have gotten 5 so far...yummy yummy!  My sister, L, fried some up last night the way we fry crookneck squash and it was yummy.  I steamed some in the microwave and my grandmother tried it, but she didn't care for it much.  My dad declined to try it. 

The cushaw squash plants are HUGE!  They are beginning to grow out of the row...not sure what I'll do about that yet.  I think they aren't ready to harvest until late summer, so it could be a long wait.

Our Cherokee Trail of Tears beans are doing okay.  We had a small mess and my grandmother cooked them up.  She said they were a little tough, but we haven't given up yet.  We've started picking them a bit younger.  We had another mess, but there was a kitchen "incident" and the beans didn't make it.  We picked last night and got half of a five-gallon bucket of beans.  It came out to be about two gallons or so of snapped beans.

On Saturday, I color coded the tomato plants in our tomato garden.  I took about a 12 inch long piece of colored yarn and put on the cage, by variety.  I am also making and laminating a card with the name of each variety on it and putting a piece of the yard on it.  I will have each one with a binder ring so we can just snap them onto the bucket and know which variety is which.

Daddy got irrigation to the watermelon plants and they are really growing.  This picture was taken last week and they have almost doubled in size since then.

The three on the left are Georgia Rattlesnake watermelons and the three on the right are Jubilee watermelons.  Both are the seeded oblong watermelons.  I can't wait! 

My in-laws will be in town this weekend.  I brought home some of the potatoes, beans, squash, zucchini, and cucumbers to do a really yummy dinner...will share after I cook it! 

Enjoy your day!



Garden Update - Saturday, June 9, 2012

Yesterday was Saturday, aka "Garden Day."  We met my dad for breakfast at Waffle House then headed to my grandmother's to play in the dirt.  

The only "work" that needed to be done was to put cages around some of the unruly tomato plants.  Oh, and weeding...always weeding.  Then of course, it was time to pick the crookneck squash...yay!  I love getting the food out of the garden.

So first I went and checked out the garden and picked squash.

Row 1 (Silver Queen Corn & Contender Green Beans):  the corn is growing great.  The beans are growing, too, even though on each end they are struggling.  

Row 2 (Clemson Spineless okra and California Black Eyed Peas):  this is the only row that doesn't have boards to define the row.  We have re-planted the peas on this row twice.  The first time we re-planted, some of the peas came up (you can see some of the taller ones).  The new peas are starting to break the ground now...yay.  I hope they come up really well because this is one thing my grandmother requested.

Row 3 is a repeat of Row 1, but has 3 Crookneck Squash at the end of it:

Row 4 (Russian Mammoth Sunflowers & Henderson's Baby Lima Beans with 4 Crookneck Squash):

Row 5:

Black Beauty Eggplant

Bottle Gord:  (the tag says apple gord, but we decided to use the bottle gord after I had made the label...oops)

Pickling Cucumbers:  

Butternut Squash:

Green Striped Cushaw Squash:

Sweet Potatoes:

Zucchini

Green Bean Arch (Cherokee Trail of Tears Beans):

My grandmother found some beans that should be ready in a few days.  There are TONS of blooms and they are GORGEOUS!

Now on to the tomatoes...if you ever have a tomato plant that gets unruly before you are able to get a cage around it...here's the answer.

Step 1 - Find a medium sized cardboard box.  Cut off either the top or bottom flaps and open it up on one side so it's just a long piece of cardboard.  Then roll it up:

Step 2:  Lift up the tomato plant on one side and put the middle of the non-flapped side of the box as close up against the base of the plant as you can.  Then gently wrap the sides of the box around the plant, drawing the two ends together.  If you are doing this by yourself, have a clip or small spring clamp to hold the box together.  Then slip the tomato cage over the box.

Step 3:  Gently lift the cardboard out of the cage:

Voila! 

Here is the tomato garden.  We still need to color code the cages since we are going to try to keep all the same kind of tomato together this year when we harvest.  Maybe I should laminate some tags rather than color?

I took the squash I gathered and canned it up.  It's an experiment really.  I know that squash should be pressure canned, but we want to preserve it to fry and pressure canning makes it mushy.  Freezing does, too.  So, I do not advocate in anyway anyone doing this.  We did it to try and see what happens. (NOTE...it did NOT work...do NOT try this please!)

Squash harvest:

I sliced the squash and put it into quart jars.  I then added 1 teaspoon non-iodized salt and 2 tsp vinegar to each jar.  I poured boiling water over it, got the air bubbles out, wiped the rims, and put lids and rings on the jars.  We water-bathed them for about 30 minutes.

I also weeded out the watermelon patch.  They are growing great!  They have even started to vine out.  However, my phone died before I could get a pic!  Ugh!  So, that will have to be next time.  It's supposed to rain today through I think Wednesday or Thursday.  Hopefully, if we get rain, it will be a slow, steady rain.

On the weight loss surgery front, the doctor sent me two...I guess presentation is the best word...to watch.  One on the band and one on the vertical sleeve gastrectomy.  So I watched those last night.  Really not anything I didn't know except on the band one, it said that part of your stomach would be sewn around the band to hold it in place...that sounds weird.  But we shall see...appt in 3 weeks.

Hope everyone has a beautiful day!

Kelly

Welcome to my brain dump!

So I have been thinking about doing a blog for a while.  Mostly to share everything that runs through my brain - my brain dump, if you want to call it that - it seems most appropriate. 

I am working on an awesome garden this year with the help of my wonderful dad, incredible grandmother, and awesome son. 

I am also starting the process of having weight loss surgery. 

Between these things, having a husband and six year old son, a full time job, and all the other little life things that pop up, sometimes I forget what I just thought 5 minutes ago.  I try keeping journals and lists, but sometimes, my little brain just needs to wander. 

I've been trying for a few weeks to come up with a blog name.  Nothing seemed right.  This morning on the way into work, I was listening to one of my fav's - Miranda Lambert.  Everybody Dies Famous In A Small Town...isn't that the truth!  Part of the chorus is "Every last one, route one, rural heart's got a story to tell" and it hit me - that's it!  So here it is, my rural heart's story to tell. 

First off - weight loss surgery.

I have been overweight my entire life.  Well, let me take that back.  When I was four, I started clogging in a group and I did that for six years until I was 10.  When I was 10, I decided I would rather be in girl scouts than clogging.  I clogged twice a week for a couple of hours each time.  I stayed thin.  Well, no more clogging and I started gaining weight.  I am 34 years old and at my highest weight of about 335, give or take a few pounds. 

A few years ago, my sister L had gastric by-pass surgery.  She had some minor complications with it, and seems to be doing great with it now.  She looks AWESOME!  My best friend, TK, had LapBand 2 years ago.  She looks incredible also.  I have tried Weight Watchers, the Duke Diet, and several other "I'll eat better and exercise" tries.  I don't have the self-control to not scarf everything in sight.  So, I believe weight loss surgery could be the tool I need.

I have my initial consultation Friday, June 29 at 1:30...woot woot!

Second - my garden.

This has quickly become my sanity check.  I forgot how relaxing weeding can be!  We have 5 rows at my grandmother's house.  In past years, there hasn't been much serious gardening going on.  Someone else did the garden one year, then last year I decided I wanted to do it and learn to can.  My dad had his tomatoes in one and a half of the rows.  This year, I kept coming up with new things I wanted to try.  So, he started a new tomato garden behind the house.  So technically, we have four "gardens" there.  One is the five-row garden, then there's the green bean arch, the tomato garden, and the watermelon patch. 

In the "garden" I have them planted:

Row 1 - Silver Queen Corn in the middle and Contender Bush beans on either side

Row 2 - Clemson Spineless Okra in the middle and California Black Eyed Peas on either side

Row 3 - same as row 1 in first half - Silver Queen Corn in the middle and Condender Bush beans on either side.  We also have a couple of Crookneck Squash plants on the end of this row

Row 4 - Russian Mammoth Sunflowers in the middle with Henderson's Bush Baby Lima Beans on either side.  There are also Crookneck Squash plants on the end of this row

Row 5 is truly my experiment row - the only thing in this row that I have ever grown before are the cucumbers and the squash...everything else is my first time growing.
3 zucchini plants
1 bush burpless cucumber hybrid
9 sweet potato plants
2 green striped squash (I have never seen these before.  Apparently they grow HUGE so I'm excited to see what they become) - if anyone has any great recipes, please let me know!
1 butternut squash
3 cantaloupe
2 bush pickling cucumbers
1 bottle gord
1 Black Beauty eggplant
1 Crookneck Squash

Watermelon patch currently has 6 hills - 3 each of Georgia Rattlesnake and Jubliee watermelons. 

At the green bean arch, this year we have only planted Cherokee Trail of Tears beans.  We had a few plants last year on this arch as an experiment, and my grandmother loved them so much she asked we do the whole thing in them this year. 

I will have to find my list of what kind of tomatoes Daddy has planted.  I know there are a lot of them though.  We do have a whole row of Celebrities.  They seem to have less acid in them and do really well in vegetable soup.

I know this has been a long post, and if you've hung in, I appreciate it.  I am really looking forward to posting and updating everything!

Kelly