Well, I didn't get any pictures from early in the season, and, as usual, I didn't get a great jump start this year. However, my goal each year is to do better than the last, and so far we are doing MUCH better than last year! In March I planted some beets, peas and broccoli. I never saw any broccoli. I'm not sure if it was the soil or heat or something else, but the beets and peas did great! I need to figure out why my beets are not bigger. I think we have too much sand??? Everything above ground seems to grow very well though, and our peas, though not very much in quantity due to a couple of bad hail storms, were very yummy!
Later into the hotter season, I didn't get as much planted as quickly as I would have liked to. I blame it on the pregnancy and CONSTANTLY being tired. UGH! But I pushed through as much as I could, and once I finally made it to that 2nd trimester and had a little more energy, I was able to do more. (The family did help, but it was mostly me working on it.) In that time I had lost some baby plants, mostly okra and tomatoes. I was mostly disappointed because I had used up all my organic, heirloom seeds and had to resort to Wal-Mart ones for replanting! Maybe I'll order more next time. Part of the reason they went bad is because I used the
Jiffy pellets for starting my seeds, and they were horrible! They were affordable, so I thought I'd give them a try, and once the plants all reached a few inches high and were ready for planting, they died very quickly. They also all had very, very thin stems and were very unhealthy-looking. I will NOT be buying those ever again!
Once we finally got some other plants in the ground, we had some strawberries, okra, squash, peppers, musk melon and oodles of cherry tomato plants! Still waiting to be planted, I also have more okra, bush beans, 3 different types of pumpkin, 2 types of watermelon, butternut squash, and carrots. If I can just get them in the ground ASAP, they should do very well!
So here are pictures taken this morning of what we have so far! Um, ignore the tall grass & weeds. We always do a little TOO well at growing those!
These are volunteer sunflowers that took over my first garden. They overtook the peas, but at least we were able to get a lot of good ones before they died off! YUM!
From top to bottom: squash, peppers and melons!
seedlings
Okra! Our favorite!
Mostly weeds, but if you look closely, you might see the 24 cherry tomato plants! The weeds are not up against the plants, but, um, we still need to get them out of there!
A lovely bloom on the okra. :)
Our first okra of the season! We each had a bite....just enough to tease us!
They were delicious! Freshly picked raw okra is the BEST!!!
My trees are doing very well! I have two pecan, two chestnut, one granny smith apple, one almond and one cherry.
Our oldest chickens, 4 females and 1 male. These girls should start laying any day now! Yea!!!! We have a white Wyandotte, two Rhode Island Reds, Black Minorca and the rooster is a Golden Laced Wyandotte.
Our "teen" chicks. These two are around 5-6 weeks old. The bigger, lighter one is an Americana and the smaller one is a Russian Orloff. We can't figure out why the Orloff is so much smaller, but it seems to be healthy!
And these little darlings are only a week old! We have two Rhode Island Reds and two mixed breeds (but should be good layers).
So that is our little homestead so far, here in the city! My goal is to expand a little each year, as much as the city will allow, until hopefully one day soon we can move to the country and get goats, sheep, etc. and do what we want!!!! Happy farming, everyone! :)
