Sunday Rambling

Anyone know what this squash is called?  How do I tell when it's ripe?

  It's official.  Oklahoma is now out of the drought status!  Such good news for folks around here.  Like folks all across the country we've been experiencing a really weird spring and summer this year.  Here in my part of Oklahoma we've had a pretty nice summer.  Of course it's not like I have much to compare it with.  Since we've been here, the past two summers  were off the chart hot and dry so anything less than that would be good as far as I'm concerned. I guess I don't have much "experience" with the weather here to draw on. 

Coming here from Central Texas I'm no stranger to long hot summers and so this years summer is a fresh and new thing for me.  90 might be hot to many of you but for me it's "do-able".   It's only been 100 here a couple of times this year. (So far anyway.)  And we've been getting rain.  I'm betting it just might be a spectacular Fall when the leaves start changing as everything is still green and pretty here. 

I'm still picking tomatoes every day.  I've about run out of things to do with them all. I might make "just one more" batch of salsa though. It's time to start looking at some green tomato recipes.  It looks as though the plants will make it on into the fall. 

The green beans I planted this year didn't do anything.  Well, they grew beautiful foliage and pretty blooms.  They just never produced any beans. I can't remember where the seeds came from but I do know that these are seed  I saved from last year that produced tons and tons of beans.  Hybrid maybe? Pretty disappointing actually. Not even a single meal from them this year.  We'll be pulling them out and putting in something else in their place this week. It should have already been done. I think I'll put in some green peas there since I didn't get a chance to this spring. There is still supposed to be time to plant more so I'll hope for a fall crop. At least the purple-hull peas have done ok.  The second "round" of peas are on the vine and almost ready to pick and it's still flowering so I've got high hopes of getting a couple more canner loads put up before they give out.

I had to pick and dry cayenne peppers again because it was so full of peppers it was weighing down all the limbs.. I'm trying to wait until the peppers turn red to pick them.  The trouble (if you can call it that) is that new peppers keep setting.  Which makes the plant limbs heavy again, drooping  to the ground. The Serrano and jalapeno peppers are really producing too.  The bell pepper plants are doing good but haven't produced as heavily as they did last year.  I've still got some that I dried last year so we should be set for another year if all goes well.  The other pepper plants aren't really producing much yet.  Most of those were the ones I picked up for dirt cheap at the end of the spring season.  Leggy and root bound.  Peppers are weird though, they still might decide to put out for me! :-)

We are hovering between the summer and the fall garden. So much stuff is still producing I'm having to shove fall stuff wherever I find the room. I think while I'm pulling up those green beans I'll go on and pull up the cucumbers too.  I only had one cucumber plant that made it this year but it's been really productive. It's slowing down now and starting to die back anyway.  I've found room for spinach, pinto beans, squash, lettuce and carrots and all those are in the ground.  I've got some broccoli and cabbage seeds that are starting to sprout and I'm hoping I'll be able to get them out in the garden soon.  I'm just not having much luck with either of them so far in my gardening journey.

I'm sorry it's been so long since I've sat down and tried to write.  As you can imagine I've been super busy and it ain't over yet!  This gardening thing is consuming most of my time but that's ok, It's not like I've got anything else to do.  I can't do things as quickly as other folks can.  I have to sit on my trusty bucket much of the time and walking the rows is a slow process.  I can't walk more than about 75' without having to stop and let the pain subside. I have to take lots of breaks. But hey, it is what it is and I'm still able to get my butt out of bed every morning.  Ok, I'm off to try and get some things done. Have a Super Day guys!!!