a {partial} snapshot of the bounty from our garden....

this picture is several weeks old, but this is one of the very first harvest of a variety of veggies: basil, beets, cherry bomb peppers, a yellow tomato, green cabbage, cilantro and yellow summer squash.



beets. who knew that they'd be so popular? aside from corn and tomatoes, they are our most requested vegetable. thankfully, i planted ALOT early in the season.

i will mention here, though, that beets do not like raised beds. they do their top beety thing quite nicely, but the main beety thing on the bottom? very disappointing.

the carrots have also made a respectable showing, although they are not nearly so popular. I'll take carrots to the farmer's market only one or two more times, and then pull them all to free up the raised beds for some fall plantings of lettuce, strawberries, spinach and broccoli.

here is part of our July 4th feast: red, white and blue potatoes.

we're glad that we grew the blue potatoes this year, but the yields are very disappointing. this will be the first AND last year that blue potatoes are grown on our little farm by the bridge. even though we started them quite early, (by most standards) it's obvious that the blues needed another month or more in the ground to size up nicely.

the red, white and blue potatoes did sell marginally well at the Farmer's market, and in our CSA boxes, so i guess it wasn't a total waste...

most of the onions are harvested, or on the list for this week. many sized up quite nicely, and i was not disappointed. after trimming the tops and roots, they are spread on newspapers in the mudroom to dry out.

again, the red and white onions are a staple at farmer's market, and for our boxes. surprisingly, the white seems to be just as popular as the red onions, which is not what i expected. i like to cook with the red onions, just for the added color they give.

and just in case you think that we don't take the time to stop and smell the roses ( or purple cone flowers, as the case may be...) i took this picture last week, right outside the back door in the perennial flower garden.

and this little surprise greeted G and me on our way to dunkin' donuts at 6AM last week. this curios and greedy little skunk got in *almost* over his head. he took a little dip and dive into the pig bucket and got stuck!

Dave dispatched him without incident.

although i will say, that it would have been MUCH better if Dave had removed the skunk AND bucket from OFF the BACK porch, as a DEAD skunk, EVEN though MOSTLY buried in a pig bucket, can STILL smell up a back porch.

AND mud room.