(AF) GARDEN FRESH VEGGIES IN NOVEMBER!

  It is an absolutely BEAUTIFUL Fall day, here, today! The sun is shining brightly and the day has warmed up very nicely. Out in the direct sun, it even nearly feels hot! I am loving this!

Although Dave's Farm wasn't quite so lucky, I once again dodged a damaging freeze night before last. (only by about half a degree, I would say.) I don't think I have ever had this much garden this late into the season! Today I thoroughly enjoyed fresh green onions from my garden with my lunch. As I type this post, I am looking out my window at the beautiful contrast my tall, ripening Tabasco peppers make against the brown and nearly void of leaves trees. And I still have ripening tomatoes (both cherry and full-sized), green ones not yet ripe, and .... blooms coming on and setting! Oh, it will be a sad day in about a week when a stretch of several hard freeze nights in a row hits! But until then, I am going to really enjoy this rarity!!!

I have had 2 figs ripen so far, and quite a few more are on 2 of my trees. This is the first time I have had them this time of year, and the first time I have had more than 2 or 3 figs on them at all. I have no idea if they can tolerate a light freeze or not, and I sure do want  them to ripen! My mouth drools at just the thought of eating all of them right off of the trees! Dave and I shared the first one the other day, and was it ever a treat!!! Nothing at all like the figs you get in the grocery stores. And oh, those trees are looking so beautiful this year! One we thought had died last winter, then a couple of tiny leaf buds finally peeked out from low on the dead looking little trunk. Now the tree is taller than my head!

I have one ripening pumpkin left to pick, and I think it will ripen just in time, but that crazy pumpkin vine is now putting on more pumpkins! Will they go to waste? NO! Just before it freezes, we will pick them and fry them up like summer squash.

It is going to be a very hectic week preparing for the inevitable harder freeze a few days from now. I need to be doing so many things all at once. I have online work to do tonight for myself and the flea market, I have flea market set-up and sales the next 2 days (well, I hope sales) and now it will be dark when I get home from that, then Monday is catching up from the weekend, and Tuesday, when Dave is off, we have plans for some pressing chores that need both of us together to get done. So, somewhere in there, I have LOTS of plant work in preparation for the freeze, including potting quite a few up, and carrying in potfuls of the ones we want to winter over.

 It hasn't helped at all that yesterday, I took a hard fall and I am very sore and have jabbing pains in a few places now, today. My legs just don't work so good any more, between arthritis and a couple of other things that I don't know what the problem is, yet. Some days my legs might work so well I could dance all day, then others, it is all I can do just to make it to the bathroom, and then most days are in the middle ground. Yesterday was one of those latter. I stepped on something tiny that threw my step off and I was down fast, twisting like a pretzel as I fell, scaring poor Dave because I was on the phone talking to him when it happened. Naturally, I landed on my worst knee, and jarred my recovering back. Oh, well, I took it easy on the walking around end last night and ended up getting a couple of afghans that I had started finished. and came up with an idea for a new knitted item. I will show you that if it comes out when I try making one up, lol.

I haven't forgotten that a couple of you have asked for some of my recipes. I got very behind in a lot of areas when this site went down and I spent countless hours for over 4 days trying frantically to repair things (and had no idea what I was doing) to get things back up. (And yes, when I have a long stretch of time, I will tell you all about that, too.) So please be patient with us as I catch up both online, and off.

The wind is very high, today. I am enjoying listening to it as it forcefully rustles through the crisp, now browning leaves, grabbing them up and tossing them onto the ground to replenish the nutrients in the soil that this  year's plant growth consumed. But the wind today isn't enjoyable for everyone in our state. As I got on here, I noticed that according to the Weather Bug at the top right of this blog, that the Western half of our state is under a Fire Warning! If knowledge serves me correctly, that means there IS a fire somewhere and all those areas in the warned counties are in danger of it spreading to them. Even with as much rain as we have had in recent weeks, even my area is still listed under High Fire Danger. We had just gotten so dry that all the recent rains have only dampened the surface and just a little ways down, it is still VERY dry. I hope and pray that everyone in the Fire Danger areas are safe and don't have any losses today!

I hope all of you wonderful readers are having a beautiful day, today, and we would love to hear from you as to what your weather is like right now in your area, and where your garden stands, if you have one. Even if your garden is simply in a state of rest, we would love to hear from you.

(AF) FROSTY NIGHTS

I spent Tuesday evening doing the Cake & Ice Cream thing with my family to celebrate my mom's birthday, so I was greatly relieved that the frost Dave got that night missed me. At only an hour's drive apart, the ever so slight temperature difference in that distance made all the difference in the world. My plants looked cold, but they all survived with no apparent damage.

But over in my neck of the woods it was forecast to go down to between 28° and 32°F last night so I spent yesterday getting all my valuable veggies and house plants prepared. None of my veggies produced during our record heat this summer, but as soon as it finally cooled off my veggies finally began to bloom and set and I am not in the least ready to let Jack Frost have them!

I had quite an assortment of houseplants outside, all of which badly need repotting. But I had to just bring them inside to warmth for now and worry about repotting later. My Aloe Veras are still in the ground. They loved the hot dry summer and multiplied really well so I just put a heavy cardboard box over them and hoped for the best. I will have to dig and pot them up sometime next week.

Early in August I had planted tomato seeds in peat pots in the shade, hoping for great Fall weather to set them out into a Fall garden. But the heat and drought continued on so I only put a few of them into the ground and several into very large pots. Now, as freezing temps approach, they are growing beautifully and putting on loads of tomatoes! It will be a lot of work, but I am going to do everything I can to get at least a few tomatoes off of them. Often times I just pick all the greens ones off when a freeze approaches and either fry them or make pickles out of them, but this year I am going to attempt to extend their growing season as long as possible.

Quite a few of the tomatoes in pots I brought into the house. Now my hallway looks like a forest with a small path in the center to walk down. I kinda like it! Now, if some of those little tomatoes would turn red, and a few stay green, I will be ahead on my Christmas decorating, ha, ha, ha. That is a very tempting idea and would definitely be a Christmas the grandkids would remember.

As for all the rest of my plants .... some in the ground and some in pots too large and heavy for me to lift by myself, I dragged out every old blanket, large heavy boxes, and thick feed sacks I could find and spent the afternoon and evening covering everything up. Until we have a harder freeze for several nights in a row, it is better to cover up the plants in the big pots anyway, rather than drag them in and out of the house.

We have a chance of a light frost again tonight so I am just going to be lazy and leave everything covered up today, then uncover it all tomorrow morning. After that, we are suppose to have at least 6 days of beautiful, warm weather before any more chances of frost. If all of my coverings keep them toasty and safe through these two frosty nights, my little Fall garden will have another whole week to grow and thrive before it is in danger again.