Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Cookie’s OK, but Watermelon is Good too on a Hot Day


As we round into mid-September at the Stoddart Avenue Community Garden, we’re slowing it down a gear this year. A couple of gardeners are already cleaning out their plots.  A few of us have planted crops for our third season.  I’m taking a cue from the St. Vincent de Paul pantry garden (after the August heat fried my spinach and lettuce) and invested in some row covers to protect my greens and lettuce from the sun and bugs.  We harvested a nice-sized watermelon from the kids patch and the beans we planted in July are finally starting to produce.  And, Ms. D’s cat, Cookie, has been pampered at her new foster home.


We usually have a melon patch for the kids in the corner of the Garden.  Last year, the pumpkins
took over, so I banned pumpkins this year.   We planted cantaloupe and watermelon, but only the watermelons took off.  One sneaky bugger got really big without our noticing.  However, it’s taken me weeks to get the kids together to share it.   I finally threatened to donate it to the food pantry and that brought a gaggle of kids over to eat it last Wednesday.

My niece also sent me a picture of Cookie, who has put on several pounds since we last saw her.  She has made a new friend at her foster family.  When she lived with Rose, she was friends with her dog, Brandy.  Now, she has a new canine friend to keep her company.
On Saturday, we have almost a dozen Capital University students coming to help us weed, harvest and start cleaning up.  South came by to see if I’ll have any big strong work for him to do, too.    We need to plant our grape vines, but I doubt that I’ll have time to pick them up before then . . . .


In the meantime, I've been putting my new dehydrator to use drying serrano, jalapeno, ghost and cayenne peppers so that I can grind my own chili powder.


No comments:

Post a Comment