Re: N & C Midwest: June 2016!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/19/2016, 8:29 pm

CitizenKate wrote:
Scorpio Rising wrote:
Side view of the South Annex! Containers

Left to right; Minnesota Midget muskmelons, Blacktail Mountain Watermelons, and 2 determinate tomatoes, a gift from my son's friend's dad who did not know what he started! In cool red cages from Walmart!
Nice - love the containers!

Thanks! I filled the bottom of them in with empty 2L bottles from my friend so they wouldn't be so heavy and expensive to fill....worked great! I have never done containers before, so will be interesting!

**sanderson** 6/20/2016, 1:47 am

Kale, cut most of the leaves, wash, cut out the stem and roughly cut. Blanch in boiling water for a min, plunge in ice chilled water for one minute, then drain. Freeze in serving sizes in Food Saver bags.

herblover 6/20/2016, 11:31 am

Garden is producing like crazy! Picked kale for supper and another gallon ziploc bag of salad greens which have been fab this year! Chard needs picked too; I can probably start freezing it and the kale. First carrots should be ready to pick any day and all the toms have at least blooms and some have fruit.

**Scorpio Rising** 6/20/2016, 10:46 pm

sanderson wrote:Kale, cut most of the leaves, wash, cut out the stem and roughly cut. Blanch in boiling water for a min, plunge in ice chilled water for one minute, then drain. Freeze in serving sizes in Food Saver bags.

OK, I will do that. It just grows so fast! I wish I did do smoothies! Thanks, sanderson.

Herblover, it has been a great year for greens! I am going to freeze some of that kale for sure! I test pulled 1 each carrot and beet....not yet. Couple more weeks or so. Have enjoyed the stuffI planted a lot so far! Just out of my element with the kale! It is soooooo good for you!

CapeCoddess 6/21/2016, 3:21 pm

herblover wrote:Garden is producing like crazy! Picked kale for supper and another gallon ziploc bag of salad greens which have been fab this year!

Yeah, lettuce heavy here, too...breakfast, lunch, dinner, snacks. Since I need to drop a few lbs of extra weight, I've been using it in place of bread, too, for sandwiches and veggie burgers. Marvel works great for burgers.

CC

**Scorpio Rising** 6/21/2016, 6:16 pm

I need to be better at packing, because I have soooo many leaves! Lunch and dinner for sure, also sugar snaps. Which I have really enjoyed!

CC, that Matchless has a nice sturdy but not tough leaf, similar to Buttercrunch. It would make a decent bread substitute! Thanks for the idea! Gotta eat the lettuce!!

Peppers have blooms, one (maybe the banana) has little peppers! Tomatoes with blooms, and cherries have baby maters! Ground cherries have little tomatillos on there, they will drop when ripe? Wish I had not sandwiched them between the squash. Gonna need a flashlight! LOL

Gonna see how dried out the boxes are. Will probably have to water.

CapeCoddess 6/22/2016, 9:46 am

Yep, the ground cherries drop to the ground when they are ripe. I've got to get mine in the ground! They have flowers on them in their Solo cups. It's just been so cool around here for these heat lovers that it's hard to tell when to do it.

**Scorpio Rising** 6/22/2016, 9:36 pm

CapeCoddess wrote:Yep, the ground cherries drop to the ground when they are ripe. I've got to get mine in the ground! They have flowers on them in their Solo cups. It's just been so cool around here for these heat lovers that it's hard to tell when to do it.

I get it. We had a cold Spring as well, but you have had a persistent pattern of cold that is unusual for June 20something.

Mine have little fruits in paper husks , can't wait to taste my first one! EVER.

**Scorpio Rising** 6/23/2016, 8:53 pm

We got 4" of rain in like an hour last night. Woke up at 0230 to the beeping alarm from the sump pump, whose battery back-up had failed....yay. Water all over in my basement. Pushed a random button that seemed to wake it up--brand new system...and 2 hours later the basin had returned to its normal level....jeesh. Know what I am doing this weekend! Water came in though a drain, not the pump basin...?

Glad I watered last night! LOL! With my luck, and the accuracy (

) of the weather tracker lately, we would have gotten skirted if I hadn't. Oh well. We needed the rain. Just would have been nice to have it all outside my house.

**trolleydriver** 6/23/2016, 9:48 pm

Scorpio Rising wrote:We got 4" of rain in like an hour last night. Woke up at 0230 to the beeping alarm from the sump pump, whose battery back-up had failed....yay. Water all over in my basement. ...

Sorry to hear about your water problem. Hope it did not cause any damage. Is it a finished basement?

**Scorpio Rising** 6/23/2016, 10:12 pm

Thanks, TD. Yes, about half is finished, and other half is storage. Most of what is wet is trash anyways, old boxes, old obsolete records, etc. some stuff needs to dry out, my daughters American Girl doll clothes, that kind of stuff. Just work. Yuk. At least it is just rainwater!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/25/2016, 9:39 am

Beautiful day here, will re-apply the peppermint soap concoction to my pole beans since the massive rain has come and gone! Will need to tied the tomatoes up more later. Might check the carrots/beets, need to check my notes, I think I just checked last weekend and not ready--if so, will wait another week.

I think I can hear things growing out there!

What's up, Midwesterners?

CitizenKate 6/25/2016, 10:05 am

Scorpio Rising wrote:We got 4" of rain in like an hour last night. Woke up at 0230 to the beeping alarm from the sump pump, whose battery back-up had failed....yay. Water all over in my basement. Pushed a random button that seemed to wake it up--brand new system...and 2 hours later the basin had returned to its normal level....jeesh. Know what I am doing this weekend! Water came in though a drain, not the pump basin...?

Yikes!!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/25/2016, 6:30 pm

Yeah, pumped 2 inches out of the pool today. But stuff still needs watered, especially the containers. Still dealing with basement....grr.

**llama momma** 6/25/2016, 10:13 pm

Got a late start and had to cut back this year. Things are mostly in growing mode not harvesting much at the moment. Picked dill flowers this morning. Have baby maters, baby zukes, baby cukes and baby peppers. Bush beans and black turtle beans have immature flowers. Anise hyssop is an herb with blue flowers that draws bees. The leaves are quite flavorful for making a rather tasty cup of tea. So much so that I've picked a bunch of leaves to freeze and use year round.

**llama momma** 6/25/2016, 10:23 pm

Scorpio Rising wrote:Yeah, pumped 2 inches out of the pool today. But stuff still needs watered, especially the containers. Still dealing with basement....grr.

Feel your pain, No fun at all. In the spring we had a sump pump pipe malfunction. Found water spraying vertically soaking the ceiling and spraying horizontally soaking everything in its path across maybe 15 feet or so. The giant puddling mess alone was a pain in the neck to clean up.

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 10:06 am

One thing (well, actually, a bunch of things) I didn't get in this year were herbs. I always grow basil, cilantro, dill at a minimum. I do always have rosemary and thyme, because they are perennial (Rosemary is the only herb I can keep alive over the winter indoors). Anise hyssop, I have heard of it! Is it licorice flavored?

LM, that sounds terrible! At least my damage was all on the floor....still.

Gonna be hot today. Going to head about to water everything before it gets too warm. Doubt there is anything to harvest. I did re-apply the peppermint soap concoction to the pole beans last night. Fingers crossed!

**llama momma** 6/26/2016, 11:04 am

I'm sorry you are still dealing with water damage. Hope it is soon behind you. We had fun trying to fix the pipe because the pump kept going off and spraying and didn't care if my husband was working on it. We both got pretty wet Razz

I usually do basil but didn't this year. I like chamomile tea and have a couple squares of it. That's it for herbs.
And yes anise hyssop has a very nice licorice taste with a mild almost lemony finish. There is a concoction for soaking this flavored hyssop with regular plain hyssop in a jar with raw honey and Braggs type of cider vinegar. Age it, strain it and it is called oxymel. Saw a discussion online. It's an old fashion winter medicinal that breaks up congestion. Supposedly. I've got a jar of it in the pantry, want to see for myself if it really works.

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 5:53 pm

Hmmmm, that mixture sounds like a winner! Keep me posted on how it works for ya! I don't have any hyssops to add!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 6:01 pm

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image25

Red bee balm...

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image23

Pink bee balm...

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image24

Daisy with a mini bee!

All bee attractants...and my sunflowers are coming on!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 6:06 pm

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image26

Minnesota Midgets muskmelons in the South Annex

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image27

Blacktail Mountain Watermelon in the annex as well...all got a good drink today!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 6:17 pm

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image28

Baby cukes and Patty pans upper left

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image29

Copulating orgylike JBs I hate them...... Evil or Very Mad

Ground cherries! Can't wait for my first taste!

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image31

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image30

Patty pans...so delicious and buttery!

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 6:27 pm

So I had some square footage come open due to the sugar snaps and some lettuce being done...called New Leaf, they were giving away for free potato starts! FREE FOOD! And one of my faves, I might add! So I went and got 11 taters...I also bought a bag of. Dirt to fill in a hole that is an ankle killer next to the south annex containers....

**Scorpio Rising** 6/26/2016, 6:30 pm

N & C Midwest: June 2016! - Page 4 Image32

Look at these gorgeous taters! Goin in tomorrow!

Thanks, New Leaf! And I filled in the ankle killer..... cheers

CapeCoddess 6/27/2016, 4:56 pm

You veggies look so lush, SR. Nice! And look at those FREE taters! They are SO ready to go in.

Let us know what you think of your first ground cherry once you're tried it. What a Face

They don't taste like anything else.

CC

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