rain and rosemary

"What was the weather like today?" I asked Larry during our journal session.
"Raining, I guess," he answered. It was pretty accurate. During class we had showers which turned to down pour to almost clear sky and then through the whole cycle again. Most of us chose to stay dry in the greenhouse...

Nick stood out in the rain the entire time. And liked it.



Lila has taken the class for many years and her favorite activity is making herbal infused vinegars in the fall. For years we have had an enormous rosemary bush at the garden. This past winter it did not survive the harsh conditions. Lila transplanted a new plant in the spring to make certain we could do the vinegar. She asked about the vinegar and checked on "her" plant all season. Today she was delighted to start the process.



Julie fills a jar with rosemary.



Larry and Keri help fill jars for those who missed class today.



Bobby concentrates to get every needle in the jar.

Then we added sage which will turn it pinkish purple and topped the jars with vinegar. We wrapped saran wrap around the tops (metal lids will corrode from the acidity of the vinegar) and we will let it steep for several weeks.

end of summer

Today was the last official class of summer. Most of us will keep up the good work next week when the fall session begins. A great excuse for Mary and Keri to bake cookie though.



The class showing off our windsocks.



Then we moved the whole group five feet to the left to get a reluctant member in the photo.

one big zuke

mary julie and carrie are all posing with the same enormous zucchini,but only one of them brought it home. (We are hoping for some zucchini bread to be brought to class this week. hint, hint.) Sometimes we struggle with the fairness of gardening together and sharing the harvest. This week we harvested the one zucchini and a small handful of beans and peas and lettuce. It hardly seemed fair for one person to bring home the celebrated produce and others to take home little or nothing since we all help with planting,watering, weeding and harvesting. But this is an important lesson in the garden too, trusting that another week we will each get a piece of the abundance.

Mary's view of garden class while we harvested peas,beans,zucchini, our first tomatoes, lettuce and thyme.


Mary loves flowers and wanted to take photos of the pretty pink cosmos...


...her good friend Carrie...


...and the johnny jump ups.


Dion picking peas from our rustic trellis


Larry knows where the action is and moved right in for this portrait of Julie.


Then they tried it again together.


Carrie and Mary.


This week's class photographer with her assistant (me.)

(rustic pea trellis)

All the hot weather is helping our garden really grow. We harvested peas, beans and lettuce. And then I gave the whole garden a good long water.

Carrie's photos

Carrie was our photographer this week. You can tell from her shots she is a real people person.

hot hot hot

I forgot to bring the camera up to class today. We would have seen some sweaty photographs of wilting gardeners. Nick cooled himself off by thoroughly and repeatedly showering with the hose. It might have been too hot for us,but the plants are loving it. We picked three good sized zucchini, loads of green beans and a bunch of peas.

Nick documents the garden

Nick really took to the digital camera this week and went around by himself capturing the afternoon.


a self portrait of this week's class photographer


Keri finishing up the watering


Libby pouring iced tea


Lila

garlic!

After a week we described as "too hot" the garlic was ready to pull. This is a much anticipated favorite activity every summer.

Reina works it out of the soil with a hand fork.


Lila uses her muscles to yank the garlic out bare handed.


Mary shows off a nice head of garlic with lots of roots.


Carrie keeps her cool when pulling the garlic.

We have been painting fish windsocks for two weeks. (Nick even painted the rock that was holding down his fabric)



Dion shows off our first tender harvest of nine green beans.
Julie took this photo of the tomato plant she watered with stinky horsetail tea to help the tomato cells grow strong.

WELCOME

Every week at the end of class we sit together and drink mint tea and write a group journal. We note what kinds of jobs we did and try to remember the names of the seeds and plants we worked with. We also talk about the weather (very important to gardeners)and any other natural happenings up at our spot. I got the idea to create an on-line journal to help participants better share their garden experience with their family, friends and loving support staff. Perhaps someone else who is gardening with folks of all abilities will see our site and get ideas to help them be successful in adapting to the needs of the garden and the gardeners.
I will try to add something to this blog every week. But please be patient if it takes a while before we all get in the rhythmn of sharing in this new way.