Happy (Steroid) Harvest!!

Well, it is harvest time.  So begins (well, actually continues) the gruelling labor of plucking plump, ripe, fresh veggies from the ground. Ha!

This year (our 2nd year of having a teeny tiny urban garden) was our first year of growing zucchini. We harvested quit a few zucchini, to my surprise. Most of them were the size of pickling cucumbers - all but one:

I am not sure to what we owe the size variation.

The little zucchinis ended up in Cris' delectable cookies. The big one that obviously was on steroids ended up being sliced into coins and fried. Toviel and I smothered them in butter and ate it. The rest of the family was not too fond of it, but Toviel and I....we will eat anything that is smothered in butter. It was delish!! And for the next few days I mustered up some new-found energy to do some serious organizing and cleaning. So, I am pretty sure that zucchini was on steroids very good for me.

What We Do Instead of School

Last week the weather was so nice. Not your typical September weather. I felt bad for all the kids who had just returned to school and had to miss out on part of the sunshine, since we had such a wet and cool summer.

This is what we did the first week that other kids went back to school:

It was something like 35C or 37C out. We had only had 3 or 4 days this summer that were even close to being pool-worthy, so I happily filled the pool up and let the boys spend the afternoon splashing around and keeping cool. I usually add some bubble bath to the water and they enjoy some bubbles while getting clean.

When they were done and eating a 100% juice freezie, I announced that I was going to harvest some of our garden. Elijah protested and asked that I wait until he was done his freezie because he wanted to help.

He loved plucking the beets and carrots out of the ground. He also helped me with the tedious peas-and-beans-picking from start to finish. I was lucky that I was able to employ my mom (who was visiting for a few days) to do the shelling, cutting & washing of the veggies as that is my least favorite part of having a garden.

It was an enjoyable and relaxing end to the summer.
Now...on to fall....

Foraging For Food...

...in my back yard! My teeny-tiny back yard!

Our garden is bring forth fruit (and veggies).

Peas!

Green Beans!

Zucchini! (it is so teeny still)

Beets!

Red Onions!

There are SO MANY ladybugs in our garden this year!

The Harvest

Delicious Peas!

I love peas. Especially raw. I love peas so much, someone dear and close once called me pea-ness.
These peas are especially good, and especially raw.

I can tell you one thing, if I had to work this hard every day to get food to eat, I'd be a whole lot thinner.