Saturday gardening journal

Here I am shamelessly recycling this post from last saturday!! nothing much has changed in the past week, still way too much swiss chard despite giving lots away and eating more if it of course!...

Since Ginny's first gardening journal I've been planning each week to participate in the fun, but never quite manage it.  Even my yarn along posts are very sporadic at the moment. So after preparing this post I realized that Ginny doesn't do her gardening journal every saturday and typically I didn't choose the right week.
But I've just discovered that Samantha over at Lodgepole Peace Farm is doing a similar thing so I'm going to link up with her today.

When I put my 'hoist' on the table this morning I quickly grabbed the camera and got to peeling and thinking of what I would say in my first ever Saturday Gardening Journal.

Notice the absence of Swiss Chard! even I, a chard maniac, am 'over' this vegetable, and we still have loads of it in the garden.  We seem to have planted some kind of giant self-cloning variety.  The kids, who were never that enthusiastic in the first place, have gone from "oh no not that again" to an outright declarations of "we hate this!".

just look at all that swiss chard!!  thankfully I remembered to take this picture before hanging my smalls on the washing line!

Thus to date we have harvested:
-New potatoes
-Spinach - and have a 'late' variety now coming up, much to Tino's delight.
-Beetroot - they are very slow this year so I'm trying hard to leave them a bit longer, but they are soo yummy.  This one is going into a little jar of chutney.
- Flat yellow and green beens - which I'm starting to freeze now as they are coming thicker and faster than we can eat them.
-Lettuce
-White cabbage
-Carrots

pick ' n eat - a speedy snack, who said 'fast' food couldn't be healthy.

-Cucumber - eaten and pickled (and eaten a jar of the pickled already)
-Rhubarb - pies and jam
-Red & Black currents - jam
-Broccoli
-Courgette
-Squash - some one gave us the seeds but I don't know what they are actually called. I sliced one into half-moons and roasted it with oil, salt and various herbs - including lavender, and it was delicious.  I think I might try the next one with butter, maple syrup and cinnamon as seen in Ginny's post.

The leeks are fattening nicely and I think I will freeze them in small batches for soup this winter.  Also planning on freezing ice-cubes of parsely as the dried stuff has no flavor, but will dry the mint, lavender, thyme and rosemary.  Not quite sure what to do with the oregano yet?
My prune tree has 5 prunes, 4 more than last year but I doubt that they will ripen, this is a very temperamental tree, I don't think it ever got over the rough treatment it got from some hungry deer two winters ago!

there are actually 5 prunes hidden in this picture!

She sprouted lots of flowers in the spring, I rather hopped they'd all turn into big juicy plums.

but just look what deer are capable of doing.  The tops were too high to reach , the bottoms hidden by snow, and the rest as you can see, is history.

Unfortunately the mirabelle tree out the back didn't appreciate getting pruned and has refused to produce anything at all!

a mix of flowers and herbs make a sweet smelling table decorations.

my handsome garden helper!