kinderGARDEN Thursday: week 16, 17, and 18

Hello, all you kinderGARDENERS, we are still here, just overwhelmed with life and underwhelmed by the bounty of the garden.

Week 16 can be summed up by 2 words: squash bugs. I went out that week and it was like squash bug lovefest on the zucchini vines. I had a picture of about 100 drowned bugs, but I decided it was gross, so be thankful you don't have to see it. Matthew helped me for 3 days straight, night and day, pick off bugs to squish or drown.

Week 17 had a return to a bug less garden, beautiful flowers, as shown above, and...

watering in intense heat...

and a baby mini pumpkin. I actually stalked the bloom so that I could personally fertilize it, to be sure we got something!

It was also the week, Matthew and I replanted parts of the garden with winter crops.

Considering the creek behind the house as quit flowing, parts have completely dried up and it hasn't rained since mid August, I have started watering once a week. Week 18, most of the garden is dead or not producing no matter what I do anyway, so I have decided it doesn't matter. I keep telling myself to just pull it all, but I can't stomach it. But with the lack of watering and high temps, I doubt much of the newly seeded areas are going to grow let alone sprout.

So there you have it, crunchy-ville. We have gotten, 7 purple green beans, 5 Chinese red noodle beans, 25 cherry tomatoes, 15 peppers, 9 mammoth sunflowers, 1 mini pumpkin, and basil, mint, and sage leaves the entire summer. Not exactly worth the time so far.