Well, I had my blog all ready to go this morning, but Kim hadn't got her blog up yet, so I decided to wait until after I got home from all my errands. Big errand day. Anyway, after reading
her's I realized that it wasn't just a suggested "let your kid take pictures," but sortof the assignment for the week. Thank goodness I was brave Monday and let Matthew take pictures, but I had been planning to let that be the blog for Friday. So I've totally revised and here we go. We will start off with the best of Matthew's photo's. Remember he is 3 on Sunday, so I think he did a pretty good job. I didn't make him explain them. I'm not sure if he could. But I will tell you he watched me take pictures of the garden this morning, and he went in, got his camera, and took a picture of every single pot in our garden. They weren't very good because he just shoots with little aiming, but that's what he was doing. Monkey see, monkey do. Ok, here's Matthew's shoot from Monday.
Matthew must have found the marigolds important, because I think he took a picture of every single bloom. This was the least blurry of them.
Our pepper plant that looks like a weed.
The tomato in the pot, the pot knocked over and the pot back upright. There was many multiple shots of this pot at these 3 different stages.
For not quite 3, I think he did an amazing job! I took charge of my beloved camera again, when he was trying to force the shutter window open, while it was turned off. Enough was enough.
Monday I launched war. War you say? Why? Where? Well, I have had, for the first time in my life, major problems with caterpillars. I've never had a problem before so I'm mystified about whether they were in the soil I bought (they are very tiny ones, not big) or since I didn't see them before we got here, is it this location? Whatever the case, they are here and they are eating everything to stubs. All 3 of my Martino's Roma tomatoes, a caterpillar ate down to stems. Here is a picture of the Cream Sausage that nearly suffered the same fate.
Looks pretty sad uh? My onions sprouts disappeared over night, but they are slowly returning. I finally broke down and said enough is enough.
Enter the new plants. Enough with seed, I need results now!
I got a new tomato plant, Fresh Garden Salsa, to replace the munched Martino's Romas. It's just too late to try from seed again. I bought marigolds, since the internet said they may help repel the caterpillars. I bought basil for the same reason and it smells so good! My peppers have steadfastly refused to sprout, so I bought a Garden Salsa pepper. It has been the most challenging year I've ever had gardening. Some stuff sprouted and died. Others haven't sprouted. Others I swear aren't even growing. Just for fun I also bought a lavendar plant, but it's roots looked like they were dying once I got it out of the pot, so cross fingers it doesn't bite it too.
And this is how my True Black Brandywine looks this morning with it's added helpers. Isn't the variegated basil beautiful? I haven't seen a single caterpillar since Monday. Is it working or is it a fluke? I don't know, but I'm grateful for the break anyway.
While examining the garden this morning, I really looked at the pepper, which happens to be in bloom. It really has beautiful little white and blue blooms when you stop to look at them. I hope they are getting visited by pollinators. I never had to worry at our old house because it was full of wild honey bees, bumblebees, wood bees and many other things. Pollen got moved.
The more I looked at the pepper plant, I finally realized that it had a pepper, quite possibly ready to be picked and another 2 growing. I thought I'd picked a plant that hadn't set fruit yet. That shows you how observant I'm not.
Of all the seed we planted the beans are far and beyond out performing all the others. Matthew told me he wanted green beans yesterday for lunch. I told him that I would open a can and he said, "NO, I want PURPLE green beans Mom." The sweet sound of success. My son wants our very own purple green beans. Me too kid, me too. They haven't bloomed yet, but I'm hoping that's purple flowers getting ready to bloom.
And to wrap this long post up, Cathryn, who visits and leaves sweet messages, wanted to see the whole catalpa tree. Since I can't figure out which is her blog, or if she has one, I decided to just post it here in hopes she catches it this week! Here is the little one in the side yard.
And here is the big one in the back. They can get very big and elegant. Hope you enjoy the pictures Cathryn!
We attended 3 parties in 2 days. 2 were for Matthew, 1 for Angela getting accepted into the PhD program. These are pictures from Matthew's actual birthday.
Auntie came and brought a truck full of goodies. The go cart...
...the military jeep and a small bike that is still a little too tall for him. Plus wrapped gifts.
I made Matthew a homemade white cake with cocoa fudge frosting. Yum!
Blowing out the candles.
Auntie, you made this gift too hard to open!
The joy of being spoiled with too many new toys. This kid just raked in the goodies this year!
We went to see Great MaMaw and she even had a gift for him. Don't peek!
It's a big truck!!!
Hmmm, what can I stuff in here??? Thank you to everyone who attended the parties, gave gifts, drove a long ways to attend, and risked being flooded out of your home just to celebrate Matthew's 3rd birthday with him. It was a fabulous time!
