Garden or pumpkin jungle?
Hi everyone welcome back! It’s been taking me a moment to get back into the swing of things after all the commotion of July but I am working on it! Instead of spending Tuesday in the sewing room (like I was supposed to) I sat down with my planner and took a moment to realign myself with my goals and ambitions for this company and for my garden next year. I think it is really important to take that time to write down all the ideas and thoughts that float around in our heads so we can work towards them smoothly. I went into the sewing room and saw what a mess it is and decided that I needed to take some time on a different day to get myself reorganized because I could not stop thinking about the garden and getting it ready for the cold. Some major things I need to do before then starts with getting the chicken coop frost ready for my girls, however, I also need a greenhouse so I can prep for the garden next year. Soooo my plan is to take this little shed type thing attached to the back of the house and remove the wood from the top half of the walls and replace it with either greenhouse panels or some old windows to really let that sunshine in. The shed is in a really sunny spot and the walls are only plywood so it doesn’t seem like it will be too difficult. As well, I think I am going to reuse the wood I do remove to help seal off the chicken coop. I am looking into doing some of that this weekend as I already have a line on some windows. The next priority after that is doing a fall crop planting. I would like to replant some beans, peas, and maybe some loofas but where I had them they were getting eaten by the chickens. Once the chicken coop is fully sealed hopefully they will leave my crops alone! Now that I will have an actual greenhouse I am going to turn my grow room downstairs that I used temporarily and turn it into a pottery studio so then I can contain some of the mess and have a good area to do my work. Once all of that is done maybe I will be able to sleep and get more sewing done. I am really wanting to make dishwashing aprons! I love wearing an apron while doing the dishes because it helps protect my clothes but sometimes it leaks through and I still get wet so my thought is to take repurposed shower curtains or some other thin plastic and sew it to the back of the lap of the apron to prevent leakage. Once I try it and iron out the kinks I will put them in the shop as well. My whole goal when I am trying new products or I am building something new is to do it with as little waste as possible. Everything is reusable if you try hard enough and when it is still quality material it makes it really hard to throw away. I hope I am not the only one who thinks this way and that I can build a customer base who is like minded.
The garden. Oh boy. The gourds and pumpkins are taking over. My husband asked if he had any okra growing and I told him those sprouts got eaten by the gourds a longggg time ago. At this point I am trying to keep their grubby little tentacles off of my tomatoes and peppers. My pumpkin hammock seems to be working well but it got full very fast. The one thing I will be doing next year is a separate pumpkin patch and if anything I should start prepping it now so the ground is ready for them next spring. i have quite a few baby gourds and some baby pumpkins which, for the first time yesterday, I was able to help pollinate them! I was never catching the female flowers when they are nice a bloomed but yesterday I had three and I went crazy. I took at least 3 males flower stems to each female flower so let’s hope I did it right. Is there such a thing as over pollination? I have a few baby watermelon which I am very excited for as they were one of my hardest plants to get to grow. I learned that they grow best when direct sown in the middle of June. As well as the squash which seem to be making a good grasshopper home. I managed to plant a cucumber in the middle of the watermelon which I am ok with since all the ones on the trellis died. Overall I am really proud of my garden and did not ever expect it to be this full. I got a few gardening books from my grandma when she was in town and one of them is a gardeners journal which has been super helpful with planning for next year. When I get my garden binder together I will post about how I did it what I did and how you can do it too. For now, plan on farmers market on Sunday with hopefully a couple new products and I will keep you posted about the greenhouse!
Talk to you later!
The homesteaders wife
