Harvest

One of my favorite parts of the summer was the debut of our first ever garden! It took a lot of preparation; attending gardening classes, reading up on the subject, getting our garden area ready, the grow boxes built and divided, etc. so we were a little late planting. I have to admit I was overwhelmed at times (did you know a zucchini isn't called a zucchini on the seed packet, it's called a summer squash and there are a gazillion varieties?) and I was very skeptical that anything would really grow. But come what may I was thrilled to be giving it a try. Just like the book promised, we started to see little sprouts in about a week! We had so much fun checking on the progress every day, but the real excitement came when we actually saw fruits and vegetables growing! Now I must confess that we made some mistakes (we seriously underestimated the actual size of a tomato bush for example, and how many tomatoes it would produce. And aparently you can't pull a radish out to check it's progress and then stick it back in the ground) but everything we harvested tasted delicious. The convenience of getting fresh lettuce and tomatoes out of the back yard for my sandwiches never got old. We learned SO much from our little garden this year and can't wait to make some modifications and do it again next year!

Although we didn't grow these apples, we also attempted our first ever apple pie this summer. I guess the garden got us in the mood to try new things! Thanks to our handy dandy apple corer/slicer/peeler and the pre-made pie crusts from Pillsbury, it was a breeze! And oh so delicious.