Lessons Learned with Growing Strawberries

 Here at our homestead, we’re in our fourth year of gardening in the raised beds that Michael built.  This includes growing strawberries, which has come with a few surprises and lessons learned, some quite by accident! I thought I would tell you a little bit about that today. Especially because lately, we’ve had more strawberries than we’ve known what to do with, and it was the last thing we expected.

The first thing we learned, the very next morning after planting our very first strawberry starter plants 4 years ago, was that we needed to find a way to protect them from the birds and small animals, if we ever wanted to have any berries to pick.  There were squirrels feasting on our new plantings in our bed, and that put Michael in high gear.… Read More

Garden Peek!> Early Summer 2011

I believe we’ve been both gardening and blogging, for about 3 years.  Our life is filled with so many various passions, there is more than we are actually able to get to blogging.  I sure try to get it all in though!  But one area that is especially hard to keep you all updated with, is the gardening!  Good gosh. Things grow and change SO fast, by the time I photograph what I want, edit the photos, and start putting a post together (while you know, living my life and doing 1,000 other things in the midst of it all), the post report, explaining the photos I took, don’t seem very current by the time I get to typing it out!Read More

Strawberries, Super-Sized.

It’s that time of year again, when we start sharing with you what we’ve got growing in our gardens!  For me, growing our own gardens is one of the greatest gifts of the season, and I revel in the joy of it!  So I am anxious to chit-chat with you in all of the gardening-related posts coming up, as we update you on this year’s fruits of our labors, and sharing with you all of the photos I’ve been taking as well.  I love to talk about gardening, so I hope you’ll all join me in interactive conversation, in the comments section throughout the season!Read More

What's Growing in the Gardens!

Finally, I have gotten it together enough, to show you what we’re growing in all of these garden beds we’ve got going.   I’m telling you, I find it extremely challenging to blog about garden updates, because everything changes so fast!   So, this post shares some of the rapid garden progress that can happen in what seems like the blink of an eye.

But I also wanted to share this little story with you.  A couple of weekends ago, we had a spontaneous tag sale.  We had quite the traffic for it too (thanks to Michael’s  Tag Sale professional signage that no one could miss).  But what was so funny, was people were more interested in our gardens when they got here, than our tag sale items!!  It was comical.  They were walking around, peeking under leaves, asking questions and generally flattering us to death.  For 2nd year gardens, we were puffing up a bit and struttin’ around like peacocks.… Read More

Strawberry Surprises & Pixel's Reviews

The last time I had checked the strawberry bed, there was 1 strawberry that I was sure would be good and ready the next day for pickin’, and I had my name all over it!!

But I didn’t actually get out there until 2 days later.

And lo and behold, there were several ready, and some were downright huge!

Not only were there a good many ready, it was obvious there would be a good many more ready in the next day or two also.

They always look so pretty among the green leaves, and dark rich soil, that I’m always feeling a little….reluctant, to pluck them off the stems.  I remember having the same hesitations last year.… Read More

I Am Seeing RED!!

It’s Monday evening, at the close of our long Memorial Day weekend. It’s a bit sad the weekend has gone by so fast, but we’ve got to be happy with all we got accomplished outside! I have been taking photos like crazy, and can’t wait to show you all what we got done, and what the drawn out plans are for our front yard transformation, into a garden wonderland!

Pansies, Verbenas & Berries

Yesterday morning, I found myself up wicked early.  And not at the computer, in my bathrobe, with coffee. But up, dressed, and outside with my camera, taking photos around my yard.  (With coffee.)  I had to wonder what in the heck was going on with me lately.  I have never-ever been one to  get up early, unless I absolutely-no-way-out-of-it-have-to.  This morning, I was not only up at the crack of dawn, but after a night where I had laid in bed during the night, for at least 3 hours, wide awake!  I thought for sure I’d be sleeping like a rock, come morning.… Read More

Gardens Progress Update/Front Yard Transformation

AA

In our last post, we shared with you the very beginnings of our front yard transformation.  We planned out 3 gardens, built 3 garden beds, had loam delivered, filled the beds with the loam, and got our strawberry plants planted all in mid-May.

At the end of May, after the threat of frost had past, we planted all of the vegetable and flower plants in the beds.   I did not take photos of the extensive work we did that day along the way, because frankly, I was covered in earth and sweat, and wasn’t about to touch my camera. : )

A

Here’s a photo of our front yard now, with the 3 garden beds.… Read More

Our Gardens / Front Yard Transformation

We have grand dreams for our yard, and it’s likely you’ll be able to watch the transformations take place right here on our blog!   But we can tell you right away….it’ll always be slow-going.  A little a year. Whatever we can do.  Whatever we have the time, or the money for.  And when we’ve thought about it, we’ve realized we need both at the same time, to see any real progress.  ; )    But you know, we’ve learned to enjoy ‘the process’.  The RIDE, as they say.  After all, we may be too old to ever really DO the end.   But having hopes and dreams are half the fun!… Read More

A simple Summer Treat

1_SberrBberrsink

We threw together this wonderful summer treat on the afternoon of {A}’s birthday, and called it a  Birthday Parfait.

It couldn’t be any simpler to make:

1) Rinse some strawberries and blueberries in the sink.

(Next year we’ll have enough strawberries of our own from our garden, to not have to use store-bought, but these were really good berries, anyway! Big, juicy, and sweet.)

2_SberrSlicing

3_SberriesSliced

2) De-stem and slice the strawberries.

4_Bberries

5_Bberries

3)  Go through the blueberries real quick , just to make sure there are no smooshy ones, : ) , and also take off any tiny stems still on.

4)  Get out your can of Redi-Whip.… Read More

We Picked Our 1st Garden Strawberry!

first

Back on June 11, {O} came running in the house all excited, because Daddy had let her pick the first strawberry from our garden.  It’s was a BEAUTY, don’t you think?  Thank goodness it was a good size berry, because every one of us were so excited, we had to split it 6 ways! My bit was just a tad bitter, I think. It was kind of hard to tell because it was so small.

Second

There were a few other of the June-bearing berries here and there, that were almost ready for picking, too.

Third

Some were in earlier stages than other, but they still looked like they were going to be good ones!… Read More

Strawberry Fields. FOREVER!

header_jbtag

Our family has gotten into some major gardening this year, and you’ll be seeing a whole lot of  it coming up this summer.   Our first project was a strawberry bed. We LOVE strawberries!  Just fresh picked and washed.  In our cereal.  As strawberry shortcake.  Chocolate covered strawberries.  : )   If our crop is plentiful enough, I may even make some jam!

1freshgarden

In early May,  Michael built the bed, and we filled it with some ordered and delivered loam, because our yard/land is pretty sandy.  Then we planted 2 kinds of strawberries. Junebearing, and Everbearing.  I discovered while planting that we didn’t get a tag for the Everbearing plants.  I was irked with that, not only because I would have liked to know which variety of Everbearing we got, but also because I wanted to photograph that tag too.… Read More