How Did My Garden Grow

I love growing a garden, and eating fresh food straight from it!! The weather was so good this fall, that we were eating from our garden into late September! It was awesome! I didn't do hardly any canning this year, which was a nice change from years past. 

We cut down the pear tree in our yard late last fall, so we no longer grow any pears, which is a relief to me as I don't like them and always felt guilty if I didn't pick them and do something with them. The big transparent apple tree only grows fruit every other year, so this was its year off, which was also nice because I usually spend a lot of time picking the apples and canning them. The smaller apple tree that grows red apples only a grew a few fruit this year, and the boys picked them and threw them in an apple war during our family barbecue in August. I didn't realize it until after the fact; I was irritated at first, but I got over it. There was only one fruit-bearing tree in our yard that I partook of this year, and it was a surprise to me--the plum tree! Josh gave me a flowering plum tree 5 years ago for my birthday, but he thought it was a non-fruit bearing tree. It grew 4 plums this year, though, and they were so delicious! I am hoping the peach trees that we planted 2 years ago will start bearing fruit next year--they grew so well this year. One of the mowing clients that Ammon has let me pick some of the peaches off her tree, and I ate peaches for breakfast and also for snacks everyday for two weeks in August, and it was absolutely divine!

In the garden by our home, we grew raspberries and rhubarb, and I planted strawberries this year. I didn't cut or eat any rhubarb this year, which is strange because it is my favorite! But I started going on a dessert-free, less-sugar diet in July which was about the same time that they were full and ripe, and I worried that if I made any kind of rhubarb dessert with it, I would eat it all! There were only a few strawberries that grew, but the birds nibbled on them, so next year I will have to put some kind of netting over them to protect them. Thankfully, I had a lot of raspberries to pick--more than the previous 2 years (when we planted them), which was exciting! I ate bowls of them (with milk) for breakfast 4 times, and Josh and I picked and ate them off the bushes for months. We have two kinds of raspberries: red and golden, and they were my favorite thing we grew this year!

In the garden spot by our driveway, we grew corn, potatoes, onions, and about a 1/4 acre of pumpkins. The onions didn't do so well this year, because they weren't weeded very well. We only got about 25 total, and they were all very small. The corn did fabulous, though. We ate corn on the cob for dinner 5 or 6 times throughout August and September, and then in mid-September, I spent one evening freeze canning the rest.

I saw an idea that someone posted on facebook of using a angel food cake pan to help process the corn, and it worked fabulously!!

The corn freezing process didn't seem as overwhelming this year--it felt like the right amount of corn to cook and process, and I got it all done in one afternoon/evening. We ended up with 14 bags of it, which is just about right for the year--I just barely finished using the last bag from last year's freezer corn, so this was perfect timing, too!

We grew Red and Yukon Gold potatoes this year. We've dug up and ate two loads out of our garden already, and we aren't even half done digging them all up yet! They are so delicious and we love eating baked, boiled, fried, and mashed potatoes!

We planted less variety of pumpkins this year, and this was the highest crop we've ever reaped for sure! We spent 10 days in September picking pumpkins out of the patch. We took over 7 trailer loads to storage sheds, and each trailer had approximately 100 pumpkins on it--which means we grew about 750 large pumpkins this year!! We also grew mini pumpkins, and we had several boxes full of those, and we grew some white pumpkins in our neighbor Frank's garden, so the number of overall pumpkins is over 900.

We feel so blessed for our productive garden this year! Summer produce is always so delicious, and I've really missed eating the fresh raspberries and corn the last few weeks! It's kind of sad to see the plants die and turn brown, but I've already been making plans for next year's garden, and am looking forward to reaping what we sow once again!