Crocuses, Herbs, Tulips, & Perennials

Early Summer Vegetables and Herbs

Globe Artichokes

Bright Lights Swiss chard

'Giant' tomatoes

Bolting lovage seedpods

Dinosaur kale

Spring Salad!

Lettuce and spinach with chive and calendula blossoms

A Pretty Pink & Purple Bouquet

Princess Victoria Louise poppies with catmint, chives, columbine, and mint

Chives in Bloom!

Back Yard Kitchen Gardens in May

Dinosaur kale, Ruby Streaks mustard, lettuces, radishes, chives, herbs, mints, lavender, breadseed poppies, bachelor buttons, forget-me-nots, strawberries, Patriot blueberry, perennial sunflowers, and tiger lilies

 All of the above, plus:

Spinach, potatoes, cabbage, broccoli, Red Russian kale, Swiss chard, Red Torpedo onions, arugula, artichokes, snap peas, shelling peas, snow peas, rhubarb, more lettuce, zucchini, cucumbers, lily flowering tulips, Valor plum, Glacier cherry, Egyptian walking onions, more kale, and sweet peas

Orange Emperor Tulips with Sage

Tulips and Trellises

Emperor tulips and snow pea trellis in the square foot bed

Orange and white Emperor tulips

Tulips, snow peas, lettuces, arugula, lavender, columbine, poppies, and herbs

A view from the deck

March Vegetable Gardens

Lots of new seedlings this month along with overwintered flowers, herbs, and vegetables

Growing in these beds right now:

Spinach, kale, chives, chervil, rosemary, sorrel, rhubarb, snow peas, snap peas, shelling peas, radishes, onions, rudbeckia, violas, forget-me-nots, poppies, hyacinths, daffodils, and four kinds of tulips

Square foot garden bed with a large trellis ready for Schweizer Riesen snow peas

Growing in this bed right now:

Snow peas, lettuce, beets, radishes, arugula, chives, sorrel, strawberries, oregano, sage, poppies, lavender, primroses, sedum, grape hyacinths, and two kinds of tulips

Home Grown Fresh Mint Picnic Coleslaw

I harvested one of our savoy cabbages and made this delicious mint coleslaw.  It's a recipe I adapted from The Kitchen Gardener's Handbook by Jennifer R. Bartley.  Along with the cabbage, the recipe includes carrots, green onions, fresh mint leaves, flat-leaved parsley, and a light dressing. It's delightful!

A New Bed for Fall Cabbages

 This is our newly-planted bed of fall cabbages. The first one in the row is a savoy mini-cabbage called Alcosa, and the other five are Marner Laggerot cabbages, a red savoy variety.  In the front of this bed, the rosemary and sorrel are thriving. 

Seasonal Renovation

It was time to give this square foot garden bed a little renovation for fall plantings. Last week, it was full of poppies, onions, and flowering kale as seen in the photo below.  I harvested the onions and composted the poppies and kale.  Now you can actually see the tomatoes and herbs that have been growing here since early June. In the newly open spaces, I've planted Giant Winter spinach, Cylindra beets, Yaya Hybrid carrots, and Pink Punch radishes.  It's a couple weeks later than would be ideal for planting the root crops, but if all goes well, they'll be ready to harvest before the average first autumn frost. 

Wildly colorful spring garden bed before renovation...

Pink Poppy with a Busy Bee

Another breadseed poppy is blooming, and this bee really likes it.

The Delicata squashes in this bed have grown quite a bit in just a couple weeks.

Such a beautiful blossom!

Pink poppies are so pretty with lettuces, chives, and squash in the background.

This Week in the Garden

Summer vegetable beds in July!

What we're harvesting this week:

Dinosaur kale

Divina butterhead lettuce

Oakleaf butterhead lettuce

Cascadia snap peas

Maestro shelling peas

Red new potatoes
Cauliflower

Savoy cabbage

Walla Walla sweet onions

Radish seed pods

Kale shoots and flowers

Nasturtiums

Chives

Sage

Oregano

Italian parsley

Mint

Lemon Balm

Rhubarb

Strawberries

Red and yellow raspberries

What we're planting now for fall:

Tonda di Parigi carrots

Nelson hybrid carrots

Sora radishes

French breakfast radishes

Divina lettuce

Umpqua broccoli

Cascadia snap peas

Summer Square Foot Garden Bed

Summertime square foot garden bed in July

Everything has grown a tremendous amount in this square foot bed during the past couple months.  This is our original vegetable bed that we keep expanding each year.  It's big enough now that we need stepping stones to walk through the middle of it.  We've got lots of other garden beds now, so this one has become a good kitchen potager full of herbs, flowers, and vegetables.  Here's a list of what's growing here this summer:

Snapdragons

Poppies

Sweet peas

Alyssum

Kale flowers

Lavender

Calendula

Strawberries

Oregano

Sage

Chervil

Italian Parsley

Garden sorrel

Chinese chives

Basil

Thyme

Bronze fennel

Walla Walla sweet onions

Lettuce

Sungold cherry tomatoes

 

Just to give a comparison, here's a photo of the same garden bed in spring.

Springtime square foot garden bed in April

In this spring photo, it's easier to see the onions (many of which have been thinned out by now), as well as the stepping stones!  You can also see a good amount of spinach, a small row of shelling peas, some mustard greens, and the very beginnings of the kale plants. 

Flowers & Herbs in Patio Pots

A  few kinds of mint, sweet peas, alyssum, and soon-to-be-blooming peacock orchids, along with poppies, calendula, and strawberries in the background

Bouquet in a Basket

Big clusters of oregano and lemon balm harvested today!