Summer’s lease hath all to short a date.

-   William Shakespeare

With the dog days of summer in full swing, it may be hard to imagine fall as being right around the corner. In fact, late July through September is the best  time to extend your home garden’ s growing season by planting a fall garden. If you have been enjoying the fruits of your labor in your garden through the spring and summer you’re in for a double treat with your fall garden. Fall gardens take less time and work because the soil has already been worked up in the spring.

Many vegetables, such as broccoli and cauliflower actually do better when grown during the late summer and early fall months and some such as beets, kale and swiss chard develop an improved taste after being exposed to a light frost.

To prepare your garden for a fall harvest

• Remove any residue or debris from previous crops
• As in spring, spade or loosten the soil
• Add high quality organic fertilizer to replenish the nutrients used by your spring/summer crops
• Plant seeds according to their recommendations
• Keep the soil moist until your seeds germinate (this is especially important because you will be planting at the end of summer when soil tends to dry out quickly)

As summer comes to a close and fall approaches, frost presents a threat to many garden vegetables. However, there are many crops that are not effected by frost, or even moderate freezes and will continue to produce harvests well into the late fall moths. Some of the best fall producers are :

• Root crops (including, including beets, carrots, parsnips and turnips)
• Cabbage
• Broccoli
• Cauliflower
• Kohlrabi
• Swiss Chard
• Chinese Cabbage
• Kale

Other, more sensitive crops such as beans, cucumbers, tomatoes, and squash will, if protected, continue to produce crops into the fall. Some recommended and effective way of protected these plants in your garden are to cover them with boxes, tarps, plastic or blankets. Covering the plants allows them to stay warm and decreases the chance of an early or light frost killing them.

Here are a few recipes to encourage your appreciation of your fall garden!

Sautéed Swiss Chard Ribs with Cream and Pasta Recipe

Ingredients

Method

1 Separate the ribs from the greens. Cut the ribs into 1/2-inch to 1-inch pieces. Blanch the ribs in lightly salted boiling water for 3 minutes.

2 Melt butter in a saucepan on medium heat. Add the drained, blanched ribs and simmer for 4 minutes. Add heavy cream and cook until cream reduces by two-thirds.

3 While the cream is reducing, cook up your pasta according to the pasta’s package directions.

4 Mix creamed chard with pasta. Season lightly with salt and freshly ground pepper.

Arugula Salad with Beets and Goat Cheese Recipe

Ingredients

“Why do two colors, put one next to the other sing? Can one really explain this? No. Just as one can never learn how to paint.”

-Pablo Picasso

In life, everything is a blank canvas, patiently waiting for someone, anyone, to pick up a brush and breathe life into it. For years, I have seen my muted brown, wooden, garden fence as a canvas screaming for help.

Last Friday, I finally listened.

I find beauty in children, in color and in the chaos of mixing them. So, I decided to invite the neighborhood kids over for a new age, Tom Sawyer fence painting party.

I spent the day on a mission to find a variety of paints, preferably for free. As it turns out, Home Depot is the best place to do this. I was able to get a variety of unwanted or mis-tinted quart and gallon size paints for $1-$5 a piece. This jackpot combined with unwanted, old paint donations from friends and family resulted in a palette of more than ten colors including red, white, purple, green, gray and yellow.

At 5pm on Friday, moms and kids, dressed in their best old painting t-shirts,  found their way through our front door. We devoured chicken, salad, wine, milk and apples.

After an extreme bee attack, resulting in 12 bee stings, 1 spilled glass of milk, 6 terrified children, 1 empty box of benadryl, multiple empty wine glasses and 1 miserable, very uncomfortable but luckily not allergic mom, we decided to break open the paint.

The painting ground rules where simple:

• Take off your shoes (and your clothes if your mom approves and requests)
• One brush per color
• Don’t eat the paint
• Minimize paint on anything that is not the fence (ie rocks, trees and grass)

Kids, when presented with a group project involving anything potentially hazardous or uncontrollably chaotic, will work with super human speed. Within one minute of the first paint can being opened the 12 kids had organized and unananmoulsy agreed to a “splatter” technique. Within ten minutes, they had converted to a “paint a body part and rub the body part on the fence” technique. Within 30 minutes, it was clear that only one rule was going to be followed (don’t eat the paint). Within 45 minutes, they announced that they were done and ready to bathe.

On Saturday morning, I looked out the window and took stock of my new fence. Its fantastic and full of light and laughter.

I only need to put some finishing touches and I will say it’s “done” and ready to house our Heirloom Vegetable Seeds!

Thank you neighbors and friends for all of your energy and work.

Thank you Steph for the wine, chicken and for taking one (or 12) for the team. Thank you Persephone for the wine and salads. Thank you dad for the paint and brushes. Thank you Tom for killing the bees. Thank you God for garden hoses,  grass that doesn’t die from paint and parents willing to let their kids get messy.

current garden renovation costs: $70
Weed mowing $60
Paint for fence $10

A weed is a plant that has mastered every survival skill except for learning how to grow in rows.

~Doug Larson

Weeds are nature’s graffiti.

~Janice Maeditere
Criticizing another’s garden doesn’t keep the weeds out of your own.

~Author Unknown

Standing in my garden, surrounded on all sides by weeds up to my thighs, I feel a sense of impossibility. I can’t even see the dirt, how will this land ever produce more than prickly non-sence?

And somehow, I’m reminded of every obstacle in life; every moment that feels as if it will never end and every bridge that feels as if it cannot be crossed. My mind floods with dreams and the impossibility is shoved aside.
I don’t mind weeding. I actually LIKE weeding. I like the feeling of dirt under my nails. I like the catharsis that comes in that last moment when the root pops out of the ground. I like feeling like I’m wining some battle (even if it is just for today). But, I realize, this is not a job for me and my hands. If I put on my gloves and start pulling these weeds- I will never win. So, I call Gabriel.
Gabriel says he’ll weed the garden for $50 and for $10 more he’ll throw in a flower bed. Sold.
Gabriel came this morning and I happened to be gone while he was here. He worked fast and, two hours later, when I returned he was already done. On inspecting my garden, I realized I made two mistakes:
1.I was gone when the work was done
2.I was unclear with what “weeding” meant to me
The weeds were gone. But, not pulled. Gabriel had mowed them down. While this is helpful, it doesn’t get me to a garden with workable soil.

It DOES however get me access to the fence. Which is great, because all of the kids in the neighborhood will be here tonight to paint it!
I’ll have to deal with the weed issue later- maybe I’ll till the soil?
current garden costs:
Weed mowing $60

Short Term Goals:
Paint the fence
Till Dirt
Continue research on best seeds planting times

I recently re-introduced myself to the world of gardening after leaving my home garden in the hands of renter for two years.

What was once a lush and productive home vegetable garden has become an overwhelming weed heaven. I’ve decided to approach this problem as an opportunity for a  fresh start.

I intend to use this blog to share my process, progress, inspirations and revelations. I have frequently looked to the web for guidance in gardening, for how-to information and before and after examples. However, I have discovered that gardening, unlike building a chair or painting a room, is a process that can not conform to a step-by-step brochure. Gardening is an art, a relationship, and a series of beginnings and endings.

In the past, I’ve had a very traditional home vegetable garden. I’ve had rows of beans, carrots, melons, peppers and various other home garden staples. I’ve haphazardly planted seeds that looked appealing or somehow delicious from various stores and websites. I’ve never put much thought into what to plant next to what or which corner of the garden to use. I’ve never tracked what was planted where in past years and how that may effect the future years. I just planted, watered and prayed.

My weed heaven is giving me the opportunity for a fresh and intentional approach. An opportunity to put thought and  design into the relationship, to bank on research rather than simple prayer and to share and document my experience.

My short term goals:
-Remove weeds and add high quality soil
-Research optimal seeds planting times
-Paint garden fence