Nothing in the past tense, but I'm SUPER excited my tomatoes already have blooms. This is the earliest yet. BLTs here I come!

Just harvesting herbs as needed. I do have tiny tomatoes and peppers. Peas are just germinating. Squash and zucchini are coming along. The okra hasn't germinated yet. I'm so ready to harvest things!

My roses, lilies and gladiolus have gone crazy! I am looking forward to my hardy hibiscus blooming.

I have already harvested and cooked a giant amount of collard greens,and divided them up into portions for the freezer. They have grown back and are ready for another harvest now. I cooked one of our cabbages a couple weeks ago, and there are 5 more out there ready to eat. I am hoping SO will find someone to take a few of them and at least half the new collards. If not, I will cook another batch on my off days if I ever get any. Brocolli did greatly! I got huge amounts of it and it was delicious. My tomatoes are loaded. I got all different colors of regular sized and cherry/pear tomatoes because I like how they look. None are ready yet but it looks like I'll have tons! I spotted a few cucumbers on the vine and my beans have flowered. I have 3 types of potatoes that I have no clue how to tell when to harvest, but the plants are very large and healthy looking.

The cabbage i cooked. It was pretty big.

This is about half of the first harvest of collards.

Here they are cooking.

First crop of broccoli! The heads were HUGE!

First bell pepper of the season. I love the purple color. I was a little perturbed when I cooked it. I knew it was green inside but I did not realize that when you cook them they lose their purplely ness and turn green. WHATS THE POINT?!??! Oh well, it tasted great. I have purple, red, orange and yellow bell peppers.

This is my potato/bean/cucumber bed.

The rest of my cabbages.

My second batch of collards and some lettuce.

Here's my supervisor, making sure I do not mess anything up....

My broccoli is about baseball size now so it will be another week or so. Garlic scapes are forming so I may pick a few to take to the lake this weekend to include in a grilled veggie medley. I've harvested a few onions to use a scallions in salads and the rest are just showing signs of starting to bulb up. I've also harvested about 15 lbs. of asparagus so far but I'll probably stop in a couple weeks.

Here's a few pics of my recent picks...

Yep, my earliest tomato ever......... (but I cheated Mother Nature for it ;-)

Waterlilies are blooming.

I have cabbage envy. Got a late start on planting everything due to rain and work. Mostly rain. My cabbages are still tiny and I harvest them for the tender leaves. Now that other stuff is growing I'll probably cut back on picking them.

Wow, the veggies you all are showing look terrific! I have water-envy. We did plant tomatoes because we love them so much, but they'll end up costing a boat-load in watering cost. It's hard to let the plants and flowers I love go...

Mmm - I haven't grown cabbage in a long while, but I do like it a lot. Unfortunately, so do all the slugs and snails here. I basically make 2 things with cabbage- a saute of chicken thighs, celery, onions, garlic and lots of fresh parsley, and creamy coleslaw so I can have slaw dogs. I grew Pinetree's cabbage mix, which has various sizes and shapes, so that was fun.

Right now my tomatoes are actually ending - it's too hot at night for blooms to set any more. However there are still a good number of good sized green ones that will ripen over the coming week or so, and I have a big bowlful already. I've narrowed it down to one variety - Tomande, because it can survive our harsh conditions and produces the most delicious fruits of any I've grown - except maybe Hillbilly. The variety has gotten very difficult to find now though. I believe it's French.

My semi-wild blackberries are ripening and I'm in a standoff with the mockingbirds to see who can get to them first. I resorted to wrapping ripening tomatoes and berries with sheer fabric to hide them from the birds.

The biggest harvest is my Rattlesnake pole beans - over the past several days I've picked and picked and have several pounds in the fridge, and have roasted a couple batches of them too. There will be (hopefully) a second harvest after awhile. IMO, they are the best tasting green beans.

I envy those in cooler climates - it's getting way too hot & humid here for much of anything now. I'm still thinking of okra, but it may be too late.

I have planted one Celebrity tomato and one sweet Million tomato. It is still kinda cool here. I did a real vegetable garden when the kids were little, but just me now. So most of my beds are flower beds.

Peonies, columbine and iris did spectacular this year, and the last 3 days of rain have ended them. Goose berries will be ready in about a week, Only one big bush, but I will get about 3 gallons of berries off it. Sour pie cherries are still green but growing on two dwarf trees, I will be lucky to get one pie. (birds) Next will be all kinds of hybrid daylilies. When my grandson becomes a toddler, I will probably do snap peas and strawberries like I did when my kids were little.

I don't grow cool weather veggies. Last week I planted tomatoes, peppers, snow peas, cucumbers and zucchini. They probably won't be ready to harvest until August. It finialy warmed up and quit raining enough to plant. I have daisy's, iris and clematis blooming. The annuals are all planted. I still have some seeds and transplants to do.

I am envious of those of you who have green thumbs. I can't even keep potted flowers alive. Amy your vegetables are beautiful.

I'm envious of AmyLou's gardening skills!

I only have mini sweet peppers (from a potted plant that I overwinter inside), and arugula to pick right now. Blueberries & strawberries (just a few plants) will be next, then tart cherries. I've just planted cantaloupe (first time for this) and butternut squash - hopefully not starting too late. Lettuce is up, still too small to start picking. No sign of the parsley or dill yet. Have a couple of key limes just about ready to pick.

Woohoo! Just noticed today that the grape has got 9 little bunches started, despite the pruning the $%*&# deer gave it the other night. It also stripped most of the leaves off my 2 super dwarf apples and 2 of the cherry bushes, so fingers crossed they survive .

Flowers: dames rocket, native honeysuckle, clematis, peonies, roses, iris, bleeding heart, blue-eyed grass, weigela, azaleas. Woodland phlox and lilacs just finished,

Bigtime goof - l thought about three weeks ago should check asparagus bed - didn't until week before last Sunday.

Quite a few stalks as high as my shoulders, the branches all stretched out: too old - grown way beyond usefulness.

Some hills quite small, it's about 15 years old, but the largest hill had over three dozen stalks.

Last week I took several packs to the old guys Coffee, Cookies and Conversation group at the village church, neighbour lady, a friend, picked me up and took me.

I package them in about half gallon milk cartons, but this will go for a month to six weeks and I need to keep the few that I have saved, so I put some water under the asparagus into plastic milk bags a bit smaller than the plastic coated cartons, so folks can take a bag and leave the cartons for me.

Today a group member who lives in a nearby village came to buy cheaper gas from a nearby indigenous settlement so picked me up with my five cartons in grocery bags.

After the group I took my empty cartons in their bags to hitchhike the two miles or so to a plaza, a guy gave me a ride, did some banking and picked up about 9 grocery items, able to have them along with empty asparagus cartons all in two bags.

It's usually more difficult to catch a ride near the city - took about a half hour a week or so ago, about 20 min. today.

A lady who lives about 3 mi. from there picked me up. She'd come to buy the cheaper gas near me earlier in the day ... but drove me the 9 mi. or so home.

I've been finding that several times, mainly people who have picked me up in the village en route home have gone further, or somewhat out of their way, to bring me home, for which I am very thankful, especially when carrying a load of groceries. .

I told elsewhere of three women, one a neighbour friend, another a nearby acquaintance (to whom I'd given veggies some time ago), and a third, a complete stranger, who called me from a driveway a distance ahead of me on a busy street on the edge of the city, and a guy from the coffee group, had given me rides relating to the coffee hour last week.

If some would be interested in further particulars, I'm sorry, but don't remember on which thread I wrote it.

ole joyful

Side yard garden. Only thing climbing so far are snow peas to the left. Have some volunteer squash plants very bottom left. I was going to pull them but decided to keep them and harvest blossums sooner than I would've been able to. Far end you can see my pile of straw I moved from the tunnel and my mulch pile that is slowly being spread around the yard. If it would just stop raining I could finally get rid of it all.

Persimmon trees on ends, raspberry plants 2nd and 4th and a tiny Aunt Ruby's German Green tomato I didn't really have room for but could toss out.

5 more cabbages

A giant reusable shopping bag full of the second batch of collard greens.

Now, the real problem all gardeners face, who to pawn some of these off on????

I just pulled out tons of lettuce that had gone slimy because I couldn't pick it fast enough. Good problems to have though. Better too much than not enough.

We just planted veggies today as it is not warm enough here up north until Memorial Day. Very short growing season.

Not much planted this year. The tomato plants are 4 ft tall. Lots of flowers but no tomatoes yet. We have only picked artichokes and chives.

I already harvested all the radishes. This is a portion of today’s haul of Baby Gem romaine lettuce after washing and spinning. Tomatoes are setting fruit and there are a few baby squash and peppers. Can’t wait for the tomatoes, but the raccoon is already trying to harvest them before they are ready.

I harvested enough greens and snow peas to make a salad today. I also dug around for some new potatoes to make with my dinner tonight. It's fun growing potatoes and hunting for them. I did see Chipmunk Charlie out there digging in one of the potato beds before I went out there. It has been pouring rain on and off all day. Tomorrow will be dry and Sunday, so will be able to do some yard work.

Amylou, if my cabbages ever get that big I'll be in the same predicament. Have plans to offer them and other extras to a couple neighbors and if they don't want them to take them to the local food bank.

Just beginning to plant things here...temperatures just starting to be warm enough

We have an early harvest here and begin in mid February. So far this year, we have harvested carrots, lettuce, kale, chard, red mustard leaves, arugula, mizuna, basil, oranges, lemons, limes, clementine, blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, ollalieberries, boysenberries, potatoes, bok choy, jalapeno, bell pepper, ginger and grape leaves.