TY Gets a Summer Helper

For those of you who didn't know, our niece Rebecca is staying with us this summer. She has an internship at Presbyterian Cancer Rehab & Wellness as a Copy Writing Specialist.  And she's participating in a work study program at TY's Veggie Garden (of course).  Her first lesson?  How to turn a compost pile (Tom wasted no time).

Tom gave her all the ins and outs of brown vs. green, this amount of water vs. that amount of air, etc. He was also envious of her tres chic hat than his functional broad brim.

Then she got to work, moving the contents of bin three into bin four.

And like the true Florida girl she is, she did all gardening in flip-flops.

And after about an hours worth of work, Rebecca had all contents moved into bin four.

Things are coming up in the garden!  Woo hoo!  Here we have a cucumber plant, a tomato plant and some cilantro...

 marigolds and Swiss chard...

nasturtiums and beets..

lima beans...

squash...

marigolds and dill...

soybeans...

basil...

peppers and tomatoes....

and potatoes.

What we've planted up to now has primarily been in boxes three & four.  This weekend we moved into box two and planted tomatoes, parsley, two different kinds of peppers, okra, and green beans.

Tom transplanted two of the mammoth squash plants into box two so they'd have plenty of room to spread out.

When we moved in there were two dirt patches the previous owner used for flowers.  The one in the backyard we are using for potatoes (which, as you saw above, is doing very well).  The one in the front yard we designated as the Great Pumpkin Patch. Rebecca and Tom planted seeds that we saved from last October's pumpkin.

They planted a LOT of seeds (about 30).  If all of them come up and produce pumpkins, we're going to have to open a pick-you-own pumpkin for the neighborhood kids.

Once I finished watering the boxes in the back with Jerry Baker's Green Up Tonic (beer, amonia, Karo syrup, plant food, and dish soap), I watered the pumpkins.  The white puddles on the ground form because of the dish soap in the Green Up Tonic.

Rebecca illustrated her idea of the size she believe the pumpins will grow. After the final watering we said a prayer around the pumpkin patch. The prayer was that our patch might be deemed the most sincere in all the land, productive, green, and of course full of pumpkins. If so, then on Halloween The Great Pumpkin will rise, fly through the air and take toys to all the children of the world. In the words of Linus, "I don't see how a pumpkin patch can be more sincere than this one. You can look around and there's not a sign of hypocrisy. Nothing but sincerity as far as the eye can see." God willing. :)

~Y