It's Been A Busy Week..!!

WOW....it's been a busy week.... the kids are out of school now......how that changes your schedule!!

Chris started canning this week by making and 28 pints of grape jelly.  In another few weeks, the wild blackberries we have will begin ripening and she's going to make some blackberry jam.  Hopefully, we'll beat the bears to them this year.  Last year, they got to them the day before we went to pick them so we are going to pick them just a bit early and let them ripen the last few days in the shop.  We'll see how that strategy works out! 

Lauren officially kicked off her summer vacation by catching (or attempting to catch) fireflies.  Her first night was successful and she caught five (not bad since it's still a bit early), but last night, she was skunked by the fireflies but managed to catch a fairly large toad......a far cry from a firefly, but it kept her entertained.  She turned it loose unharmed and the only damage was to the jar that I don't think we'll be using in the kitchen anymore, if you know what I mean.

I wanted to try something different in the garden this year by building a trellis for the cucumbers to grow up on and keep them off the ground as well as make them easier to pick.  We've always planted our cukes in mounds and let them sprawl on the ground, but I read about trellising them on another blog and thought I'd give it a try.  That article showed the use of twine for them to vine up on, but I would think this would cause sagging due to the weight of the cukes, so we used some bamboo stakes that we already had for the uprights and then used green sassafras (flexible enough to weave through supports) to build the vining grid.  We'll let you know how this works out.

          

The potato patch just keeps growing and growing......I hope theree are as many "taters" under the dirt as there is vegatation on top!!!!  We've hilled them as much as we can so they are on thier own now.  Another week or so and we will be picking our first green beans, so we will know how they're doing when we dig for some new taters to go with them.   

                                   

Peace