Autumn already?

Where does the time go? Suddenly August is gone and school has started. Where have I been? In the garden, growing a zillion cucumbers and huge tomatoes.





In the kitchen, canning pickles and tomato sauce.



These are my first tries at canning veggies. I've also got a crock of cabbage in the basement, fermenting into what I hope will become sauerkraut and not some nasty mess. No photos yet. Fermenting seems like a private process of becoming, not to be interrupted and captured on film. Rather like human adolescence.

And I've tried to spend less time inside on the computer and in books and more outside among the plants.



Now that the weather is cooler, the morning glories are staying open a little longer into the day. And the zinnias are regularly visited by monarch butterflies and hummingbirds.

Before and after

I've become addicted to Design*Sponge and all the pretty things and pretty places featured on the site. Inspired by many of their "before and after" posts featuring reclaimed furniture and redecorated rooms, I've been trying to see more potential in what other people discard or are otherwise done with.

I found this chair on the curb during Granville Clean-Up days when residents can get rid of large items and others can go curb shopping among the piles. Getting it home the four blocks was tricky because it's pretty heavy and it doesn't fit in the car (except in the passenger seat if you leave the door hanging open...).



And it cleans up real nice after four coats of primer.



The seat was made from a cabinet door from a neighbor who is currently ripping out a kitchen back to the studs (thanks James!). The fabric is from the local Granville designer Amy Butler. I made the cushions myself, even covering leftover buttons with fabric to make the matching buttons.

July in the Garden

I returned from Minnesota in late June to find my garden erupting in foliage. The tomatoes have grown to be at least as tall as me and they're now setting fruit.



Particularly beautiful are these tomatoes that I grew from seeds saved from a delicious Italian tomato we ate last summer in Le Marche. The other half of my tomato plants are San Marzano tomatoes, grown from Italian seeds sold in the U.S. There are fewer fruits coming on the plants right now but I'm hoping to use the San Marzano mainly for canning, while the other ones are for eating fresh.



Also looking good are my fabric potato pots. I was intrigued by the concept of filling a container in order to grow potatoes and I've read about growing them in bushel baskets, clay pots, etc. These collapsible fabric pots appealed to me since I can remove the soil after the growing season and store the pots folded flat (don't ask me where I'm going to store all the soil, I haven't figured that out yet). Not all my potato started this year but I think it's mostly the fault of the seed crop and not the new-fangled pots.



In the newly reorganized herb garden.



I put the little clay turtles in the mint pots. Someone else (the little girls next door?) decided they needed to be together and arranged them side-by-side, making their way to the rain barrel...

Up North

We've just returned from a visit to Minnesota where it was nice and cool. Don't these views make you want to be there too?

My big heap o' trouble

I heard one could get a "truckload" of free wood chips from the village. I should have asked exactly what was meant by "truck." I envisioned a pick-up. They provided a dump truck. I calculated that I could've mulched our entire lot at least three inches deep.

Thankfully as of posting this photo the hill is perhaps a little over a third gone. My neighbors, friends, and friends of neighbors have come to help themselves. But still, what to do with the rest?

Tutti a tavola a mangiare!

A year ago we were in Italy. Now that it's almost summer I've been dreaming again of Italy. So last night we made a homemade pizza with fresh ricotta and arugula from my garden. Wow.

I had never had fresh ricotta before but now I think I'm spoiled for ricotta forever. Really, if you can find it it's worth every penny. We finally made it to the foodie mecca of Jungle Jim's in Cincinnati and now our fridge is stocked with all sorts of fabulous finds and rare delicacies. Too bad I'll just be eating ricotta at every meal...

And the garden?



I finally have my own vegetable garden in my backyard. We built the beds in April and already are eating spinach, lettuce, arugula, and swiss chard. Also planted in the beds are leeks, onion, shallots, snow peas, beets, eggplant, tomatoes, carrots, basil, and cilantro. In containers I'm growing potatoes and I've planted pumpkin seeds in a few spots to see if anything happens. Perhaps I'll go sow some pole beans this afternoon.

The fencing? Granville has a serious deer problem. They eat all the hostas, of course, the daylily buds, the hydrangeas, viburnum, tulips, hollyhocks, sedum, phlox. They even eat things that are supposed to be unappealing to deer: coneflowers, boxwood, coral bells, alliums, etc. They eat the plants growing right next to the houses, they walk down the middle of the streets in full daylight. They do everything except walk in the house and open the fridge. So, the veggie garden needs a high fence. I've reinforced it at the bottom to keep out marauding ground hogs. So far no invaders but I wonder if the raccoons will find it when it's tomato season.

Cozy Kitteh

Max has found an alternative use for my grow mat.