The Mountain State Fair: Project Round Up

 It's that time of year again. For the past 3 years my kids have enjoyed entering projects in the fair. Drop off day is Tuesday. Which means Monday will be spent in the kitchen- since Lakin is finally old enough for the competition we have a total of 11 baked goods to be entered. I capped them at 4 each and one didn't go through. It'll be a long day with lots of dish washing! I will apologize in advance that most of the pictures are from my phone and instagram!

This year the boys are entering more from the garden. Rylan is going for the largest watermelon.  I don't have a picture of it since it's still out in the garden. He had plans for other squashes- winter and summer, but with all the rain and other odd weather, the plants had a hard time. Cale and Cohen are both entering winter squashes seen below, and Lakin is entering his butternut squash (not pictured)

Cale, Cohen and Lakin have also been working on some of the craft categories, here are a few of their projects. Cohen's santa ornament made from a recycled coke can, felt and alpaca fiber. Cale's basket made from a hose and zip ties. 

This one has been hanging in the living room for months now. It's Cale's recycled decoration- a skeleton made out of  milk jugs.

Lakin's jewelry. Beaded earrings and a bracelet for the recycled jewelry category.  Do you remember Cale's peacock sculpture from last year? This year he's entering this Big Head as his sculpture. It's still a work in progress- which must be finished tomorrow! Cohen is also making a sculpture- of a beetle. And we have a couple more Christmas ornaments not shown as well as some art- oil pastels, watercolors, etc.

Of course, I have mentioned Cale's big pumpkins. The stems were getting soft- some sort of fungus I think- so we picked them since the bugs were starting to pick at the soft spots. We crossed our fingers that they would last until the drop off date.

But today this happened. The smaller of the 2 giants...rotted from the stem and bottom. It was great fun considering this occurred in the living room! It smelled TERRIBLE and took about 20 or more towels to clean up and Rylan, Cale and me to drag it out of the house- gagging all the way. We are still hoping the biggest will last. Like I said- not a good squash year. 

 

 This year Rylan didn't enter many arts and crafts- 2 pieces of art work was it. He did enter 3 model kits, a lot from the garden, baked goods and 6 photographs. My dad let him use his camera, and I thought he got some great shots!

So there are just a few of their projects. I'll post pictures of their baked goods on Tuesday once they are all done!

Life and Garden via Instagram

From the top, L to R:

1. Produce basket from our nightly harvests 2. Making fresh rainbow salsa
3. Refrigerator pickles 4. Eggplant Crisp
5. Cohen's Red Mini Bell Pepper 6. Cale's huge pumpkins
7. Making garden veggie soup  8. Cale's favorite place to be

Garden Update: July 6, 2013

 We got rain. All. Week. Long. I feel like I have said that before, but this has got to be the rainiest year I can remember having in a long time. It seemed like every time I tried to get in the garden it would start pouring. But, rain is a good thing. And everything is growing really well because of it.

This is one of Rylan's Moon and Stars Watermelons. It's either red or yellow inside, I am not sure which.

The tomatoes are huge. And I have followed my normal pattern of planting way too close together and it has taken on a jungle feel. Some are towering over my head and the kids like to crawl through the tunnels beneath the plants.

Here are a couple: Chadwick Cherry, Yellow Pear, Rylan's Golden King of Siberia and Green Zebra. The Farallones are huge and the last picture is of the Super Sioux, which is really nicely formed.

 The eggplant, pepper and cucumbers have take off. We have a garter snake living in this bed. We often find it under the cucumber vines or between the eggplant.

Red Lipstick peppers and Red Mini Bells....

Large Red Italian Pepper and Rylan's purple jalapeno...

 Apple Eggplant and Ping Tung Eggplant...We've also picked a couple Black Egg and Purple Long

And Dragon's Egg Cucumber.  These have a very nice flavor. We also picked a couple of Rylan's White Wonder and a Suyo Long.

Tonight Lakin helped me top the basil. It was getting taller and closer to flowering so we cut it down. This is the second major pruning I've done this year, but I got enough to make more than a quart of pesto tonight.

My Calendula and Chamomile and Cohen's zinnias. He's growing 4 or 5 different varieties.

 

 Then the summer squash, beans and okra... Cale's white bush marrow squash and his big pumpkins...he's aiming to take the prize in the biggest/heaviest pumpkin contest in the fair.

 

 

 This was tonight's harvest: Basil, cucumbers, eggplant, peppers....

So how does your garden grow?

This post has been linked to the Homestead Barn Hop, Clever Chicks Blog Hop, The Backyard Farming Connection, Tuesdays with a Twist, Tuesday Garden Party, Tuned-in Tuesday, Tuesday Greens, How Does Your Garden Grow?,

Farm Fresh Recipes: Swiss Chard Crepes

This post can now be seen on my other site, The Free Range Life. Here is the link to the recipe for Swiss Chard Crepes.

Farm Update; June 16, 2013: Growing Up

We've gotten a lot of rain this spring, which means the plants are very happy. All sorts of tiny fruits and flowers dotting the plants. The eggplants are huge, compared to the non-existent plants last year anyway. I keep a healthy dusting of Diatomaceous Earth on them to keep the flea beetles away. I've started dusting the cucumbers too. Just in case the cucumber beetles decided to show up.

The peas are starting to die down. We were picking about 5lbs a day last week, but with the temperatures in the 80s the flowers are done and we are just waiting for the last pods to ripen. I have a total of ZERO peas in the freezer. But I do have 4 boys who have eaten 5 lbs of peas a day for over a week. I guess that is good too.

 The tomatoes are growing like weeds. I am trying to stay on top of the suckers, but sometimes they get out of hand. It seems like I tie them up to their stakes and 2 days later they are needing to be tied up higher again.

No red ones yet, but lots of beautiful, little green fruits. Here are just a couple of them. We've got all sorts of colors- pink, orange, yellow, red, green and white. Can't wait for the colors to start showing!

Some of the stems on these plants are just massive. They hardly need staking at all because they are almost 2 inches in diameter.  I am not sure if it is because of variety or because they were hardened off really well on our windy back deck.

Remember Chickory and her 12 chicks? They are almost 6 weeks old and are finally big enough to be let out to free range during the day. Mama keeps them in line and keeps them safe from the big birds. Since it looks like have a number of roosters in this batch, we let another of our broody hens sit as well. She's sitting on 10 eggs, which are due to hatch this week sometime. Our current laying hens are getting up in age, and are in need to replacing.

The baby goats are growing too. Jack and Jill are 12 weeks as of today, and Kipper and CoCo will be next Sunday. This means they are officially weaning age, and are ready to leave. Coco was picked up yesterday. Kipper and Jill will be staying together and leaving to go to their new home on Tuesday. Jack will most likely be leaving on Tuesday as well. It's sad to see them go, but will be nice to get the extra milk from their mothers and have 4 less mouths to feed!

 I successfully started 5 lavender plants from seed, and they are getting much bigger. I am hoping to propagate a few more plants from cuttings this year once these plants are big enough.  I also  harvested my first cutting of basil today and now have a pint of fresh pesto in the fridge.

This post has been linked to: The Homestead Barn Hop, Thank Goodness It's Monday, Clever Chicks Blog Hop, Make the Scene Monday, Homemade Mondays, The HomeAcre Hop,