BLOOMS!

It worked, we grew sunflowers!!!  These were the first 3 to bloom.  More on the way.  The bees love them.  It's cool to see which plants grew the best.  The first to flower were the ones on the east side of the plot, closest to the water.  But the ones on the west side of the plot grew taller. Taller than me!

Allan and I still need to keep up with watering and staking but there are few weeds and the plants look really healthy.  Even the marigolds added for some color around the border look great.

Growing

16 sunflower plants, growing taller by the day.
One is nearly as tall as me with leaves bigger than my head.
A few are showing signs of flowers.

Strong seedlings

The sunflowers are getting bigger!  We have 16 plants in the 4x8' plot.  The tallest reach about mid-thigh. 

Mammoth and Hybrid Snack Seed

 The sunflowers are doing great!  We have two varieties:  Mammoth (up to 8' tall) and Hybrid Snack Seed ( 5' tall)- both are edible.  About half of the garden was planted from seed right there and the other half were seedling transplants started indoors.  The indoor seedlings grew fast and were a bit more leggy than the in-ground ones but all are doing well.

A bit of organic fertilizer and some watering over the weekend has really helped these little guys out. 

A few marigolds were planted last week for color and interest while we wait for the sunflowers to get bigger.

In the rest of the garden plots, people are harvesting strawberries, lettuces, and herbs. 

Phase 1

The first phase of planting happened about a week ago.  We kept a few of the existing plants to see what they do and covered the exposed soil with woodchips to retain moisture and create a worm habitat.  Two varieties of seeds were planted 1 inch in the ground.  Each planting area was covered with a reclaimed water bottle to create a greenhouse effect.  With a little luck we'll have sunflowers later this summer!

Plot 78B

My friend Allan and I are now co-lessors of a 4x8 garden plot at the Fox Point Community Garden!  She's not much to look at right now but we are hoping with a little TLC, she will be beautiful and bountiful.

The garden came with a thriving chive plant, an abundance of chickweed (which would be great food for chickens if either of us had any), and a few yet unidentified seedlings.  We pulled the chickweed left it lying there to keep the soil from drying out while we plan our crop.

To create some diversity in the Community Garden, we chose a crop that has big showy flowers, is edible, and grows well in full sun.  We'll shop for seeds this week and get them in the ground.  Stay tuned to find out what it is!

Food Bits

Cauliflower Pizza Crust

A new recipe I tried to pack more veggies into pizza.  The crust is made from... grated cauliflower!!  The original recipe I used is here but the second time around, I liked the addition of fresh oregano, red pepper flakes, and some cornmeal. Cooking on parchment helped it release from the cookie sheet.

It was actually quite yummy (plenty of cheese!) even if it wasn't as crispy as I'd like.  I will make it again.  Heck, I still have half a cauliflower left!

Walmart Steaks

Walmart is now offering "top quality USDA choice steaks".  There are ads all over TV where "steakovers" fool restaurant patrons into thinking they are getting a quality product.  No apologies here but I really don't think I'll be getting my meat from the same place people go to buy home electronics, gardening supplies, and jumbo packages of paper towels.  

By eating less red meat in general, I don't feel bad about splurging on the occasional steak that I know came from an animal that was fed well without hormones, and slaughtered humanely.