I wouldn't normally say 70 degrees is warm. Really, it's just lukewarm. But for the end of October...it's surprisingly warm. I can remember my first Halloween in Indiana where all the kids were dressed up in costumes which you couldn't see. They were all bundled in coats since it was snowing out. THAT was a big surprise for a kid from Tucson.
Anyway, the "warm" weather is appreciated, and I don't feel quite so bad about just now getting my garlic in the ground. Yes I know I'm late, by something like a month, but we haven't had a frost yet, so hopefully it's not too late for a good garlic crop.
I finally got around to picking green tomatoes too. I think I picked around 50 - 100. A ton. Really, a lot of tomatoes. Something keeps eating them so I figured it would be no loss if they fail to turn red over time. I'm only concerned about putting some tomatoes that already have a whole or two in them in the basement. I hope the bugs aren't still there chomping away at my green tomatoes. I still have a bunch of tomatoes on the vine too, probably another 50, but they didn't seem as far along as these tomatoes are, and with this weather who knows when the frost will hit. I could have another month of growing (especially if I decided to go find a pop-up greenhouse, but all bets are off if I get around to it).
My carrots are HUGE. I mean over 12 inches long and, at least at the top, about the width of a small jelly jar. I only have about 12 left to harvest, but I'm saving them for a day when I need to figure out what to cook.
Yesterday I pulled out the first bag of frozen broccoli and decided that I should have blanched the heads before freezing them. It was edible, but not nearly as good as the fresh stuff, and a bit hard. I'm hoping broccoli cheese soup will come out so good I don't even realize it's from my frozen supply, but we'll have to see.
Not much more homestead wise has been going on around here. I'm on this crazy diet still so it's kind of taken the joy out of eating. The first week went well, I cooked everything ahead of time and we had breakfast together every morning, but it's been slipping ever since then and poor Gerd has had to go back to buying his lunches. I really think he liked having me pack him a lunch everyday.
I've been debating NaNoWriMo, but I figure if I can't even figure out how to cook meals for the month I've got very little chance of keeping up...But on the other hand I have a couple of hours every day that are being wasted (I know, I could be cooking, but I don't wanna) and writing would be a good use of my time. So we'll see I guess. I've had a few story ideas floating around in my head for a while now, perhaps one will decide it wants to pop out.
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I took down the monstrous grape tomato plants in our garden last Sunday. The vines on this thing were over 20 feet long and still blooming. We have two huge mixing-type bowls full of tiny red tomatoes in the fridge, and we mulched hundreds of green ones (and anything that wasn't perfect and ones that just hit the ground and I didn't feel like picking up because we have no room for any more of them...).
There is still one cherry tomato plant growing and producing, but its a manageable size (like 3 feet tall) and not threatening to swallow the children whole if they venture onto the back patio.
We haven't had a freeze here, yet, either, though we might tonight. I'll have to clean up more of the garden after stuff dies back, but I'm in no mood to kill blooming marigolds or the hot banana peppers until I have to.
Next year I'm going back to planting romas or other cooking tomatoes. I quit doing that a few years back after getting max 2 or 3 good tomatoes a season. But I apparently found the recipe for growing them this year (water them regularly...who knew..lol). So maybe next year I'll be able to can some for winter chili and pizza sauce :)
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