Homestead Tomato Variety

Today we harvested our first tomato from our "Homestead" variety. A nice 7+ ounce tomato.

Guerilla Gardening battle with HOA

Sad to say, that I may have to pull up a whole section of my garden that I planted, since it was a guerilla garden on land that I don't own, and never had permission to grow on. I made a point of not disturbing the HOA's plantings, only planting where they had mulch that tends to gets washed away by rain. We thought it looked better, and I know it was helping the stop the erosion that their mulch never does on land that is not being used for anything else. Luckily our green bean harvest in that area has already produced a bunch, but really sad about the watermelons. We have one growing really nicely, already a nice size, that I am told has to be pulled out immediately. But I am fighting them over some of my garden, because they are saying that I have to pull everything out, even the garden I have next to our patio under our kitchen window. I told him in no way am I removing that, as I have written permission dating back to Spring 2003 from the former HOA company giving me permission to plant there.

I personally can't stand this HOA company. Last fall a bush that they had planted did damage to our plumbing, and cost us a total of $1300 to repair (which included the price for the removal of said bush). When I asked the HOA company to cover at least the cost of the removal, they said that we were in charge of it, but now that I am taking care of the plants around my house, they tell me to take it out. So they only care when it is convenient to them, or doesn't cost them any money.

Fall Vegetable Sowing

Today I started indoors Broccoli, both Packman and De Cicco varieties, some Catskills Brussels Sprouts and Brunswick Cabbage to grow for our fall vegetables. Looking forward to hopefully eating some Brussels sprouts around Thanksgiving.

First Non-Stolen Tomatoes

FINALLY!!! We were able to harvest some of our tomatoes!

Carrots and Green Beans

This past week we harvested a handful of carrots that had started to crest up out of the soil. Antonio was intrigued, perhaps due to having seen the episode of Curious George where George grows and then later picks carrots.

Thursday evening Antonio, Julia Belén and I went out into the garden and decided it was time to really start picking the green beans. So I got out a bucket and Antonio started picking green beans and ended up picking 7.8 ounces worth of green beans. I grilled some of the green beans in Spanish olive oil and kosher salt, it came out delicious.

Butter Making

Sunday was a busy day in regards to our homesteading efforts, allbeit, not as much regarding the garden. I made butter out of a pint of store-bought cream for the first time Sunday, and stored it in our new butter bell. We had some on our homemade bread Sunday night, and it was really good, and it was nice having butter that is so soft and spreadable. Julia was busy sewing Sunday, and finished her first pajama pants that she is making for Antonio. I think that is such a great accomplishment, seeing the finished pants and know that Julia made them herself.

Oh, and on Friday Julia made some Artisan bread, that we all devoured later that evening, it was delicious.

Tomato, Basil, Cucumber, Feta Cheese and Bullhorn Pepper

The other night Julia made a dish with our homegrown Tumbling Toms, Genovese Basil, and our first Diva Cucumber. It was delicious.

And we harvested our first Bullhorn pepper of the season. A full 7 ounces.