welcome back gnome

My fishing gnome is back! I thought he fell into the pond and carefully checked the mucky bottom 4 feet down - no gnome. We found him while cleaning out the garage - in a storage basket, lost for 2 years.

gnome at work

The gnome is very quietly going about his work now. There's always a lot to be done in the spring garden. I have several garden chores waiting for me. Planting tomatoes, the patio flower pots, cleaning up the clematis vine.... not to mention just watching the plants grow. But there are also always a lot of other things that need to be done. Work, family. And then there's the weather, which has been cool and rainy the past week. I will admire my gnome and perhaps I'll join him next week.

gnome tending tomatoes

I was asked the other day where my gnome has been. Well, no where special. Just hanging out under the oregano. But for a change, I moved him over to the tomatoes. So that's his job now, hanging out under the tomato plants.

my garden gnome

garden photos

Here are photos I took yesterday of my two vegetable garden plots. The top one is my home garden and the bottom is my community plot.

Not much work going on in the community garden. I brought home the last of my garden tools and pulled a bunch of carrots yesterday. I still have several crops growing: broad leaved escarole, snap peas, Chinese greens, arugula, kale, lot of beets and radish.

I got my home garden winterized yesterday. I heavily mulched my kale, parsley and gnome (poor gnome). If the winter cold is as brutal as the Farmer's Almanac predicts, gnome will be glad. I also took down my tomato poles, dead plants and plastic mulch - finally. And I spread some more winter rye cover crop seed.

The area at the bottom of the top photo is where I will make a nice (I hope) decorative garden next year. I'd like to find a piece of "garden art". And a couple interesting rose varieties. I have a New Dawn climbing rose, two herbaceous peonies and a big tree peony waiting to be planted here. I hope this area will look better in next year's photos.

This summer, I grew sunflowers and gourds in this plot next to the house. I got 5 nice big birdhouse gourds from this area (these are BIG plants!). I hope I can dry these during the winter and have some new birdhouses in the spring. We'll see.

In this photo, this plot is filled with debris from my front yard - our foundation planting project, which is now complete. The stumps of 5 or 6 BIG shrubberies are dumped here for now. Some day I'll get around to posting photos of our new front yard. It looks nice, if I don't say so myself....

melting snow

Our snow has melted a bit. We've had two beautiful, sunny warm days. Maybe my garden gnome will be able to get back to work soon. His wheelbarrow is still buried, but at least he's breathing easier now.

my garden gnome on the first day of spring

I can see it in his eyes that he has snow fatigue too. But he's toughing it out.

Yippee its April !!

Happy April Fool's Day. Skippy and my gnome are now hard at work on the new season's crop.

more pictures of skip

about 6 inches so far

Gnome at 11 pm. Only the tip of his hat is showing. We have about 6 inches of fluffy snow and now the sleet and ice are starting to come down.

snowed under

My garden gnome is pretty well snowed under today. We got about about 5 inches of wet snow yesterday that has now frozen rock solid. Poor old gnome. My carrots and garlic are buried under there too.

gnome working in the summer garden

He's almost lost under all the foliage now. Its a big job for the little guy - but it looks like fun to me!

(remember when he was buried with snow last winter?)

first one inch ...

My husband put a yardstick up in the garden.

The garden gnomes took the storm head on.

gnome with marigolds and coriander

signs of spring

Finally, a few signs of spring in my garden. Pussy willows are out and snowdrops are opening. My gnome has emerged from the snowcover. The birds are plentiful and signing loudly. A lovely carolina wren was singing today, as well as the usual chickadees, cardinals, and sparrows. I am a bit concerned about my garlic. Its still under a couple inches of snow and the tips are looking ragged. I hope it survived.

sure signs of spring

garden yield so far

I was asked how much my little garden produces. Here's my estimate of what I've harvested so this year:

about 50 awesome tomatoes
60 large servings of lettuce and arugula
20 cucumbers
20 summer squash (zucchini, yellow and sunburst)
10 chile peppers
8 cups sugar snap peas
2 cups shelled green peas
2 cups shelled Capucijner soup peas, dried
1 garbage bag of basil (1 half gallon / 8 cups pesto)
10 little potatoes
5 cups of green beans
5 cups of soy beans in shells
4 small eggplants
20 tiny carrots
4 servings beet greens
10 small garlic heads
10 small purple onions
5 servings broccoli
herbs: oregano, dill, thyme, cilantro, parsley

Throughout September, I expect to have lots more tomatoes, cucumbers, summer squash, eggpants, chile peppers, potatoes, carrots and green beans. My fall crops will include lettuce, arugula, endive, broccoli, radish, peas, pinto beans, beets, pumpkins, gourds, swiss chard and kale. I hope my gardening season will continue into December as it did last year (with kale, lettuce and endive under covers).

I added extra garden space this year by taking out a large shrub. My total space is now about 260 square feet (five 3.7x9ft raised beds and 14x7 ft extra against the house).



(It helps to have a gnome working in the garden.)

at last - its tomato season!

I have lots of Sungold cherry tomatoes now (from two plants), and a few ripe New Girl and Orange Blossoms too. Big Beef are ripening fast. The heirlooms are sizing up: Brandywine Sudduth strain, Giant Belgium, Purple Calabash, Box Car Willie, and Mortgage Lifter.

Tomato varieties I've lost to Late Blight so far are: Pink Beauty, Cherokee Purple, Opalka, San Marzano, Early Girl and Hillbilly.

Tomorrow I think I'll check on my recollection of which varieties I have left and take a photo of the best tomato on each plant. I like to keep a record of what they look like.

garden gnomes

I have two gnomes in my garden. One in the kale patch and another in the thyme. I'm not sure where my third gnome went, he was fishing by my pond last year and I didn't realize he was gone until now, hmmmm. I guess it's time to clean out the pond.

still snowing...

At 6pm gnome is up to his ears.

Little garden worker

my garden gnome














A garden gnome is working under my basil plants. Looks like his barrow is full of water.

white garden

Looks we got a foot of snow, but hard to tell with the drifting. And its still coming down. No sign of the garden gnome - guess he took off and went south.

a little bit of snow

A little bit more snow on the garden. The gnome is working hard. Its sunny today, so I will go out soon, shake the snow off the cold frame cover and pull it back. I'm going to harvest the Christmas lettuce, too.