Trying to Keep Up

Been a while since I last posted.  I've been busy with a lot of things.

The bed of greens has really filled in...I've got all the greens I could want in the kitchen now...lots of nice soups from all that.  Last night I had a nice kale and bean soup.  By accidentally forgetting to turn off the gas under the pressure cooker, I found out that kale does soften up if you cook it longer.  Kale, kidney beans, onion, and whole wheat spaghetti pieces make a really fine soup.

That big-leafed plant is mustard, and the taller feathery leaves in the second pic are carrots. It's all one planting-bed, but I set it up in two stages. The carrots were a huge success...should have planted a lot more, I suppose.  I can see that the roots have formed fat carrots, probably the biggest ones I've ever grown.

I'm working on the next bed now, it's going to be all beans of various kinds.  The containers are still producing food...a few chili peppers, some eggplant, lots of Red Russian kale, tatsoi.  After I get the bed of beans planted, I'll go back to working with the containers.

We've only had the lightest frost so far, and it's only damaged plants that were well past their prime anyway.  The greens crops seem to have really taken off since the temps dropped.  Today was the first day in a week we hit 70 Fahrenheit.

It's hard to know what to plant...you have to think a few months ahead of today's weather when you're starting seeds.  But this time I guessed right...the unusually warm weather gave way to unusually cold weather and the greens loved it.

Gardening is always a gamble.