Garden Journal-May 1

We are just so excited about our garden this year. I went out first thing this morning and took some pictures that way as the summer progresses I can see how the plants have grown. What's doing well....and what did not so much. We've expanded our garden this year to include the whole back area along the fence so we know have quite a bit of room. This year growing we have:

• 25 Asparagus. We bought two year crowns and this year have let them grow into a fern. I look forward to hopefully being able to enjoy then with dinner next year.
• 2 Cucumber plants and 3 Pickling Cucumber plants
• 2 Cantaloupe
• Several different types of peppers. I think over all we have 19 pepper plants-all ranging from sweet, to spicy, to just down right hot! The sweet banana peppers have already started to make an appearance.
• 4 Watermelon plants
• 4 squash and 4 zucchini plants.
• 11 Okra plants
• 4 different types of tomatoes
• I had planted 24 sunflowers but it looks like only 14 have actually come up. These are my pride and joys. I have always wanted to visit a sunflower field but can't find one so I created my own. These beautiful flowers should grow to be about 12 feet tall and supply us with hundreds of sunflower seeds to harvest.
• 54 pea plants. These peas have grown taller than me now. Just amazing.
• Bush Beans-I'm not even sure how many of these. We have them spread out all over the garden.
• Carrots
• 3 Luffa plants. If all goes well I'm hoping to make homemade Christmas gifts which will include luffa bath sponges straight from our garden.
• 1 Eggplant
• 1 Giant Pumpkin plant-I would love for the boys to be able to pick their own pumpkin for Halloween from our backyard.
• 4 Cabbage
• 4 Collards
• 2 different types of lettuce
• Onions
• Potatoes
• strawberries-we already have about 7 of them!
• and then the dwarf trees I bought this year that won't produce for a while. Lemon, Lime, Orange, Banana, and coffee. We also have been growing a pineapple plant for several months now that we simply cut off the top of a pineapple we were eating and stuck it into some dirt. It has already tripled in size.

As you see we have quite the garden growing. Just call us Farmer Schrocks. :) I have my basket all ready for when it's time to head out and harvest our prize possessions.