The strawberries are in a raised bed, hoping to keep the slugs out. First picture was taken around April 29th, before we left for two weeks on Kauai.

Second picture two weeks later on May 15th. They've grown! Berries are now developing and we'll have to install bird netting soon. Not a big patch, but enough to snack on when we're outside, or maybe enough for morning cereal.

Hellebores rule!

Here is this year's pic of my hellebore. Love it!! (It's other name is Lenten Rose - because it blooms so early in the year. Appropriate that Lent is just around the corner) It has resided on my front porch since last early spring. Because it isn't out in the weather, and still in a big pot, I have had to water it all year - not a problem! I checked last year's post of it and this year is about a week earlier than then....love the color. I also have 3 small new plants of hellebore, but they aren't blooming yet. I might have to wait for next year for them. I bought them at the end of last season on sale from Gurney's, so they were fairly small, and still are.I have hopes they are different colors than this big blooming one.
Anybody have any daffodils or other early bulbs popping up? Mine are about an inch above the dirt. I had mulched them with some leaves the Youth Group brought over, but the wind storms before the snow and after have taken them all away. I think the warmer 2 weeks after the snow encouraged them to sprout above ground. I hope it doesn't freeze hard before they can get to full size.

Seeds are on sale already!

Here is a picture of my first 2012 seed purchase (maybe I'll buy more later, not sure). They are on sale this week at Fred Meyer with a coupon for 40% off. I remarked to the checker that they used to have 50% off sales - he just laughed. Guess that means I should be happy with the sale now.
I am getting itchy to start gardening - ever since the snow was covering everything. Just too dang cold though. I tried to weed a bit on Sunday, but it was windy and cold, so that didn't last very long.

Bunnies 2012

Our infestation of rabbits from last summer seems to have diminished somewhat. There were at least a dozen. We haven't heard the local owl lately, so I'm guessing most of the rabbits are history.

We now identify two that show up here regularly. Here is one of them. Neither one has any fear. He hopped right up while I was photographing him and chewed on my shoes. The other day I was visiting my neighbor in her front yard and the two of them hopped right up and sat on her feet. Neither one of us had a camera with us.

It doesn't help that my neighbor feeds him. He can be found between our house and theirs among the bushes.

If he is still hungry, he prunes my ground-cover. It is vinca minor that has been growing next to the house for about 20 years, and was a mound a foot high, six feet long, and about three feet wide growing out into the grass. We trim it when we mow the grass. The rabbit has it trimmed a foot back from the grass line. He keeps it pretty even, although it is about half the size it once was.

Lately we've only been seeing one of them at a time. Can it be that more bunnies are in our future? Time will tell.

Beets

Here is Roger harvesting beets with me.

me holding the mother of all beets - it's bigger than my hand!

Results of the cutting of the beets to fit in jars. Chiogga is the name of the white/red rings beet and in the other bowl are Bull's Blood, Early Wonder, and Detroit Dark Red. The chiogga ones look pale in the jars, but I'm sure they will taste just as good. I've cooked them together with the more red ones for dinners and they absorb the dark red color - I think we'll do that if we can pickled beets again next year. We also planted Golden Touchstone which are a beautiful yellow, but there was only enough for one jar. We'd eaten the rest before today - they are delicious!!

Here are the finished jars - we (Sheila and I) got 12 pints and 28 half pints of pickled beets. Some we put cloves in with the pickling liquid. We tested this last year and it was very good. The one yellow jar is on the far right. The harvesting took a couple hours on Monday: digging, washing, chopping off roots and tops. The peeling, chopping and canning took 5 hours today. All well worth it!! yum!

Late Season photos

Here are some of my beautiful rainbow carrots - see the one with a little one hugging it? Cute! they were delicious too!

 Next photo down is my shallot bed. I planted tons of small sets and they all pretty much failed. Don't know why. There are small ones in there that developed new sets along side, so I think I will rescue as many as I can and save for spring, or clean out the whole bed and mulch after setting them back into the dirt. Maybe that will work, anyone else have any ideas? Next photo is this year's potato crop from the compost pile. We are eating some of the white ones for dinner tonight - they are in the oven and smelling almost done, so I better get this posted so I can finish the rest of dinner to go along with them. The last photo is some beets - so pretty and delicious too. These are part of the crop that Sheila helped me with last spring when I was just after surgery on my hip and couldn't do the heavy stuff. Remember she cleaned out the bed boxes and we planted peas, onion sets and these beets. We have been eating on them for a couple months, both of us - there are still some left and we are going to make pickled beets out of them. Yummm!

here are some successes and failures in my garden this year - more potatoes from the compost pile, excellent beets, carrots, and failure of shallots.

Lilies from Verdelle

Verdelle gave me these lilies this past spring. She didn't think they would bloom this year, but look! There are more buds, too.

Thank you, Verdelle!