Town House Homestead Tuesday

Container gardening has been my sanity this summer. I have been working diligently at cleaning and bringing our little piece of earth back to life. There's so much more to do just cleaning growth from a chain link fence, and working on the pollination garden a few shovels full at a time. I started two five gallon buckets of green beans yesterday. These will be growing in the breezeway so that the "friendly" animals around here won't eat them. My sunflowers are doing well. They are in the best pot of all, Mother Earth's. They are more than three feet tall at this point and I'm hoping with the heat we're going to be getting they will soon shoot higher.

A couple of weeks ago now I planted patty pan summer squash in two buckets and they are showing off at how well they can do in containers. 

I planted another bucket with basil. This is purple basil and it's also doing well growing in the breezeway. Beetles ate my basil last year and I am so looking forward to something more this year.

My potted shallots are growing and so is the one and only survivor I put in the ground. Gardening is a learning experience for me. I will succeed.

I started a pot of green bunching onions. Yes, I know they grow and spread, but I love them, cook with them, and am tired of buying them.

For a little change for our meals and salads I also started a pot of scarlet bunch onions. Although I have these in pots, I have also put a patch of each in the ground. I know it's late, but they will winter well and I'll have sets for next spring. 

My most exciting venture with container gardening is my ginger. This is my second attempt and I am happy to say it is sprouting and getting roots. It's been in the container for a little over two weeks and I think I'm in a bit of shock. I use so much ginger in my cooking, baking, and beverages. It takes about a year to grow before any harvest, but I've got this. 

In the pollination garden I have a five gallon bucket of mint growing that survived the winter and is ready to harvest. I also have a five gallon bucket of lemon balm growing and harvested that this past weekend. It is drying to use for tea. So, that's what's been going on this week at the Town House Homestead. We are making better progress than we expected. Thank you for stopping by and have a wonderful week. Happy gardening. 

Town House Homestead Tuesday

Well let's talk about activity and being busy. So much has gone on that I'm going to make it simple and mostly one liners if that's possible. 

Another find on this lovely half acre piece of the earth has been this peach tree. It's growing through the fence and has just a few peaches, but we'll see what happens. My daughter came across it when she was walking Hunter. 

I dehydrated sweet potatoes for Hunter so that he'd have some healthier chews. The teething and tooth loss has made him a little sick, so we've been trying to make things easier for him. Puppy kibbles are a bit hard so we've been adding some chicken broth to it.

I had a healthy harvest of garlic. As hoped I got 34 heads from the 36 cloves I planted. There are two braids hanging in the garage to dry well for the next few weeks.

Beekeeping has been a real trial. My daughter's first attempt at her own, and the hive split, which is normal. They swarmed to the dead apple tree about twenty feet from the hive box itself, and about eight feet off the ground. We watched it happen and immediately contacted another beekeeper and he came with his daughter to rescue it. 

This is Max doing his first swarm collection and what doesn't show in the pictures is that this is during a very heavy thunder storm.

Close to two hours later when the rain was letting up, Max and Brianna had the box filled and sealed up for transporting, and so far so good for them. Unfortunately one week later the rest of the hive swarmed to another tree 35 to 40 feet up and could not be rescued, but again I saw this swarm happen, and 24 hours later watched the swarm leave the tree and fly off into the sunset. 

This was the best picture I could get of the second swarm. We are sad, but the hive is still active and we will inspect to see if there is a third queen. You never know. 

The long neglected and dying apple tree was taken down. Emily and I needed to release some stress so in a couple of hours we had it down and mostly cleaned up. The future of the stump is still being decided.

One kids trash is a dogs treasure. Our friend Richard brought Hunter a kiddie pool. With a little duct tape repair it holds enough water for Hunter to play in. 

The gardens are growing. Weeds and all. The rose bush in the back I transplanted from a very shady corner of our lot and it is so happy. Blossoming on a daily basis. A bucket of mint and a bucket of lemon balm are almost ready for a good harvest, and there are Iris and spider wart in this corner. Much more growing and lots of planting to go this fall with bulbs. The front flower beds are growing nicely too and we'll have stronger plants to split next year to keep going. 

Everything has to look messy and old before it looks clean, new, and young again. The shed has been cleaned out so that a new floor can go down and new doors built. For now everything is in the pollination garden area that has not been planted, waiting for the new work to be done before it can go back in. 

We gathered all the landscape timbers that came with the property and stacked them in the back yard. These will become two raised beds. One for raspberries and one for blackberries. 

And here he is, the most curious puppy on earth, who stuck his face in front of the camera while I was trying to take a picture sitting down. Don't know what I was thinking. We're learning to work together. Hunter is five months old and completed three obedience classes. Some successes and a lot to work on, but he's still a baby as I am told, and he will get it. So that's how busy we continue to be as we build this half acre homestead. It is paying off in wonderful ways and we couldn't be happier. Lots more to do this summer and getting ready for winter, but even though time is passing quickly, we have accomplished a lot in 15 months. Thank you for stopping by for a visit and have a great week.