After some nice days of sun and 70’s, today it got really cloudy. Then it began snowing like crazy. Wow! We didn’t enjoy that one bit. But we had lots to do indoors. Will began shelling beans by putting them in a five-gallon bucket. Then he stomps down with his boot to loosen the beans in the pods. Finally, out comes the baseball bat, which he uses to pound down on the bean pods, shelling out the dry beans. It makes shelling them much faster than doing each one by hand. But, some stubborn varieties, such as Carminat, Monte Gusto and Hidatsa Shield Figure (some of our favorite beans too!) are harder and must be shelled by hand, which takes quite a bit of time. You can see we get personal with many seeds!
I can’t believe it; the greenhouse is plumb full of beans, squash, pumpkins, peppers, and the last tomatoes, some of which are starting to go bad. Hurry Jackie!
Today, I began cutting open Hopi Pale Grey squash for their seeds. I see Will is drooling and hoping I’ll get busy and make at least two pumpkin pies from one of them. We are so blessed to have a nice crop of very large Hopis this year. We love them so much! Sarge, the new Mastiff pup, loves them too and begs for raw squash “guts” as I seed each half out. He thinks they’re yummy too. — Jackie
Temperature here in southern middle TN going down to 28 tomorrow (Monday night) and stays in the 20’s until Friday morning and then only 37 then. Quite an early cold snap for sure, especially for us, brrrr.
Is that a Pepsi can behind Will in his picture of bean pounding chores? Stay away from that bad stuff! LOL We all want you to be healthy and around for a long time.
Yeah, it’s Pepis; Will’s drug of choice. Yeah, we know it’s bad but we don’t smoke, drink or do drugs and we all have at least one bad habit.
It’s cold, cold here too. We have 2″ of snow on the ground. Bah!
Seeing your Hopi squash reminded me of our mystery plant in the garden this year. Somehow a Hopi Squash must have been in the ground when we tilled the garden and, surprise, we had a volunteer vine producing 3 beautiful Hopi Squash from its effort. It may be a rare squash but it is certainly a tough little guy! Pumpkin pie it is but we will definitely save seeds.
Maggie
Down here I think Mr. Frosty is about to make his first visit next week as there are two mornings forecasted tor 36 and 37. It’s time. Meanwhile the broccoli, cabbage, kohlrabi, kale and collards planted over the last month won’t mind a bit.
It’s so nice to see your green house stacked with the fruits of your labor. Thanks goodness for the greenhouse to store stuff instead of having to cram it all in your living room! :)
It’s been so very dry. We had had no rain at all since Sep 17 until two days ago when the good Lord sent 2.8″. The soil had been powder dry down at least 12″. The rain was just in time for planting garlic and onions today!
Glad you got the rain! We’ve had an abundance and wish it would dry up and warm up some. Two inches of snow the second week of October is early, even for us northerners.
We have had some below freezing days here but no snow yet. I had 26 yesterday and 28 this morning. It’s been warming up to the upper 50s to low 60s, but has been windy. We are still very dry. My garden did poorly this year due to drought. Hopefully next year will be better. Your greenhouse is such a blessing and wow! What a lot of produce. It looks beautiful. Prayers for a great week and strength to get your work done.
I’m so very glad that Will built that greenhouse. It’s been such a big help in all ways!!
I have Provider beans that aren’t dried down on the vine, but the freeze is coming. Will the green, large beans have viable seeds if I pull them before the freeze, or do they really need to be dry and brownish on the plant to be mature enough to be seed for coming years? I’m guessing I’m out of time on this.
If it’s going to freeze, pick the pods and lay them out in a warm, protected area. They may or may not dry down and make good seed, depending on just how mature they are.
If the pictures are real time-doesn’t look like much accumulated yet-though the warning is there-seems like yesterday that you were first planting-where did the summer go!!! Looks like a good harvest though-and get out the long johns for working outside-how did your adopted son do with his surgery. Do you feed the left over veggies that are not canned to the cows?.
Do take care. We just split the final 3 cords of 7, of maple wood for the winter-the first half is in the wood shed-now to get the rest. whewww. Janelle
We just got 2″ of new snow so BAH!! Javid is doing great after his surgery. He’s back at the group home and doing rehab. We’re really relived to have that over with and him back to health.
Yes, we do feed any leftover produce that aren’t canned or given to friends.
Will’s working on stacking the wood in the woodshed. It’s pretty full now but he has several split piles outside that need to dry before putting inside.
Yikes! Snow already…… We have not yet frosted. Average 1st frost here is mid November. HOWEVER, we are to get to about 34 this coming Tuesday……… That is getting close.
Yes, it is! We found the weather forecasters often miss by a lot up here. They say 40 and we get 30. So, we’re really careful when the temp starts to drop.
Here in Michigan its been cold but sunny about half of the day so its good to work outside. Its been 60 degrees today. Supposed to have freezing (32 degrees) early next week. I still have squash on the vine but want to leave it if I can for a couple more weeks. Its edible now but needs to be in the ground for 120 days about 2 more weeks.
Your stash in the greenhouse looks like you are prepared for winter. I don’t have a greenhouse to store my garden produce in. You are blessed to have a husband that helps out so much.
I really am blessed to have Will, who helps out a whole lot. Not only is the greenhouse bulging but the house looks even fuller now, with piles of squash, beans, corn and melons everywhere.
Snow! Oh man…go faster! So glad you have had such a great harvest. I love seeing it all piled up in the greenhouse. Don’t you just love having one? I have just a hoop house and don’t know how I did without one. Looks like things are moving along well for you and Will. So pleased. Congratulations to David and Miss Elizabeth!!! Pyro
I SO love that greenhouse!!! Friends are giving us a large hoop house that had blown apart in a bad wind storm, along with a propane heater for it. One more job for poor Will!
Love it! I haven’t started to do anything with my Hopi yet. Gonna soon. Been canning up everything possible while I still have my peppers growing! I covered them in heavy duty plastic a week ago and they have held up so far. I had to restart seeds this spring late because I accidentally knocked over the seedlings and killed them all. So I’m willing to do whatever I have to to get these peppers off of them! I know my time is limited and I’m about out will keep on as long as I possibly can.
I have canned potatoes, the peppers I did get already, and tons of other stuff. My kitchen is a mess. I have tons of tomatoes that were green that I’m turning slowly but are either in the house or outside in my chicken coop which is warm. I also have all my onions drying the potatoes seasoning and the squash hardening with the chicken in their coop. They can’t get to them of course. All my driving varieties are also in there hanging from the rafters drying down. I’ve collected some so far but not very many. I grew Anaheim peppers and I have gotten three, what do you do with them? I grew them just for the fun of it to see if I get any and I did get nice big ones. What can I use them in that you use them in? My lettuce, carrots, peas, sunflowers, broccoli, brussle sprouts, cauliflower, cabbage and parsnips have held up in the cold so far outside still in the ground. I have beautiful heads of the cauliflower coming and I’m not willing to give up on them yet. Same with all the other plants. I’ve got to get my garlic in tomorrow before we get too cold.
I was laughing to myself when I was checking those peppers underneath the plastic because most people have given up on their gardens and their growing season, but my peppers and I have one big pumpkin plant left that I am babying along to try to get the pumpkins to turn orange and these peppers to mature. But I did pull the big volunteer pumpkin plants in the front of my house today because they’re done, and I figured I’d pull them while they were green and feed them to the pigs and cows and emus. I also have one last apple tree typic, but it’s just not quite ready yet, so I’m hoping tomorrow it’ll be ready and I can get it off the tree.
I also have 10 million things to do on the farm like haul cow is home for the winter. It’s always exciting when things are chaos!
Chaos is our middle name!! I love chiles rellenos made with my Anaheims
Seed them, stuff with your favorite cheese, batter and deep fry. Mmmmm. Your pumpkins will turn orange if you bring them inside, if you have to and if you have to, pull your pepper plants, with peppers on them and bring inside. They will usually go ahead and mature for you.
I have never known that! I’ll do that if they don’t look good after tonight’s frost! Thanks a million Jackie!
Your haul is impressive! I honestly don’t know how you can handle that much garden produce. But you should eat well for the winter ☺️
Oh yeah! I tell everyone we’re “food embarrassed” when they try to give us food. I know they haven’t seen my pantry! I don’t know how we handle so much either but somehow it gets done. Usually.
Well, you can keep the snow although it’s only in the 50’s here. I’m not ready for winter at all, been enjoying the lovely fall days here in eastern Montana!
We don’t want it either! Way too early.
Blessings as you ‘find’ more hours in the day.
Thank you, Sandy. If there were a way to hold back the clock a bit…..
Easy on the squash guts Sarge as you don’t want any surprises – no time for eat first, think later! Saw the snow on the weather and figured you were in the bullseye.
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