My Not So Secret Garden

Here is my first watermelon! I'm not sure if it will ripen before the cold weather gets here but it's worth a shot. It looks kind of ucky, but the black stuff on it is just flowers peices with mud on them. It's been raining here quite bit. Speaking of rain, A storm 2 nights ago blew my pole beans down :( Just as they were really getting going. I managed to prop them back up and spent an hour picking beans. I also had alot of tomatoes, banana peppers and cucumbers out there as well. My Yellew Bell Peppers finally turned yellow! I picked a bunch of those too! By the time I got back in my counter was full. I didnt have time to can everything, so I froze it. I ended up with 5 quart bags of peppers, 1 bag eggplant, and 2 bags of green beans (and yes, I blanched them first) I also picked 2 red habeneros for mom. I hope shes hungry... I only have about a million more out there. This huge tomato snuck up on me. It looks to be two tomatoes stuck together but I think I'll co...

The odd plant thats in my frontyard has taken over. I think it must grow a foot a day!I was thinking it must be a pumpkin of some kind, but now I dont think I'll ever know! It has bloomed and has many more blooms ready, but they are all male flowers though. The big blooms stay open for just a few hours then they close up and fall off the next day. Oh well Jer likes it so I guess it will stay out there until fall. I thought this was too pretty to leave out. Its an upsclose picture of the flower of the odd plant. This rainbow is from a couple days ago. I was driving home and it seemed to stretch all the way across town. You can just barely see it right above the garage. It was a nice cap to the day... It had rained all day and cleared up just long enough for this.

Here it is in action. It took a while to figure out just how much heat I needed to make it work properly. First it jiggled too fast, then too slow. I eventually got it just right. Here's what I got done today. 4 Strawberry jams and 2 1/2 mushroom spaghetti sauces. I didnt know you werent supposed to only fill a jar 1/2 way if thats all you had. Oops. I guess I will have to use that soon. All of the jars popped close, but my jam did not set well. Its kind of runny :( Oh well I'm sure it will taste good on biscuits or on Ice cream.

Its entirely too hot to do anything! I got 3 clematis plants and a couple clumps of daylilies off of craigslist, but its too hot to go plant them . I think they will sit in the garage for a couple hours until it cools down.

WooHoo ! YARD SALE FINDS: First up , a buzzing bee water kettle. When the water boils the Little bees on the top fly around and buzz... too cute. Second up , a Mirro pressure cooker and 78 jars. Everyone keeps saying these things are deathtraps, but hey I have AFLAC it will be OK . I read up on them so I would be somewhat sure that I wasn't going to burn the house down. It seems to be a newer model as it has multiple air vents to release pressure should anything go horribly wrong. I watched a few YouTube videos too. I'm pretty sure I know what I'm doing. I guess well find out soon though. I plan on making strawberry jam (as requested by Robbie), spaghetti sauce, ketchup, and maybe some apple butter. Oh, and canning some of my up and coming green beans. My 3rd Yard sale find is a Cuisinart pure indulgence ice cream maker. I think this might be my favorite find of all. Its brand new in the box and here comes the best part... it was free. I also have plans tonight o...