Tuesday morning musings

We have had cooler weather here the last week - after a week of record hot temperatures. We also had Memorial Day weekend, and I was so busy that I didn't have time to get out to the garden almost at all. I only spent about an hour there yesterday, just enough time to prune and water the tomates, pull a few weeds, and plant the green beans and yellow summer squash that I just bought.

I counted my green bean plants - if you include each individual plant, we have 50. I'm even considering planting more, because they're so versatile. We make green bean salads, put them in pasta sauces, make soups, add them to giardiniera, and I can freeze them. I could try pickling and canning them, too. This year I got smart, and I've planted them around the edge of one of my beds for easy picking.

I think the peas are going to have to go soon. They're drying up, and I haven't seen any new flowers in a while. We have only a handful in the fridge, so we'll probably make a pasta sauce with them.

The garlic and shallots will be coming out soon - I just turned the water off to them yesterday. I need to decide what I'm going to plant there when it's available, and also what I'm going to plant when I pull out the peas. I already have plenty of tomatoes, and I'll have plenty of peppers by the end of the week (I hope!). I may leave the space for the peas open for the melon I have planted over there. And I suppose I could plant either more eggplant or a winter squash where the garlic is. The problem is that there's really not enough room for a winter squash, because it's pretty close to the zucchini, which I know is going to get big. So I don't know what I'm going to do yet. I'll have to give it some thought.