Victor, after getting his cast yesterday, was a tad sore.  The poking and prodding they had to do to figure out where his break is (very fine line, hard to see on x-rays though I saw it clear as day – I should totally be a doctor except that I don’t like them) left his ankle and foot sore and left him a tad whiny.  By evening he was feeling much better – especially after I showed him how to slip down onto the floor and scoot across on his bum to get stuff.  The moment I showed him that he was scooting all over the main floor of the house, happy as a clam that he could do it.  He didn’t like how heavy the cast is, but motion was possible so all was good in the world.

Today, things are different.  In the short space of a few hours (roughly 14hrs of awake, new cast time), we go from racing around the coffee table (vid 8mb – can you tell how much he loves mobility?), to cruising around the table (vid 4mb).  He’s terribly sweet sounding when he asks “Can you help me, Mommy?” (vid 3.6mb).  So with or without a please, I help him walk (vid 3.4mb).

Victor now has his cast.  They asked for his favourite colour (he doesn’t have one) and he said “green” and they asked “bright green or dark green” and he said “dark green” so he has what I’d call “Kelly green” (standard green).  Thank goodness he didn’t say bright green – I may have had to gouge my eyes out.  This one’s not so bad.

(seen with the “good boy present” from a nurse at the ER – it’s his get-better-bear)

It stays on for 6wks but he can walk on it as soon as he’s comfortable doing so and I splurged for the waterproof padding so we can bathe him with less worry (not to say the inside of a cast of a generally stinky kid like he is isn’t going to still be nasty when they take it off, but at least we can keep the rest of him mostly clean).  We go back in a week for x-rays to make sure things are aligned well.  It was such a thin break that the NP couldn’t find it at first until I had to describe it to her and she consulted the Dr.

Victor’s not crazy about how much it weighs, and he may be a bit tender from the poking and prodding, but he’ll get used to it.  He was a total champ!

Well, the garden grows.  Overgrows, that is.  The cucumber completely took-over the trellis I built last month and was working it’s way down to the ground so Ken and I built it an extension.

I could do with it being a bit taller as I have to hunch when I go under (and when we’ll be harvesting), but at leas the cuc’s will be off the ground and, hopefully, happier.  This one certainly is!

The beans are producing like mad and I’ll be picking and freezing a bunch tomorrow.  The peas continue to grow, though they don’t get very big (pea size) so I’m not sure if I should bother freezing any or not – I’ll decide tomorrow when I do their next-door-neighbours, the beans.

I ripped out the spinach and tomorrow will rip out the brune d’hiver lettuce that we’ve enjoyed so much this summer – both went to seed and need to be reseeded (and they were starting to drap over the tomatoes).  The buttercrunch lettuce is finally ready (just in time for us to not be here) and looks yummy.

The tomatoes are flowering more, so maaaaaybe.Pumpkins continue to grow and flower and every time they start to become an actual pumpkin they “abort” (drop the flower just after it’s started plumping into fruit).  I don’t understand why they’re doing this, though.  It could be poor pollination (though I thought our weird little odd-bees were doing a great job), it could be a fungus (with all this rain?! never!), it could be that it’s just too early and the season has been too strange.  I’ll keep watching and see what they do.  It’s a learning experience.

The Brussels Sprouts are perking up a bit – not as much slug damage – and one of them even has baby sprouts on it.  The Luffa vine is even growing, though there’s no way it’ll fruit it’s good to know that with warmer, drier weather it *will* grow.  I’m quite pleased with how the Peppermint Bed is doing.  We’ll definitely be having mojito’s soon!
SO.  Comparisons:

Two weeks ago after the deer ate it.

Now.  There’s actually some fruit, though immature, on last year’s slug-eaten growth so I’ve hope for next year for fruit.

Tall bed (cucumber, beets, radish, carrots, daikon, summer squash) 3wks ago.

The cucumbers are doing very well, beets, radish, carrots, daikon have been harvested and/or reseeded.

Main garden image:

May 25

June 22

July 27

We’ll be going to the orthopedic surgeon tomorrow to get his cast.  I hope it’ll be fiberglass since the weight of his splint (partly plaster) is substantial.  Victor is perfectly fine.  His leg barely hurts at all and last night he didn’t wake up at all from any pain nor say he had any this morning until after he’d sat in his highchair for a while.  (They wrote us a script for a painkiller with codeine but we’re just not inclined to give that to him.)  He’s of the opinion that he should be allowed to get up and run around.  I’ll feel better once he’s casted and we know the complete details of his healing.

Broken ankle (startlingly identical looking to my own when I was 15).  Our trip plans for this week are now canceled.  Victor is in a splint for now and will have a cast as soon as we see the orthopedic surgeon.

I can’t even properly express how upset I am about this.  He’s such a physical, active kid and he’s now immobile for the next 6+ weeks.   Completely non-weight bearing so he has to be carried everywhere and toys have to be carried to him.  He’s going through this (wonderful) helpful phase right now and I’m afraid of that being gone once his cast is off.  Life has been so good for the past little while – the boys and life has been so easy…

Let’s all go to the E.R!

Let’s all go to the E.R!

Let’s all go to the E.R, and x-ray Victor’s foot!

I dreamt, last night, that I saw little green tomatoes on my tomato plants and I was *so* happy that I got something from them.

The fact that I remember this means it won’t happen and now I’m all bummed out about that.

The pumpkins are doing crazy good:

Here’s a pic from my bedroom window:

There’s three of them, reaching to each side and kinda up/kinda to the right.  The bed they’re against is 5′ wide, so they stretch a good 15′.  The flowers are big and bright and a nice thing to see in the morning.  The bees love them!  Ethan even noticed this morning that “the pumpkins sure are growing!” (I explained about how the flowers are the start of a pumpkin growing.)  I sure hope we get some impressive ones.  He said we’ll get the “biggest pumpkin!” so I don’t want him to be disappointed.

Finally the green beans are ready for picking!

That’s two *full* handfuls, and more than enough for dinner tonight.  The peas have recovered, somewhat, from the deer carnage and have more blossoms for future peas, so I’m pleased about that – so’s Ethan as he’s been introduced to the crazy-sweet, juicy joy of fresh, raw peas.  The fact that they come in their own little packaging amuses him, too.

The cucumbers have so many little cuc’s growing it’s daunting – I’ll definitely be making pickles this year.  I don’t have my family’s recipe so I’ll have to find another and experiment, some.  At least I’ll be able to use my own dill (next year I’ll hopefully use my own garlic, too!).  The squash are producing and there’s two summer squash out there begging to be picked (and will likely end up for dinner tonight, too).  Tomorrow we’ll be harvesting all the remaining beets and daikon and reseeding them.  I’ll steam and freeze the beets and their greens since Ken doesn’t like pickled beets (yet).  At the size and abundance of flowers on the pumpkin vines, though, he’s agreed that he needs to learn to like pumpkin pie.   There’s even tiny little blossoms on my pathetically tiny tomatoes!  If July continues warm and dry(er) and August gives us the same, I may get tomatoes from them, yet!

I’m sure this isn’t exciting to anybody but me (and Ken), but it’s a combination of the gardener’s version of “I am Woman, hear me roar!” (I am Gardener, hear me gush?) and the “look what *I* made?!” sense of accomplishment.

This weekend was one of those lovely ones where the weather is lovely and the work productive.  I weeded the jungle and freed up the luffa (not that I’ll get plants, but any plant is interesting to watch grow) and lilies, Ken weeded the front walk and mowed the lawn, and we finally got the tomato trellis up.  Ken helped and it looks a lot better than I was anticipating!

So now the front view looks like this:

Also…. I have beans!! (the verticle, dusty looking things)

And they’re delicious!  I can’t wait til they’re a bit bigger and I can eat a whole lot more of  them!  I think the kids will love them, too!.

I mentioned to Ken last week that I needed to video Victor saying some of his cutest words before he stopped pronouncing them wrongly.  I should have done it then.  This weekend, Grubby became Grammy (and Great Grammy earned herself said title), E!ee became E-tan.

Months ago, as we were sitting at the table eating, he kept looking over my shoulder out the window.  I asked him what he saw (he’s done this before and told me there’s an elephant or hippopotamus or giraffe outside) and he said he saw a “Woodpepper”.  I turned, surprised that he knew what a woodpepper is, and told him I didn’t see it.  He insisted, over and over, “Woodpepper!  I. seeya. Woodpepper!” (he speaks very choppily sometimes).  I turned again and looked hard and then saw it, much further away than I’d expect, blending quite well with it’s surroundings.  A Woodpepper.  This morning, my favourite of his word-mess-ups ended and I mourn the loss of the Woodpepper for the emergence of a Woodpecker we heard this morning.  I really loved the Woodpeppers.

I’d  video his colour identification but it’s hard to capture.  Currently everything, when asked, is initially “Yellow”, until you say “no, what colour is it?” and then it becomes green or blue or sometimes red (he knows those ones) or yellow again if it’s not one of those.

Today is a lovely day, so I spent enough time outside to take pictures of all the florals in the garden and around the house (the mosquitoes are keeping us inside because holy crap they’re horrible this year!!).

Pansies… how can these not cheer anybody up!  They’re still coming up in the oddest of places, but they’re so darned cute I can’t remove them.

They’re coming up in all sorts of colours, too.  I’m tempted to buy more and just scatter them around the top of the driveway (where we don’t drive), like chicken feed.

The lavender has such tiny stalks that the flowers look like they’re in mid-explosion.  They’re almost done flowering, but so pretty and smell lovely.

The shade bed in the back that Sharon gave me for Mother’s Day has been flowering for a few weeks now.  They’re understated but really pretty.  I’ll need to get more of them, I think, for the other side of the back of the house in the empty bed.

Lettuce that’s pretty enough it may as well be a flower.  Seriously.  It tastes great and grows great, too.  We’ll definitely be growing it next year.  It’s a head lettuce, but leafy enough that I just pluck it by leaf as needed.

Not the *best* picture but evidence of joy to come (lots of joy, if I’m lucky).

Lettuce, again, that’s so pretty it may as well be flowers (and tasty – except the arugula ICK!), and look how big my tomatoes are getting!! (I know, they’re not, but it’s been a horrid year and these? are grown.from.seed which means much harder than purchased seedlings).  I’m highly doubting I’ll get fruit, but enjoying their growth anyways.  (Please don’t look at the bed in the background because the weeds help me feel better about the flowers I sewed but that just didn’t happen.)

Another gift from Sharon and I completely forget what they’re called but they’re awfully sweet looking and are perfect right there.

Lilies! I wasn’t even expecting more than the pink but now there’s a lovely burgundy and bright yellow that I adore! I’ll be planting some day lilies in that bed next year, too, I think. I love lilies.

The first cucumber flower!!  The entire reason for the photos because it’s pretty and it’s the first and lo let us bask in the flowery goodness of edible things (and non-edible, I won’t discriminate).  I really like how the beets look, too.  The richness of the red on the stalks and how it bleeds onto the leaves is a great contrast of colour.

The cucumber’s *love* the trellis I rigged up for them.  It’s perfect because I’ve got easy access to their fruit and they get loads of sunshine and space to grow.  They’re growing over a foot a week, so far (on the far side the lowest bright, white string is where the new string I put up two days ago starts – they were just barely above that).  Once they go over the top I’ll either let them dangle or have them twine their way back down.

I’m really pleased, too, that the garden is where it is – I look out that window (trellis pic) *constantly* and it gives me so much pleasure to look down upon my garden.  Next year I’m totally putting in marigolds, partly for the bug control but mostly to add to the pretty-aspect of the garden.

Today, for the first time, we’re eating out of the garden for dinner (excluding the past few weeks where we’ve been eating salad like there’s no tomorrow)!

Beets (a tad small but they’ll do) will become borscht (which we all love – even the boys).  On the right are daikon (Japanese radish) which I’ll be adding to supplement the beets somewhat (there’ll also be potatoes in the soup, but I had to buy those).  We had some daikon last night and it’s different tasting than that in the store – more radishy flavour (store daikon was kinda bland).  The colour is neat… almost translucent.  Daikon grow really large (+3″ diameter, mine’re about 2″) and are sometimes hollowed out and carved like a jack o’lantern is here.  I doubt mine’ll grow that big, but we’ll see.

Along with the borscht, we’ll be having creamed greens.  I use a Thai recipe that calls for beet greens and kale but since I don’t have kale (*this* year – we’ll see about next) I’m supplementing with spinach (it’s in there, just on the bottom of the pile which is about 4 layers deep).

I’m feeling all kinds of crazy so I think I’ll whip up a batch of quicky foccacia bread this afternoon with some dill from the garden and some parmesan I’ve got in the fridge (the real kind).  The feeling of doing all this is making me a little giddy.  I’m very pleased.  Very very pleased.

Those “worst case scenarios” I mentioned a few weeks ago seem to be happening, at least in part.  The pumpkin plants (3) have taken off and are positively *covered* with blossoms and I have no idea what I’ll do with it all since Ken doesn’t eat pumpkin (crazy!).  The summer squash (4) also have started showing blossom tips – one that’s actually become a blossom and has a little squash on in.  The beans are absolutely covered in those pretty, little white blossoms I showed you last week.  The dill has gotten out of control.  The beets are almost ready for harvest (thankfully I can freeze both the roots and greens) and I’ll likely be doing them this weekend.  The daikon have really started bulking up and should be ready in a week or two, though I haven’t any idea if I can preserve them or not (likely, even if it’s just freezing).  The basil is finally coming up and looks to be a bumper crop (I’ll be able to make pesto!).  The cucumbers are also covered in blossoms.  I’m going out now to extend the trellis.

I hope I can manage it all.  At least I’m learning lots!

(or Why We’re Never Leaving Home Again During The Summer Until The Deer Fence Is Up)

I knew it was a chance.  I hoped.  They haven’t come near the garden yet.  I just hoped, most of all, they wouldn’t touch my tiny, pathetically small tomato plants.  They didn’t.  They went down the main aisle of the garden, on their trek around the house.  They ate most of the tops off the peas (which had grown quite a lot, from the size of the stems left).  They ate all the leaves off the new growth of my lilac.  They ate blooms that had opened of the lily bed (but not all of them, thankfully).

I was right in that the blooms I’ve been waiting weeks for, opened while we were away (but that’s ok, there’s lots left I get to watch open).

The deer ignored the lettuce *completely*.  WTF?!

I could have lived with that.  Really, the amount of damage is so minimal I’d hardly mind it.  The tomatoes were barely touched (took the tops off two but just nibbles and didn’t touch the rest, though they walked past all of them).  The squash and pumpkins had a *great* time while we were away.  Cucumbers are growing like mad up the trellis I built.  Some of the radish that I reseeded are sprouted.

The carnage is what they did to the other side of the house. To the rhubarb bed (rhubarb being *poisonous* and them having ignored it for several seasons). Gone.

Gone.  Only the outer most leaves are left and they’re not edible (too holy and scraggly).  I’d hoped to harvest and bake something this year.  I just hope, now, the roots got enough energy stored for anything next year.

Thee dogwood and holly I had in the front bed which were doing so well are almost stripped.  They were doing *so* well, FINALLY.  I cringed when I saw it and my heart moaned because finally that bed was starting to shape into something not an eye-sore.

I’ve been in almost tears because of what they did to the raspberries and hosta.  I’m glad I took the pictures two weeks ago; at least I can remember how wonderful they looked (though they’d grown even more and plumped out much more).

See how much taller they’d gotten?!  See those tall spikes coming out of the hostas?  Guess what was just about to bloom when we left and *did* bloom when we were away? (we found one, big fat lovely purple petal dangling from one of them)  The leaves of the hosta are completely gone – every last one.  The raspberries have almost been stripped – all the big, agressive growth they’d had was eaten (but not the older stuff).  I can hope they’ll bounce back for the season – it’s still a while off, but I doubt it.  The hosta’s should live til next year, but I doubt they’ll bounce back and I know they won’t flower again.

It may sound pathetic to cry over this, but when you watch a garden as carefully as we have and put as much of your heart into it as we did, even knowing the risks, it’s just hard.