2011 Garden .. It's A Wrap

Today was the last day harvesting in the garden before we get our first predicted frost.  I was also canning tomato sauce, watching my little grandson and cleaning up from hosting my oldest daughter's baby shower on Sunday.  That left a very slim window of time to pick the last of the raspberries and stash uprooted/re-potted celery, peppers and parsley ... along with potted geraniums and herbs into the garage to deal with in a few days.  Our apples were carefully picked and have been stored wrapped in tissue paper in the cool basement.  It smells wonderful every time I walk into the storage room.

The past few days were peak for autumn colors in the yard.  I even brought in a few boughs of maple leaves to use as 'floral' arrangements for the baby shower.  This year the sweet peas I planted produced an abundance of blooms .. they are one of my favorite flowers to pick and bring indoors.  All of the seed pods were harvested to plant next year.

It really does take many years of practice to have gardening become second nature .. even then there is something new to learn.  I have not gotten up to speed with extending the growing season using protective coverings .. perhaps when hubby retires he will lend a hand and the end of gardening season won't be as demanding (not).

For now, we have more food stored away than any previous years.  It was a lot of work keeping up with canning and freezing.  Who knows, maybe I'll have time to start blogging again :)