Fall Planting

I love fall gardening.  I thought I wouldn't.  In fact, I didn't know it existed until we moved to southern Mississippi two falls ago, and I mourned the terrible timing.  There would be no vegetable garden till spring, I thought. 

I was wrong!

This year's fall garden contains some old favorites and a few new additions.  A must-have for any fall (or spring garden) is lettuce, so I've planted it in abundance.

I even allowed Amos to sneak into this photo.  He's always such a huge gardening inspiration, cheering me onto the finish.  (He actually cares nothing for lettuce, of course.)

 

 

 

This will be my fifth attempt at growing broccoli.  I have only done it once successfully!  It needs to be thinned to have lots of room, and it requires lots of patience.  I had great results last fall, though.  By January, I had lovely huge heads of broccoli!

 

 

 

 

Onto the new additions for this year's garden.

 

Peas...

 

And fennel.  I'm very excited to see if I can grow this, not only as a new gardening challenge, but because I've never cooked with it either and would love to start out with my own home-grown variety.

 

 

 

 

This year's last newcomer is spinach. It's doing well so far.  It was one of my husband's requests.

 

 

 

Have you started a fall garden?

Piece by Piece

As the weather begins to cool (even if it's just down to 85 in the daytime and 65 at night here in Mississippi!), I get the urge to crochet a new blanket. 

 

 

 

I usually do neutral afghans in one or two colors, but I'm breaking my own mold this time.

 

 

 

 

 

And piece by piece....

 

 

 

 

I'm watching it come together!

 

 

Crochet Season is Upon Us

 

With cooler weather always comes the urge to crochet.

 

 

Gardening season, it seems, is always replaced by crochet season.  I found this lovely, non-traditional granny square and have decided making a blanket consisting of these will be my first project of "the season."



 

 

 

This lovely, flower square was designed by Penny at The Creative Penny, and she calls it the Kata square.

 

I'm taking a slightly bolder approach with my colors....

 

 

With a little orange for fall.....

 

And so begins the Crochet Season!

Heirloom Vine

Britt's late grandmother loved to garden, and she propagated many of this particular variety of vine, one of which made it from Georgia here with us to Mississippi. 

 

 

 

 

Like many vines, it grows incredibly quickly and comes back year after year.

It's also incredibly easy to "share"!  As it grows, all along the vine will appear these tiny, spiny pods....

 

 

 

 

...that will grow into very large pods! 

 

 

 

 

After 4-5 months, the vine will be simply filled with them.

 

 

 

These can be stored in a cool, dark, dry place until the spring planting.  The "pods" sprout when halfway submerged in water and placed in a warm sunny location. 

 

Think how many vines I can have in the spring!