Greenery Everywhere

I have had a lot of plant miners, fungus, other bugs and plant diseases to try to control. Plus a lot of produce starting out and dying off (any tips on that would be helpful!), but other than that, I would say things are going swell.

I think cabbage is pretty. These will be turned into cabbage salad and sauerkraut.

In this jungle of leaves we have cucumbers (pickling and regular), crookneck squash, acorn squash, spaghetti squash and zucchini. I have yet to get any acorn squash, and I have only two spaghetti squashes growing.

Beets!! I did not plant beets for me, I think they taste like dirt. I have a coworker who wanted some pickled beets and a husband who likes to eat borsch, which requires beets. Also on the right are peppers, hot and bell.

These mass of greenery is the tomato patch. You can see one ripe one on the bottom right! I also have two basil plants hidden in here that I need to make into pesto. The tomatoes will be canned whole or made into salsa, lots and lots of salsa.

I am trying to grow more herbs in our yard. This is a sage plant, which is doing quite well!

Oregano, which hasn't grown much from what you see in the picture.

Dead cilantro...but my coworker happily gave me another start so we will see if it makes it!

I have oodles of chives! These grow really nicely here.

In there I have two starts of flat leaf parsley, which has yet to become bushy enough for me to use it and rosemary. I think rosemary is one of my all time favorite herbs.

Summer

There is much to post about!

Over Father's Day weekend we hopped in the car and drove to Northern Idaho. We had heard how beautiful Couer d'Alene was and had to check it out. My parents came along for the ride.

My Aunt (my Dad's sister) lives in Spokane, and I had asked if we could meet up for dinner. I told her I would be bringing two friends to dinner with me, she didn't know my parents were coming. She was surprised to see my parents, and thought it was funny I had referred to them as my friends. 
My parents are always fun to have around.

Lake Couer d'Alene is gorgeous!!! It is so beautiful up there!

We drove up to Sandpoint and saw Lake Pend Oreille, also amazing to see! Which is one of the deepest lakes in the United States at 1,158 feet, that is scary deep!

Every other year we try to stay home for the 4th of July. This year was the year to be home. My parents and my sister in-law and niece came up to spend the holiday with us. 
We went to the zoo, ate a lot of Reed's Dairy ice cream, did arts and crafts, napped, ate wonderful food, watched fireworks, played games and saw hot air balloons take off in Driggs. 
Sadly the only thing I got pictures of was the hot air balloons, I have gotten bad about pulling out the camera to document things.

Dad and I arose at 4 A.M. to get to Driggs by 6 A.M. 

We got there just in time to see the first one get blown up.

There were several of them!

I loved how this picure turned out. You can barely see the Tetons over one of the balloons on the right.

They are fasinating to watch in the sky.

Too bad I am afraid of heights, or I would like to ride in one of these.

This is how Cosmo has spent his summer days.

Lucky dog.

We have also made several trips down to Utah for family activites, family reunions, bridal showers, birthday celebrations. After the family reunion, we got to spend time at the Dude's family cabin with his parents and siblings. 

We have been keeping busy this summer!

Garden Update

I haven't posted anything about our garden this year. Fail.

I started everything from seed this year again. I believe I ended up over watering them, causing some not to have a very good root systems when I transferred them to the ground. I pulled some out the containers and the dirt crumbled away right to the stem. I also ruined 2 tomato plants, while trying to pinch off the starter leaves or just trying to put the dirt around it in the hole I knocked off the tops. I was so frustrated by this point! It seemed that nothing I had planted was going to work out. 

The garden is proving me wrong though!

Lettuce, spinach and arugula. This is probably my favorite item in the garden, I love being able to go out and get fresh lettuce.

Beans and peas, this are both bush plants. Though I think next year I will have something for them to crawl up to keep them straighter.

If you look really really close on the left in my crooked rows, you will see carrots starting to sprout. On the right is bok choy! I haven't ever grown bok choy nor really eaten it before, so this is a first.

Cabbage and more cabbage. Also pickling cucumbers and regular cucumbers.

Lots of squash! Zucchini, crook neck, spaghetti and acorn! I staked my spaghetti and acorn. I want them to grow up instead of taking up so much space in the garden. I think though, my acorn squash might be more of a bush than a vine...we'll have to see what it does.

Peppers! I have bell, jalapeno and a hot pepper mix. I lost one pepper plant, but the others are going strong!

Beets! The Dude wanted some beets for Borsch. I also have a friend who wanted some pickled beets, which is good since I planted too many beets for Borsch.

Check out that row of garlic!! My coworker gave me the garlic to plant and I am so glad she did, it has been so cool to watch it grow. I also have 15 tomato plants, including: Early Girl, Big Boy, Jelly Belly, San Marzano, and Romas. I also have 4 Basil plants.

Minus a few plants getting a fungus, I bought a fungus spray which seems to be helping, we are off to a great start!

Redfish Lake

Over Memorial weekend we took a much needed camping trip to Redfish Lake.

Redfish Lake is located in Stanley, Idaho. A place where the Dude and I had yet to go visit, and is now a place I love and want to go back!

This was our campsite! It was awesome being so close to the lake.

The Dude was excited to have a fire, he pretty much had one going almost the entire time....almost. That little tent by him was Cosmo's home so he didn't bother the nearby campers.

Oh how I loved that lake! It is so beautiful and so clear!

My coworker let us borrow his canoe, it was a heavy bugger, but well worth taking it along!

With the lake being so clear we saw several fish swimming around. We didn't catch any, which was okay, it was neat just to be able to see them!

Aw, that view......the Sawtooth Mountains are majestic.

He had mixed feelings about being in the canoe. He tried to escape before we hit shore after the first ride. The second time out I had a towel he could lay on and bask in the sun. He also enjoyed lots of goldfish snacks.

I love early mornings when you are camping!! Watching sunrises are the best!

There was lots of nature walks/hikes to go on.

Cosmo enjoyed his time getting dirty.

We really couldn't of picked a better time to go. There wasn't too many people there since we went up on Memorial Day and came home Wednesday. We had the lake all to ourselves on one of the days we took the canoe out for about an hour before anyone else made it out. It was just what I needed, a quiet, peaceful time away from society, media, and every day strains of life. I am already planning my next camping trip here.