Still Life Photos of Rotting Food

These Still Life Photos of Rotting Food are strangely beautiful. They were created as a commentary on food waste.

 

He’s Here!

Asleep, originally uploaded by dylan555.

Baby Sean is here! He was born March 8 at 9:26 a.m. He weighed 7 pounds 3 ounces and measured 21 inches. He and I are both tired but doing fine. I’ll probably go on a blogging hiatus as I adjust to taking care of this little guy.

Merry Christmas!

Smile, it’s Christmas! Treat yourself to a good breakfast today.

Whoa! Where did that cantaloupe come from?

I was out in the herb garden/bulb/annual bed area of our front yard when I got a surprise. Hidden under a juniper bush that we affectionately call the “alien” was this:

Now, I knew there was an errant vine in that bed, which had probably sprouted from a seed in the compost. But other than admiring how it was twining around one of my Adirondack chairs, I hadn’t paid it any attention. I certainly wasn’t expecting it to put out any fruit.

The truth is that I had been neglecting this part of my front yard due to the extreme temperatures and drought conditions we’ve been under for the last month and a half. It seemed easier to just let the garden go altogether and clear out the damage when it gets a little cooler (even this weekend, it is in the 90s). I think this just goes to show that some things thrive more under well-intentioned neglect than care and attention. At least, this seems to be the rule of thumb for pretty much everything I plant (whether intentionally or not).

I’ll definitely keep an eye on this cantaloupe and see if it fares better than my other volunteers. At last check, it was still mostly green but definitely shading toward ripe. I’m getting excited thinking about this unexpected gift of garden-fresh cantaloupe!

Another Volunteer

butternut, originally uploaded by shannon_turlington.

Correct me if I’m wrong, but does this not look like a young, green butternut squash? I spotted it all tangled up in the volunteer pumpkin. A brief investigation concluded that there isn’t some sort of mutant vine but actually two vines living quite comfortably together.

So perhaps we’ll be having both butternut and pumpkin soup this fall.

Now if I can only figure out what the mysterious vines with the tiny yellow flowers that insist on trailing way out of the garden boxes and onto the lawn are.

Bee Balm

beeonflower1, originally uploaded by shannon_turlington.

My husband took this picture yesterday of a bee doing its thing on the (almost finished blooming) bee balm.

We Have Pumpkins!

It’s become clear over the past week that the mysterious volunteer squash (there are actually 2 plants) in our garden is indeed a pumpkin plant. See the evidence for yourself:

So I think we can safely say that we have an honest-to-god pumpkin patch in our tiny side yard garden. I will be looking for the Great Pumpkin around October.

In other news, the herb circle is in full and riotous bloom:

I certainly have not noticed any absence of bees around here, and that’s a good thing.

What to Do With All This Basil

My basil plants are going gangbusters this year. They really like being in the garden with the tomatoes. I guess it’s no secret that basil and tomatoes get along well together. I did a big harvest today, enough to make a good batch of pesto, and I barely made a dent. I expect I will get 3 or 4 similarly sized harvests before the summer is over.

The question is: what do I do with all this basil? I’ve been eating it on pretty much everything lately. It’s a good thing it’s my favorite herb. Today for lunch, I toasted peasant bread, spread some pesto on top and topped that with smoked trout. It was delicious, a perfect summer snack. (Thanks to Patricia Wells for the idea!)

Not just basil, but also dill and mint and thyme have been putting in overtime this summer. Today I made green iced tea with a little honey and plenty of mint — outstanding! At dinner we had dill on the salmon and mint on the squash. It’s funny that this year, when we haven’t gotten a lot of rain, the herbs are going all out.

Speaking of squash, we’re already getting plenty out of the garden. I told my husband he’d better be prepared to have squash every night for dinner. It’s true when they say that it takes absolutely no effort to grow squash. We even have squash that sprouted from seeds in the compost, with absolutely no encouragement from us. A month ago, they were tiny unidentified seedlings. Now they have turned into this:

That’s just one plant. There are several others, but this one is definitely the biggest. I’m not convinced that they are all the same kind. But this one on the corner is already putting out baby squash. What kind would you guess it is?

To me, it looks like an acorn squash (unlikely because we don’t normally eat them) or a butternut or possibly a very young pumpkin. But I know nothing of these things and am just guessing. Whatever it is, it seems clear from the number of flowers that we’re going to have a lot of them.

And that’s this week’s garden report!

My Favorite Pot

No, not that kind of pot. This kind:

So far, this is the best arrangement I’ve done this year. And it’s flourishing in the shade.

The vegetable garden is also coming along nicely. We had our first harvest already:

Simply sliced and sauteed with some chile and basil (also from the garden).

Soon, soon…

Porch Dog

porchdog2, originally uploaded by shannon_turlington.

It just isn’t summer if there isn’t a dog on the porch.