As summer comes to a close, I’m looking back on the past three months and realizing I haven’t posted in much too long. While this summer definitely had moments of joy and beauty, it was also hard in many ways. We’ve had an incredibly hot, dry summer, and while we have watered as much as possible, it’s been hard to watch trees and shrubs struggle.
As you may remember, we made the decision to not grow cut flowers this year, instead turning those beds over to peonies. I’ve missed the flowers so much! And the peony beds have been a constant struggle against weeds. Truth be told, I feel like I weed more than anything else around here!
We’ve also struggled with pest and predators. After 6 years, we really thought we had our poultry safe and sound but one by one they have been picked off this summer. We suspect it’s a raccoon but it’s coming during the day/morning hours. It’s been carnage and it’s so upsetting. The pests in the garden also took out my squash plants much too early and we struggled with root rot on the tomatoes early on. These are things I will work hard to remedy next growing season. I don’t want to sound too pessimistic because we’ve still had a lot of bounty from the garden even with pests and my failures/mistakes!
I’m sad to report that we got no stone fruit this year. Our freeze in May did the blooms in and we didn’t get a single fruit. Such a disappointment as we look forward to eating, freezing and canning these beauties! There’s always next year and we certainly haven’t suffered too much in the good food department!
The best part of the summer has been spending time with friends who have come to visit and family! How has your summer been? I hope it’s been wonderful.
