Oh my gosh…did you see the full moon the other night? I don’t know how it looked from your part of the world, but it was big and bright and amazing here. Not only at night, but in the morning too. It took up the whole sky. Our new kitten was definitely digging it. We let her out for a bit (while the dogs were safely tucked in the kennel). Then found her 20 feet up a pecan tree. Maybe she was just trying to get a better view of the moon. Of course, an hour of slapstick ensued while John and I tried to no avail to get her down. 20 feet up a rickety ladder in your pajamas in the middle of the night while a kitten tries to play tag with your fingers as your trying to “save” her…ah, good times. She spent the night in the tree. And of course was safely down (all by herself) come morning.
We ate the first cucumber from the garden. Very tasty. Our edamame met a terrible fate and died when our neighbor accidentally turned off the sprinkler while we were away. I saved as many of the pods as I could and then forgot about them so now they’re chicken food. Sigh. Lots of tomatoes with lots of worms. Dang, those little buggers can do much damage in a short period of time. They especially like the big beefsteak tomatoes. I’m definitely going to try a few new varieties. Maybe the worms won’t like those as much. It seems like there are a lot more pests this go-round.
Now that it’s colder, I need to consider what to do with the herbs, hot peppers and carrots. My thyme has already died down. The sage is not far behind so I’ll probably pick what’s left and dry it. I’ll probably pot a basil and parsley and dry the rest. The cilantro is half dry seed (bottling for coriander) and half leafy. I don’t think it will make it in a pot, but I can try. The rosemary is on its last leg. The hot peppers are still going strong. I’ll probably pot all of them. I’m not sure what to do with the lemongrass. The carrots I’ll keep in the ground covered with paper bags.
We plan on covering much of our garden in paper bags for the winter. Well, the root veggies like the potatoes, garlic and carrots. I started asking for paper rather than the plastic they’re so quick to grab at checkout. I was surprised how few bags I had using paper. I probably had 5 paper bags which generally translates into 12+ plastic bags. I know, riveting stuff here.
Oh! We saw turkeys. Wild turkeys. Crossing the road! And you thought only chickens crossed the road. There were about 20 of them. I had to stop to let them cross. They did not look both ways before crossing. They were skinny, definitely not of the Butterball variety. They’d better beware…hunting season started last weekend and it’s almost Thanksgiving. Not a good time to be a turkey out on the open road.