Hanging Planter Labels

I just made the cutest labels for my hanging planters!!  Last summer, we wrote the name of each plant in sharpie on the front side of the milk container and it lasted for the entire growing season.  But this summer, for some reason, the sharpie washed off after only a few days.  I decided to make some labels that are cute and hopefully durable and weatherproof.  Check them out:

What I did was take one of those 9 by 13 aluminum baking pans and write/engrave the name of each plant with a pen.  I took a box cutter and cut a square around each plant name, and then I took some pliers and folded the edges back so no one could get cut.  I went over the engraved names with sharpie so they stood out more and covered the front in a layer of packing tape to protect the sharpie from washing away again.  The last thing I did was use a single-hole punch, thread some twine, and tie them to my hanging planters.  They look so good!  I hope they last all season.  (Also, see the end of this post for an update on how my plants are doing!)

Baby fruit update:
     - I have at least 9 baby tomatoes and the biggest is already the size of a grape!
     - I have 1 baby bell pepper, but it's so tiny, the flower petals are still around it.
     - I have 1 open flower on the banana pepper plant that should show fruit soon.
     - I have 3 baby zucchinis!  The largest is only about an inch long.

Red, White, and Blue

I made a beautiful arrangement in my window box!  I didn't mean for it to be so patriotic, but I guess it is heading toward that time of year.

I reused my little yellow bucket from last summer for some of the extra flowers.

I sat outside and read for a couple hours this morning and I was surrounded by flowers near my veggies, flowers on the table, and flowers hanging in my fabric planter.  It was so nice!

Planting SEads for the Second Summer

I'm back in business for my second attempt at growing a mini vegetable garden!  Last summer, I grew 2 roma tomato plants, 1 cherry tomato plant, 2 bell pepper plants, 1 jalapeno plant, and 1 unsuccessful zucchini plant.  That was a lot for me to keep up with, so this summer, I'm taking a step down and only growing 4 plants.  I'm growing the bell peppers again, but this time I only have 1 plant so none of them go to waste.  I'm doing the same thing with my roma tomatoes, but this time I'm growing it in a planter on the ground instead of in a hanger.  I was most excited about my zucchini plant last year, so I'm trying again in hopes that it will properly fruit this time.  The last one is a banana pepper plant (sweet and mild rather than spicy), which I'm trying instead of jalapenos this year.  The jalapenos grew the easiest out of all my plants last summer, but I just couldn't keep up with it and I hate to let any of my veggies go to waste.

I got the plants 3 weekends ago, and once I brought them home and put them in the planters, here's what the set-up looked like.  The tomato plant is in the planter on the ground, and the hanging planters from left to right are the zucchini plant, the bell pepper plant, and the banana pepper plant.

And here's a close-up of my baby roma tomato plant:

3 weeks later, here's what the plants look like:

And this is what my cute little roma tomato plant has grown into:

I finally had a break from homework today and was able to go pick up a tomato cage from Lowes.  I know I should have done it a couple weeks ago (before my tomato plant turned into a monster!), but I'll get it to work.

This is the most exciting part... I have baby zucchinis growing already!!  They're pretty tiny, but you can definitely see a couple thick stems that are definitely the beginning of a little fruit.  I'm so excited!  Check out these zucchini babies:

Maybe that only excites me, but you have no idea how badly I wanted some homegrown zucchinis last year!  It better work this time.

I'm also growing flowers!  I just got my window box and my little yellow bucket set up today after my trip to Lowes, so I'll get pics of that tomorrow.

Best Homemade Pizza Ever

Get ready for your mouth to water!  You're going to be so jealous of the pizza I made a couple nights ago.  It was so yummy and so beautiful!  I used 3 of my green bell peppers and half a dozen of my Roma tomatoes, along with some mozzarella and pepperoni and a smidge of pepper.

Now for the close-ups:

I know you're jealous, right?

I had a couple extra bell peppers that I couldn't fit on the pizza, and in the past couple days, they've turned completely red!  They're really pretty.  I think I'm going to pick another green one and make a stirfry with the red and green bell peppers.  I noticed something else from my garden had turned red today, too -- one of my jalapenos is almost completely red!  I've never seen that before, but it looks cute.  Does the color change effect the spiciness?

 

Still Going Strong

I got back to my garden after being gone this weekend and I got to pick a ton of veggies!  I got 11 jalapenos, 5 bell peppers, and 7 Roma tomatoes.  The jalapenos are about 2 1/2 inches, the Romas are 2 to 3 inches, and the bell peppers are only 2 1/2 to 3 inches.  I had hoped they would get at least 4 inches long, but they still look and smell delicious!  I plan on making a couple homemade pizzas with some of the bell peppers and Roma tomatoes.

The bell pepper flower buds started showing up on Aug. 5 but I don't have a picture or a plant log note about the actual bell pepper fruit until Aug. 22.  That means it took about 40 days for that baby fruit to mature into a 2 1/2 to 3 inch bell pepper.  I would say that they stopped growing at least a week or week and a half ago, so maybe they only need 25 to 30 days to mature.  One of them already has a spot that's starting to turn orange.

My jalapenos have done better than any of my other plants by far.  They're still going strong and there are a ton left to pick!

We even made stuffed jalapenos!  They were sooooo yummy!  We started eating them before I could get a picture, but we made at least a pound or a pound and a half of them.

The only problem I've ever had with my jalapenos was a mystery spot on a single jalapeno a couple weeks ago.  I don't know what it was, but it looked weird.  If it was rotten, you would think it would turn black or something.  But it turned a very light color in just one spot and I haven't seen it on any other jalapenos since.

And I was worried that my little lizard friend had either moved on to a different yard or had been snatched up by a bird, but he came back!  That obnoxious little dude is still eye-balling me, too.

My plants look very healthy, especially for it starting to get so cold out.  But my tomato plants are so heavy that the branches keep collapsing and I either have to tie or prop them up.  I might try growing them in a planter on the ground next year so they have more support.

I should be able to pick another half a dozen bell peppers and a dozen more jalapenos in the next few days.  Same with my Romas.  Those cherry tomatoes are the slowest to mature -- I've only gotten one ripe cherry tomato this whole time!  They all need to hurry up if they don't want the cold weather to kill them.

Here's my little "helper" giving you a big aaarrrrroooooooooooohhh!!!

My Biggest Fan?

I found an interesting new creature hanging out by my plants today.  I went outside this afternoon and was surprised to discover a lizard sitting on the plastic of one of my plant hangers!  After he got over his second of being stunned by my presence, he quickly regained his confidence and scurried up to the rope of the plant hanger.  I say confidence, but he was actually really obnoxious!  Check him out:

It turns out he's a green anole lizard.  They like to eat grasshoppers and crickets -- something they have in common with my dog.  Apparently they don't eat veggies, so I suspect he's on my plants because he's after the little black ants crawling all over the place.  I guueeeesssss that's okay.  But I'm still mad at him.  I tried so hard to shoo him away!  I yelled at him, I whined at him, I bargained with him, I told my dog she had to help (which she didn't; she just sniffed the ground and was a totally useless helper).  My neighbor even had to poke his head out his door to see what I was freaking out about!  I chased that little douche (the lizard, not my neighbor) all over that plant and he still wouldn't leave.  I told you he was obnoxious.  Here are some of the best pictures from our battle:

His butt is on my vegetables!  I will definitely be washing my bell peppers before I eat them.

Look at this little douche rolling his eyes at me, like he's thinking, "Who me?  I'm just a cute little lizard, keeping these bell peppers warm with my stinky lizard butt.  Don't mind me."  I hate him and his sassy eye-rolling.

Okay, lizard... You may have won this battle this time, but you're going down if you start eating my vegetables.

My First Roma Tomato

I finally picked my first Roma tomato a few days ago!  As a reminder, let me show you its baby picture:

In my plant log, I note that Aug. 5 was the first time I noticed this baby tomato pop up, and this is the first picture of it from that day.  It might have gone unnoticed for a day or so, though.  I waited several weeks before I noticed any change in color, but then it start turning a different shade of green, then yellow, then orange, and finally red!  It turned a different color each day.  Here are the countdown photos:

Aug. 3 - starting to change color

 

Aug. 4 - turning yellow 

Aug. 5 - turning orange (exactly a month after the original picture)

Aug. 6 - almost completely red!

Aug. 7 - right before I picked my beautiful Roma off the plant.

And you can see how many more I have that should start changing colors in the next couple weeks!

I picked this Roma tomato on Aug. 7, about 33 days after the baby fruit was originally spotted on the plant.  It is about 2 1/2 inches long.  I haven't tasted it yet, but it looks delicious!  My green bell peppers are also 2 1/2 inches long right now, but I'm hoping those will keep growing.  Here's my most recent picture of the bell peppers:

And Then There Were Six...

 

RIP Zucchini Plant

I tried very hard to keep you alive

But it seems you tried even harder to die

I'm sorry I let you down

A Month Makes a Huge Difference

Speaking of growing like crazy, let me remind you how my plants looked on that first day when I brought them home (July 29):

Now look at how big they are a month later! (Aug. 28) 

This process has been so amazing.  They all grow at different rates and go through different life cycles, but every little bud that pops up and every baby fruit that starts growing is equally exciting!  Growing on a smaller scale like this, where I can go out a couple times every day and closely examine every single plant, has been especially amazing, too, because I get to see how fast they change from each hour of the day.  I go out in the morning, and sometimes I spend half an hour picking caterpillars off my tomato plants, trying to spare the little spiders that have made webs there.  I can't even keep up with all the jalapenos popping up!  I go out midday sometimes and find that my zucchini plant is super-droopy, so I give it a little bit more water, and within minutes, all the stems and leaves have popped back up and look happy again (despite its sick spots).  I can see all the little holes from the caterpillars and aphids, and I see the harmless little ants crawling all over the place, but every single plant has been producing fruit - though few have matured enough to pick yet.  The only thing I've been able to pick so far is the jalapeno plant.  I made the mistake of trying a bite of one of the fresh jalapenos, though.  I crunched down only once and had to immediately spit it out!  From one bite, that I didn't even chew or swallow, my mouth burned for half an hour.  Fresh jalapenos are no joke.

Besides the helpful little spiders, the only other insects I like seeing out near my plants are the bumblebees!  Look at his cute little fuzzy body!

Except the other thing with a cute little fuzzy body (my dog Paisley), got curious about what I was taking a picture of, so she ran over and stuck her face right on the bumblebee!  Luckily she didn't get stung, but she did freak it out and it flew away.  She's not the best gardening helper.  Here's that little stinker "helping" with my plants:

And one more just for laughs:

Bell Peppers Galore!

My zucchini may be deteriorating, but my bell peppers are thriving!  I've got 5 or 6 big bell peppers on one of my plants and almost 10 little bell peppers on the other plant!  They're growing crazy-fast, too!  Check this out.  Here's one of the bell peppers on Aug. 27:

Here's that same bell pepper 2 days later (Aug. 29):

And here's that bell pepper this morning (Aug. 31):

It's growing a warp-speed!  All 5 or 6 bell peppers on that plant are about that same size.  Here's another:

And another:

They're 1 1/2 to 2 inches long now!  I'm hoping they get as big as the ones in the grocery store because then I can make some awesome stuffed bell peppers!  They're sooo good baked, and if I'm able to do it from this batch, I'll try to post the recipe.  Either way, these baby bell peppers are super cute and I'm super excited.

Oh, Zucchini... how you disappoint me...

When I first got my plants a month ago, I was the most excited about the zucchini.  I love zucchini and it's one of my go-to additions to a lot of the meals I make.  So being able to grow my own seemed so amazing!  However, this excitement brought much disappointment.  My zucchini plant has been deteriorating over the past couple weeks and almost every leaf has now been taken over by a powdery mildew and it is literally covered in little white spots.

Many of the leaves in the back have turned yellow and I've had to trim them off, and the rest are quickly being taken over by these sick spots.  This wouldn't be so bad if I was at least still getting healthy zucchini.  But every time I get a female flower that produces at beautiful little baby zucchini, the blossom refuses to open and it shrivels up and dies.  I've been hesitant to just rip it open and pollinate it myself.  I thought that forcing it open would damage it, but I guess at this point, there's not much to lose.  I don't want to just junk the entire plant yet, especially since it's not infecting any of my other plants.  I have a couple good baby zucchinis still waiting to be pollinated, so I guess I'll get up early tomorrow and see if I can pull those female blossoms open a bit and keep them from shriveling up yet again.  Oh, zucchini... why must you be so delicious to eat yet so difficult to grow?

The War on Worms and More Excitement

My plants are growing like crazy!  In the past 5 days, almost 10 baby Roma tomatoes have popped up on one of my plants!  My 2 Romas that have been growing for the past 3 weeks are getting quite impressive, but neither of them have started turning red.  Here's one of them:

I've had a hard time finding the flowering time for the kinds of plants I'm growing - all I can find is the maturation time of the whole plant.  What I really want to know is how long it takes for a single fruit to mature.  From the plant log that I've been keeping, I can tell that it takes between 2 and 3 weeks for a jalapeno fruit to mature.  The first two jalapenos that grew were first logged on Aug. 2 and were picked on Aug. 21.  The third jalapeno was first logged on Aug. 6 and was picked this morning, Aug. 22.  All three are about 2 inches long, but I haven't taste-tested them yet.  In the same amount of time, my two oldest Roma tomatoes have gotten very big, but they're obviously not mature enough to pick yet.  The internet is good for a lot of stuff, but it won't tell me how much longer I have to wait on my tomatoes!

At least a fruit has finally popped up on my Cherry tomato plant!  But more exciting than the Cherry tomato is my Bell Pepper plant!  I finally have Bell Peppers!  I counted 3 this morning, but there could be more.  Just like the Roma tomatoes, they pop up so fast and so tiny that they're hard to spot and keep track of.  Look at how cute the Bell Pepper is!

What I love about this picture is that it shows the entire life cycle so far of the Bell Peppers.  You can see the tiny bud in the middle, then a bud slightly larger and lighter in color as the leaves turn to petals, then the white open flower, and finally the adorable Bell Pepper fruit!  I'm not sure if they're going to get as big as the ones I see in the grocery store, but that would be amazing!  Either way, my dog loves Bell Peppers, so hopefully we'll get to taste them in a few weeks.

But back to the Romas - The War on Worms is still underway!  Here's a picture of the enemy:

It's weapon is that big black spike on its butt, but it obviously doesn't know how to use it because it's pretty harmless.  I picked at least a dozen of these evil worms off my Roma plants yesterday.  My neighbors probably thought I was crazy because I was out there screaming at those dumb worms!  After I couldn't find any more worms, I went back inside and did some research.  Apparently these are Green Horned Caterpillars or Tomato Hornworms because they're specialized eaters.  They attack tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, and maybe a couple other veggies.  I've found a couple on my other plants, but they're mainly just on the two Roma plants.  Then there's a completely different kind of caterpillar on my Cherry tomato plant.  They better watch out for me, though, cuz it's on!