I was thinking about the last post I made about our heirloom tomato success and I realized that the picture I included just couldn’t cut it when it comes to describing our success this year. And while the pictures I have for you today still can’t do it justice, they will better illustrate what I mean when I say that we got far more tomatoes than we expected!
But folks, before I unleash the pictures on you, let me say this: my wife is awesome. Even in the face of countless batches of tomatoes, she processed them like a champ. Orange, yellow, and red flesh of the fresh sun-ripened fruit was no match for her skinning and canning prowess! (I might have to post again showing some of the fruits of her labors, you will be truly amazed!) These canned and stewed tomatoes make for a great addition to winter stews to help bring the flavor of summer back into those cold, frigid days.
So now, without further adieu, I present The Tomatoes! (Some of them, at least…) Click on the pictures for a slightly larger, and more detailed, view.
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- Slices of a freshly picked tomato.
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- Some of our garden produce.
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- A bowl of tomatoes.
We had a big problem with blossom end rot last year on our nursery-bought Romas, but the three or four plants we got this year did far better. Tara read up on it and ran some of our eggshells through the food processor and then poured the gloop near the trunk-base of the plants. It definitely seemed to help. Still, the Amish Paste heirloom variety did seem to fair much better and was not as susceptible to the problem though they are very similar to, if not slightly smaller than, mass-marketed Roma hybrids.
I also snapped some pictures of our heirloom seed saving efforts and I will post them here soon. Stay tuned, though, I’ve got posts coming on the local peaches we bought, homemade soda, and I’m trying to convince Tara to make some time to post about her homemade yogurt she’s been enjoying for the last few months!
We decided to change things up in the garden this year by moving away from many of the hybrid varieties we normally plant. The biggest section of our garden to feel the impact was the numerous tomatoes we include in our plantings. New to the garden were several heirloom varieties: Hawaiian Pineapple, Amish Paste, Black Cherry, and Mr. Stripey, to name a few. Many of these varieties were obtained from the Eco-Festival we attended in Salt Lake City.
All told, growing heirloom tomatoes was no more difficult than growing the standard hybrid varieties that have saturated the market over the years. There were a few issues, of course, but nothing drastic. On some of the larger varieties, there was a small problem of not catching the tomatoes before their skin split, but after a few misses, we were able to determine the best time to pick by gently squeezing the fruit for tenderness.
The Amish Paste were much like Romas, though slightly more petite and less prone to blossom end rot. When allowed to grow in tight clusters on our biggest plant, they actually looked quite a bit like strawberries. Of course, this doesn’t make for very fun canning, more small fruit makes for more work, but they were great to feed to the little red head. She loves eating fresh food out of the garden!
The Hawaiian Pineapple was a huge hit with its sweet yellow flesh. Sliced and topped with salt and pepper, they were a perfect afternoon snack on hot summer days. Even Tara, who doesn’t eat tomatoes in such a manner, loved them. Don’t get me started on BLT sandwiches… Yum!!!
The Bear Creek tomato was a fun one. With its dark purple skin and beautiful flesh, it was definitely an eye-catcher. I gave my mom a few of the different varieties to take home and she came back asking for more of “that purple one”.
Mr. Stripey actually came from Home Depot, believe it or not. We planted one right before a late frost at the beginning of the season and he was looking very sad for a while there. So we ended up picking up another and planting them side by side. It wasn’t long before the original recovered and both plants produced some very large fruits all summer long. Some of these things were huge!
In the interest of preserving the heirloom tradition, we did a little research into how to keep tomato seeds from our harvest so we’ll have a chance to grow these wonderful varieties for years to come without depending on vendors or catalogs.
Verdict: Growing Heirlooms = Success!
We’ve been feeling a bit itchy over the past few weeks, our constant attention drawn to the notion of our own quiet homestead and hobby farm surrounded by mountains, lakes, and trees.
So far, all of our efforts have stemmed from our life of modern suburbia with our backyard garden, canning veggies and fruits, and trying to live a more sustainable lifestyle in the face of looming Walmarts and McDonalds. What’s more, we moved into a community with a Homeowners Association, something we are now starting to regret. For years the association was a defunct pipe-dream of the developer, but once it was time to get their deposit for the subdivision back from the city, however, they decided they had to turn it over to the community. That’s when things started to get hairy.
Imagine a world where a self-elected committee decides that they need complete access to your property to ensure that you are observing and obeying the rules of the community that they choose to enforce without giving you the respect of honoring the rules of how they are to conduct business. That doesn’t sound like home-ownership to me, it sounds like renting from a bad landlord. But in the state of Utah, even landlords are required to provide written notice of intent 24 hours prior to any kind of inspection. The HOA currently believes they don’t need to offer the same courtesy to the homeowners of the community. How odd it that?
It’s things like this that push me more and more toward the rural homesteading life, where your neighbors are kind but mind their own, where the air is fresh and clean, and where neighborhood politics are far from a concern.
In this day and age, you’d expect that the community would be revolting, demanding change with fists raised in the air with pitchforks and the tar and feathers standing at-the-ready. Not so much the case. I mean, I have personally offered to pitch in some of my own money to help print out fliers and canvas the neighborhood in an attempt to get people involved, but no one else seems to want to participate. They’d rather just blog about it or complain to other neighbors. In the end we are left with a general air of, “What can we really do about it?”
If this was the life I wanted, to live in a subdivision where the Walmart drowns out the twinkling of the midnight stars, well… maybe I would do more than offer to help fight. Perhaps I would take up the banner and lead the revolution towards HOA dissolution. But, honestly, what does it really matter? I did my part, I offered, and no one else stood up with me. So let them complain. I go in search of my dreams.
So far, our search for a viable homestead has lead us towards Maine. We lived in Alaska for four years while I was in the military, so the cold shouldn’t bother us. In fact, Tara is more fond of the cold than she is of the heat, so I suppose that works out. Besides, cool weather compliments her knitting, so that’s always a plus. 
Sometimes I really do wish we were more spontaneous when it comes to life changes, but we’ve long erred on the side of caution when it comes to these sorts of things. So the plan would be to find an acceptable property, fly up and check it out to make sure it’s what we’re looking for, and then come right back home. Yep, that’s right… we’d probably end up enduring five more years right here with the HOA before selling and making the move. The idea is that over the course of the next few years we could pay off the property, build more equity in the house, learn more valuable gardening and homesteading lessons, and then sell the house as the market recovers. That is, assuming we will start seeing an up-trend and this isn’t just a precursor to some astonishing apocalyptic end.
Of course, there are some other options, like finding a good job in Maine that will help pay for moving expenses. But I’d just as soon count that as a bonus option rather than incorporating it into the plan.
How about you? Are you currently homesteading or have dreams to in the near or distant future? If so, please tell us about your experiences or what your dream location would be. We’d love to hear from you.
I am naturally frugal by nature. I remember as a kid telling my parents I did not want the pink jeans at the store because they would not match as many of my shirts as the regular blue jeans, therefore making less financial sense. I also had a slight obsession with the colors in my clothing matching, but that is an issue for another time. While I do not obsess about my clothes matching anymore, the frugality has stuck.
This evening I was sitting at my sewing machine, zig-zagging over a rip in a pair of jeans that have obviously seen better days, trying to make a nice repair. My silent plea to my pants is to give me another three months. These jeans have been with me for about a year now, and I wear them a lot. I should probably just let them go, and I know this is in a certain part of my brain. However, the penny pincher in me yells for me to rise to the challenge and see just how long we can use them. It is not that I can not afford another pair, it is that I, plain and simple, do not want to buy them yet.
When the green movement started gaining popularity, I was irritated by the whole thing. It seemed to be that the only message was to spend more to save the earth. After a while it occurred to me that buying more stuff, be it made in an environmentally friendly way or not, does nothing to save the earth if you did not need those things in the first place. Here is where my frugal side and my green side sing together in harmony. If I fix these jeans….if I wear these shoes a bit longer… how much pollution (and money) could I be saving over my lifetime? It is a perfect match.
I do realize that there is a time to tell the jeans good bye. Of course, it is not really good bye when they just get moved out of the closet and into the scrap fabric pile, perhaps to be turned into a new purse.
The first frost of the fall has hit and our tomato plants are drooping sadly, a clear sign that we need to start thinking about preparing our garden for winter. We learned some valuable lessons this year, particularly regarding the nastiness that comes with an over-population of potato bugs due to a wet spring.
The cantaloupe turned out just as small and unappealing as ever, the corn ended up a little better than last year, but nothing really to write home about. Our tomatoes and asparagus did surprisingly well, as did our patty pan squash. The eight ball zucchini was a fun addition, but we learned that just like regular zucchini varieties, you’ve got to watch those suckers or you’ll end up with soccer balls, but I guess that’s why they invented zucchini bread, right?
The crookneck squash appeared to be a little too close to our regular zucchini plant and we had a bit of strange cross pollination on some of the fruits. They looked positively sickly and unappetizing.
We got a surprising number of blackberries on the one cane that has toughed it out from our original planting from starts we got from my grandpa two years ago. I decided to give him a chance to spread out a bit and buried the top of his cane in the soil a few feet away from the base, in hopes that the top will take root and form its own cane next year. My grandpa said that’s how he got his thornless blackberries to spread, so I’m hopeful.
I let our gangly pear tree fruit out this year. I actually thought that the fruit would bend and snap his skinny limbs but he did surprisingly well. The pears grew substantially more than I expected and are the tastiest ones I’ve ever sunk my teeth into! I’ve had homegrown pears before, but this tree really outdid himself. Thumbs up to you Mr. Pear, I congratulate you on a job well done!
Another addition to our crop this year was the small bunches of sugary grapes that the little one loved to pinch from the garden at any possible opportunity. It still surprises me at just how much she loves having a garden in the backyard. I can always depend on her to help get me out of a funk after a long day at work. We simply walk outside and take a stroll through the various bushes out there in the back and she shares her excitement, refilling my energy bar if even just a bit.
Let’s not forget the older kids, though! They were much more helpful this year and they learned some valuable gardening lessons with their various projects. The watermelon growing contest was a wash because they failed to water their plants regularly and it seemed that the ground they planted in lacked the nutrients to support large growth. Perhaps with winter knocking at our windows, I will allow them to plan for the year to come and let them stake out their spots in the garden where they can lay down fall leaves and grass cuttings to enrich the soil for their next efforts.
The potatoes were a real eye opener this year and we intent to increase our plantings next year. The buttery flavor of homegrown Yukon Gold taters simply cannot be matched by anything I’ve ever bought from the store.
Another success, and learning process, was the beans. We learned that a few months after the initial planting, that we should plant another round of beans, rather than waiting for the existing ones to produce more. After the initial growth period we saw a drastic decline in production, whereas the seeds we planted at that point took off and produced a new batch that added to our summer stews and soups where the older plants sat looking sad and expectant, waiting for their imminent death at the onset of the cold months to come.
In years past I would break out the tiller and fold and chop the foliage into the soil, but this year I have decided to move the plant matter to the compost pile and spread out a heavy layer of leaves, grass clippings from the few mowings left before snow, and perhaps a bale or two of straw if I start feeling fancy. I’ve also got a few bags of horse manure I scooped up from my mom’s corrals earlier this summer, which would also be a good addition to the mix.
That’s one thing we’ve really had to work against, poor soil left by the developers after they scraped away the topsoil. The area we live in has a lot of clay under the surface and it’s been rough to try and work with that kind of ground. The plants don’t like it much, and neither do we. But, the good thing about the world we live in is the replenishment cycle of death and decay, which helps to feed future growth. At this point, it’s just a matter of helping to provide material that will break down to form the kind of soil that we need.
So how about you? Have you started thinking of how you will prepare your garden for winter yet? If not, grab a nice mug of hot cocoa and get to it! The cold months are upon us!
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