Soaking in the Glorious Sun!!

Me with Adam enjoying an amazing day at a local forest park!

Now that summer has finally arrived here in Oregon we are making the most of it! Summer to me means seemingly endless days of sunny weather where you wake up to the sun streaming through the windows and enjoy spending time outdoors most of the day. I am really a "summer person." I have to admit it really is my favorite season! Since summers are so short around here I really love to soak it in! Since I sunburn easily I do have to wear a hat and plenty of sunscreen but it doesn't stop me from getting outside in the warm, sunny weather as much as I can! I love growing colorful annuals as well as blooming perennials in the garden, watching my vegetable and fruit garden grow, barbecuing and eating outdoors. We are lucky here that although some days are hot we tend to get a dry heat so it is easier to tolerate. It has been perfect the past few days- with temperatures from 75-80 and sometimes a bit into the mid-eighties. Perfect!!

Now that Adam and I are over the illness that struck us all we are out and about a lot! We are having a great time! I hope all of you are enjoying summer to the fullest because it sure goes by quickly!

Suburban Garden Report:

Finally some major things are happening in the suburban garden- like our first tomato forming on the vine! This weekend I finally had a chance to put cages on our tomatoes and tie them to the stakes. I have learned the hard way this year that I need to put the cages around the tomatoes when they are small plants because at this stage they have grown so large I am not sure which plant is which and I had to tie up many loose ends to the stakes. However, I know that they will grow better now that they are staked up a bit more. When we went to buy our tomato cages at the home improvement store they no longer had the circular metal kind that I was used to, but more of a "tower" style cage. It really seems to work well though and they can be reused as well.

Our first tomato forming on the vine! Hooray!


The tomato cages that we set up for our tomatoes during the weekend. I can't believe how tall and large the tomato plants have grown!


I love how our kitchen garden is really filling in and growing well!

It is amazing how fast our garden has filled in and grown. I am very proud of it. It is great to know that some of my herbs including the rosemary and lavender will survive the winter and come back next year. Sometimes things that grow beyond the "bounds" of our garden should be welcome too. I think it is better to work with nature the way it is rather than try to "train" it too much. There is a wild or volunteer mint plant that always seems to come up every year near our concrete patio in the back yard. This year I decided to let it keep growing there rather than try to pull it out or mow it down. It has been great because I've now used it in two salad and some iced tea. Delicious! It is important to use what we have and enjoy it!

A volunteer mint plant that is growing in the corner by our patio. I love to use it in salads!

I am enormously happy with how the side yard I planted this spring has been turning out. I tried to place the plants according to size and although I didn't know exactly how it would look later on I think that my vision is really working out to be a nice garden. I am happy with the different textures, colors and heights of the plants. I think that I am slowly learning how to plant a flower garden and this will help me in the future. I realize this type of flower garden is really what I would like in the back yard. I would like layers of color like you see in English cutting gardens. To that end, I think I will scout out perennials that I like that are on sale towards the end of the gardening season and start planting and layering them in the garden. I can work little by little on this to get the English garden effect that I want.

Hooray! The daisies are blooming now!

A pretty red dwarf dahlia in our side yard!

Our side yard is growing nicely and I love the different colors and textures of the plants.

The hydrangea bush in our front yard. I love the huge blooms!

Country Garden Report:

The following report comes from my mom Serena Johnston. This coming Friday Adam and I will finally make it out to the country garden to photograph the amazing progress of the vegetables and fruit. (Since we are finally well enough to visit) In the meantime, here is what is happening in the country garden:

It was a great weekend in the country garden. Dad and I worked on Friday and Saturday to do a lot of weeding around the main garden area, including the boysenberries. The warm rains we had earlier really brought all of the garden to life, but unfortunately the weeds came to life too. The garden paths are loaded with pulled weeds, and we will to remove them all so their seeds stay out of the garden area.

I did some research on the problems we had with our raspberries, which slowly died over the wet spring. In fact, only one plant survived. I did some research through the excellent Oregon State University Extension Service, and discovered that our raspberries had phytophthora root rot, which is a greater problem in Oregon and southern Washington that in other areas of the Pacific Northwest. Plants should be grown in raised beds, or in ridges about a foot high to promote drainage. Our extremely wet springs and summers for the past two years probably added to the problem. Also, that end of the garden is partly shaded and the heavy clay soil stays wetter there, as we have wondered for years if there might be an underground spring in the area. The solution is to get raspberries that are resistant to that disease, and to plant them in an area where they will not be as susceptible. We plan to do that next winter and early spring, and will use that section of the garden for plants that thrive in moist soils. I think this is a reminder that finding the right place and using the right methods will bring the right results most of the time.

On the bright side, our boysenberries are just now ripening, and Dad just came in with about a quart of beautiful boysens. I would expect that the next couple of weeks will be loaded with fresh berries. Yum! This is the first year we have had many, as they were only planted last year.

The peas are winding down, although they are still bearing. I am considering leaving the rest on the vine to ripen into seeds to save for next year. I'll read a bit about that and see what should be done to save the pea seeds. The radishes bolted and are bearing seed pods. I decided to let some of those mature so we can save those seeds too. The other seeds that are maturing are the bok choi seeds. Those have volunteered in the garden the last couple of years, and for the most part I like it, as they are ready to eat when the rest of the garden is too soggy to plant. They offer fresh greens, and those are nice to have in the early spring. It feels like a little gift!

Dad continued weeding while I tied up the tomatoes. They are absolutely loaded with blossoms, and many of the plants have several tomatoes on them of various sizes. It is exciting to see them in such good shape, compared to our tomatoes of last year. I think we should have a good crop if the weather holds. Keep your fingers crossed! The corn is looking amazingly well, too. It has not yet shown any tassels, though, so it will be a while. That's okay, we have plenty of other veggies to tempt us. The zucchini has yellow blossoms, and as fast as zucchini produces, it won't be long. It is also very healthy compared to last year. I hope you have all of your zucchini recipes at the ready!

The pumpkins and squash have small green blossoms, and the watermelon and cantaloupe are at the same stage. I was careful to choose varieties that were supposed to mature even under cloudy conditions, but of course, we shall see. The potatoes have finished blooming some time ago, and the plants are beginning to turn a bit yellow. I managed to water the ground around one plant with a hard enough spray that I uncovered some nicely-shaped and -sized red potatoes. I hope that indicates an eventual good harvest there, too. We have eaten some new Yukon Gold potatoes already, as they were from buried volunteers from last year that we missed picking, but on the other hand that gave us the perfect excuse to have some new potatoes for dinner last week so we could move them out of the way of other plants. They were excellent! Beets, Swiss chard, carrots, parsnips, and kale are all doing well, and we have had some chard and kale for meals a few times. Chard, kale, and lettuce are all cut-and-come again, and all are doing well. I hope we can keep them going into late fall.

We finished up our efforts by watering everything well. As I am sure you know, there is always more to do. We want to spread around some of the rotted chicken manure, for example; and weeding will continue. The clear difference between last year and this year is that the areas where we (and our hard-working chickens) worked to improve have definitely gotten better. The area where the corn is was an especially good reminder, as year before last we had a good corn harvest, but we had to work really hard at it. This year, there are fewer weeds in the corn section, and about all we have to do is water and keep the weeds down.

Tonight we had a simple dinner which included a lot of our fresh garden produce. I sliced a big turnip into chips, and steamed some broccoli spears. Those, and a plate of fresh pea pods, gave us a great vegetable selection to use with ranch and blue cheese dip. I cooked the turnip tops with about 1/4 of a piece of bacon. Yum! We finished up with some of our fresh lettuce on top of some Shy Ann hamburgers for a satisfying dinner. -Serena Johnston- August 1, 2011.

A Day at Noble Woods Park:

Last Friday since I was still healing from the illness that I had but was well enough to get out of the house Adam and I decided to go to a local nature park to explore and have a picnic. It was great fun! It was nice to finally get out of the house a bit more- although we both really missed going to the country garden to visit my folks- we sure did not want to get them sick. We had passed by this park many times on the way to Hillsboro or another park but hadn't stopped there before.

Adam near one of the bridges over Rock Creek in Noble Woods Park in Hillsboro, Oregon.

It is an amazingly large, tranquil, forested park made up of paved trails as well as some gravel and wood chip trails. Later on up the trail there is a large, sunny, grassy area with a nice shelter full of picnic tables. We had such fun walking down the trails and looking at the trees, flowers and bushes.

A beautiful flower I encountered along the park trail.

Along the trail Adam enjoyed using his new binoculars to explore and look around at the nature area. This forest park is so nice and cool in the summer weather because of the shade of the trees. It was so pleasant here.

Adam along the trail at the park.

Later on we came to a viewpoint area where we stopped to look around. Adam loved looking at all of the different trees and would say "hello" to each of the passers-by on the trail. He had fun greeting them.

Adam sure had fun at the lookout point. He enjoys the time in the forest!

Adam had fun sitting on this unique tree.

We learned by reading some information on the map shown below that the park was purchased through many large donations made by individuals and groups. It is so wonderful that people in the late 1990's came together to buy this park. It is a wonderful nature preserve and a great place to spend a day. Along the trail there were many people walking their dogs, running or cycling.

We found out that this park was bought by many people pooling money.

Later on we walked back to our car and took out our simple picnic lunch of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, grapes, snap peas from my parent's garden, tortilla chips and cookies as well as juice and water. It was a nice respite to sit down for a while.

We were lucky that there was a picnic table right by where we parked!

After lunch Adam was ready to hit the trail again! I was amazed! We set off down a different trail on the other end of the park and we discovered that there was a small trail that lead to the creek. Adam could not have been happier! He was so excited to see the water! When we first got to the creek we saw a crawdad there crawling along in the creek! What a sight! I wish I would have taken a picture but I was a bit stunned at the time. After a while Adam coaxed me to help him across the creek on the large rocks. Once on the other side he happily threw rocks into the creek- what fun!

The pretty Rock Creek that we crossed together.


What fun in the water!

Later on, Adam and I crossed back to the other side of the creek. Then, he got into the creek- waist deep in the slightly mucky water. He seemed to really love it in there and was pretending to "fish." The only hard part was trying to coax him out of the water to make our way home for his nap. I ended up having to carry a "mucky" Adam out of the water on up the trail to the car! However, he had such a good time it was all worth it!

Looks like Adam has a future in fishing!

Adam really got in the water this time!!

Homemade Cobb Salad with Basil Dressing:

Tonight since it was a warm, summer night I decided to use a lot of our lovely lettuce in the garden along with some of our fresh basil and eggs from my parent's chickens to create a lovely Cobb Salad. This salad is really my favorite salad of all time. It is so nice as a whole meal. I ended up combining a couple of dressing recipes to make the dressing for the salad so I could incorporate some of our fresh basil into it. Enjoy!

A lovely Cobb Salad- perfect for a warm summer dinner!

Cobb Salad: Makes 3-4 servings

4-5 cups washed mixed greens cut up into bite size pieces. (I usually just shred the pieces by hand)

1.5 pounds boneless, skinless chicken pieces (I brined these, barbecued them on the grill, then cut them into small chunks.)

5-6 slices bacon-crumbled into pieces

4 hard boiled eggs- cut up

Gorgonzola or blue cheese

2-3 tomatoes- chopped

Put a large portion of lettuce on each plate. Top the lettuce with "stripes" of chicken, bacon, hard-boiled egg, tomato, and Gorgonzola or blue cheese. Then, drizzle with the fresh basil dressing. The recipe is below:

The fresh basil dressing I made.

Fresh Basil Cobb Salad Dressing:

1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
Dash salt and pepper
1/2 teaspoon sugar
2 minced cloves of garlic1 teaspoon dijon mustard
2 sprigs fresh basil, chopped
3 tablespoons olive oil

Combine vinegar, lemon juice, salt, pepper, sugar and basil. Using a whisk, gradually beat in oil until mixed.

I hope you enjoy this week of summer and have fun outside as much as you can!