Sunday June 22 UPDATE

This is what it looked like out my back door 2 days ago.
The whole sky was like this! 

All week we've had storms. We have hot days, then it cools off way too quickly and we end up with clouds that are just downright scary. Luckily, this year, we've not had the sirens go off once, and not had to go down to the shelter. Quite a feat for living smack in the middle of Tornado Alley.

All the rain though, has helped the garden tremendously. Tomatoes are growing and will ripen soon. I've picked peas a couple of times, enough for my salad. Fall will bring our main pea crop, right now they're just for fun. Yesterday we picked 50lbs of taters, enough to get us to around December. I hated to pull them early, but we had an infestation of Colorado potato beetles. I tried to keep them in check, but just couldn't. So I'll put more taters in the ground and hope for another 50lb crop this fall.

50 lbs of beautiful organic red potatoes.
Value if purchased would be about $100. So we just saved $100!

My strawberries though look like crap. I'm not sure what's wrong with them, I have a soil test coming and will try to ascertain the issue. I thought it was iron chlorosis which is what we had last year, but blood meal did not help this time. So I thought maybe the soil was too alkaline, as the rest our soil can be, and so added some sulfur. That was a no go too. I might have to just say goodbye to this bunch and plant a crop in a raised bed where I can control the soil a bit better. It could also be a virus.

Check these leaves. They look worse now, brown on the edges. :( 

Oh! And I got sunburned. And by sunburned, I mean sun. burned. My husband sprayed sunscreen on all of us, we're all pasty skinned you know, when we left for the market. He apparently didn't get my shoulders as well as he should have and I trusted I was covered. Yikes! Im paying for it now! Vinegar is helping, and I should be a-ok in a couple of days.

Daily chores are getting to me. Its that time of year when I have no desire to be in the house doing laundry or washing dishes, all I want to do is to be outside in the garden. I am forcing myself though to keep us in clean clothing and dishes :) Of course, I have family coming this week so there's some extra incentive there.

Three of the six chickens. 

We still only have one layer. I long for the days when I head to the coop and collect six eggs. They're now 17 weeks old and they should all start laying soon. Well today is jam packed, I have the house to really scrub (my mother is coming this week), mulberries to process, more mulberries to pick, and of course, family to take care of in the midst of all that.

So until next Sunday, have a great rest of your weekend and a terrific week :)