Green Bean Bonanza, Sad Tomatoes and more...

Remember those Blue Lake Bush green beans I planted, the ones that had been in the freezer for 12 years? Well, I cooked up a whole pot of them last week. I wish I had taken pics, but I didn't. I actually cooked them at a friend's house, because I had a kitchen fire on Christmas Day and don't have a working stove right now. Yeah, I'm a clutz. I left grease on the stove. Good thing I wasn't cooking a Christmas dinner! There are some upsides to not celebrating Christmas, although, if I'd had a house full of people, maybe the damage wouldn't have been so bad.

Anyway, the beans are putting forth another flush of blooms, and I have some harvesting size now, so I'll be picking them and doing the crock pot thing with them. I expect to get quite a few beans from these plants before I have to replant them.

My tomatoes aren't quite as healthy as my beans. It seems the Early Girl has been hit by a blight, because all the bottom leaves are dying and falling off. The fruits are being eaten by some sort of bugs. I need to spray them, but I hate to use poison. I've been taking cuttings from the plant, but if it has a blight, they won't do well either. Sad.

The lonesome little Japanese Eggplant is loaded with blooms and tiny baby eggplants. One is harvesting size. The sad part of that is, I love fried eggplant, but have no stove. I guess I'll try to boil some water in the microwave and blanch and freeze them. I had good luck with my eggplants living a long time last time I planted them, so hopefully I'll have the same with these.

I cut the tops off of turnips and planted them, but I haven't really watered them a lot, so they're not growing. It was really an experiment to see if I could get turnip greens out of them.

I planted lots of seeds, some I got in trades and some herb seeds I bought. I am really praying the Cherokee Purple tomatoes come up. I've always wanted to taste those, but they are way too expensive at the store. They're heirlooms, so I can save seeds.

I also have some Grape and Cherry tomato seedlings growing. I don't know why I have so many tomatoes, because I don't really even like them!

I really need to get some squash and cucumbers into the ground, but I've been so busy, I haven't had time to prepare the garden spot on the other side of the yard. I'm going to try hard to get that done this week.

I have some volunteer watermelons coming up in the compost pile. I'll probably leave them just to see how it goes.

Guess that's all for now. Happy Homesteading!