New Blogs!

John and I have both started new blogs and we hope you'll check them out.

Mine is focused on food storage, cooking, gardening, etc.

John's is focused on the Animation industry (film, tv, games, apps, etc.).

We'd love it if you'd take a few minutes to check them both out.  Thanks!

Invaders!

It has been a constant battle to keep my garden free from rabbits and caterpillars this year! 

I put up some green plastic (in a grid pattern) to keep the rabbits out of my backyard.  It worked for a while, then I found a rabbit in my backyard (which should be impossible).  When I investigated, I found this:

Take note of the green plastic pieces on the ground.  The rabbit chewed it's way through!

After seeing this, I noticed that my pepper plant near my gate was being eaten.  I thought it was the rabbits, but I was wrong!  I have more hornworm caterpillars!

Thankfully, they didn't eat any peppers!

My Garden Haul

My garden has really started growing, and I've been able to harvest some produce this week and last.  It is delicious!

My Garden is Growing, Bugs are Attacking, and My First Harvest!

I know you'll tire of this soon, but here are some more pictures of my garden.  It's growing beautifully!  (Especially considering how late in the season I planted it.)

But there is opposition in all things.  I found another Tomato Hornworm Caterpillar and a cute little grasshopper.  I got rid of the caterpillar, but I let the grasshopper be.

And today, I had my first mini harvest.  I ate these yummy veggies within 5 minutes of picking.  YUM!

The Peppers Are Coming!

After my gardening adventure earlier this week, I was pleasantly surprised to find some new growth on my Gypsy Sweet Pepper plant.

It's an adorable little sweet pepper!  

I can't wait for more to come in, and it looks like I will have quite a few!

If you've never heard of Gypsy Peppers, they are cute little, multi-colored, sweet peppers like these:

My Japanese Eggplant has a couple more blossoms.  

And, finally, my spinach is thriving!!

New Growth

Yes the Tomato Hornworm Caterpillars ate through two of my tomato plants, but my other plants are doing well.

My Japanese Eggplant is blooming.

My sweet peppers are getting ready to flower.

As is my zucchini plant.

Invaders!

My lovely garden has been invaded!  First I had rabbits, then I had pill bugs (roly polys).  Now I have Tomato Hornworm Caterpillars.  If you haven't seen them before, they look like this:

They are HUGE!!!  And I was a little freaked out.  We weren't sure whether or not they were poisonous, so we exercised great caution.

Anyway, let me back up a little.  On Monday, I noticed a half eaten green tomato.  I couldn't see any bugs on my plant, and it was too high for the rabbits to get, so I thought the lizard I've seen around our garden may have chomped on it a bit.  Today I noticed three more half eaten tomatoes, so I examined it more closely.  I found a huge hornworm caterpillar.  It was eating one of my tomatoes.

We removed it and my dear friend, Kristina, and I examined it.  Here are some pictures and a couple of videos.  You can hear how squeamish I was!

No, we are not eating the caterpillar.  

We did not want to touch it, so we used utensils for our examination.

Kristina thought there were bound to be more of these creatures on my tomato plant, so her daughters examined the plants.  They found 4 more!  Here they are:

These caterpillars eat so much!  They decimated the top branches of my roma tomato plant and ate a lot of my heirloom plant.  Here are a couple of pictures.  Note that the branches are stripped of leaves.

Gardening

It's been over a decade since I last gardened.  I decided now was the time to take the plunge, so, after I was released as Relief Society President, I planted some vegetables in our backyard (and side yard).  Here are some pictures.  (Hopefully, I will have a wonderful crop, so I can can my bounty!)

An overview of the backyard garden.

An overview of the side yard garden.

Detailed Pictures.

See this huge tomato plant (which is taking over my planting bed)?  (Including the other tomato plant and red pepper plant next to it.)

This is the only tomato on it!  I've been trying a few things I read on the Internet to increase the number of tomatoes, but I guess this plant (an heirloom variety) really doesn't like the hot weather we've been having. 

This much smaller tomato plant (a roma) has over 20 tomatoes on it already.  

I guess the hybrid plants really do produce more in our hot climate.

 Zucchini plant

Spaghetti Squash and another tomato plant.

Pumpkin plant.  (You may be asking, "What's the white stuff on the ground around it?"  Well, pill bugs (roly polys) were eating it.  This "white stuff" is corn meal which they do not like.  So, my plant will hopefully start thriving!)

Another heirloom tomato plant (Mr. Stripey - a cool looking yellow and red striped tomato).

Green beans.  

I have a tomato cage and green "mesh" around it to stop the rabbits from eating it (they love it).  

So far, so good.

Another tomato plant.  

The pill bugs liked this one too, hence the cornmeal on the ground around the plant.

Broccoli (from seed).  

I need to thin it out, but haven't yet.  

Hopefully, I will have some lovely broccoli relatively soon.

 A sweet pepper plant.

A sweet, red pepper plant.

Spinach (from seed).  

A friend of mine said it grows great here in southern California.  

It's doing wonderfully so far!

Another tomato plant. 

Eggplant.

Japanese Eggplant.

I'm having a lot of fun so far tending to my garden.  It's good exercise and hopefully will allow me to have tons of canned tomatoes.  My goal is to have enough tomatoes that I don't need to buy any canned tomatoes at all for the next year (until my crop next year begins to ripen).

Wish me luck!