A Sunday stroll through the garden

We have pumpkin seedlings! The rotten squirrel who usually stalks my bird feeders ate about half of the seeds we planted in the pumpkin patch. We have about six seedling that have sprouted and at least two of those are our giant pumpkin variety. I am super excited about attempting to grow a giant this year! The boys are hoping to be the talk of the neighborhood (in a good way!) and maybe even get a picture in the local paper.

Daniel and JP's sunflower garden is still going strong. I think sunflowers are my new favorite flower. They attract lots of honey bees to the garden and they are absolutely beautiful against the green field and blue sky.

We are still harvesting tomatoes although not in the same quantities as earlier in the summer. I have a nasty infestation of leaffooted bugs in my tomatoes. I really prided myself on not using any pesticides this year. The boys caught frogs and lizards, and the sunflowers attracted lots of ladybugs so pests have not been a problem, until now. I am going to HAVE to spread a little sevin dust on my tomatoes if we want to keep harvesting...and trust me, we do!
Not soon after this picture was taken, that little leafhopper in the picture met his maker!

We've still got tons and tons of peppers and they just keep producing! I work the first half of the week, but when I'm done I'm going to be pickling a bunch of these beauties.

The cantaloupes are still producing, but not in the same quantity as earlier in summer (which is good because for a while there we were pretty sick of cantaloupe!) I was so surprised that they were continuing to produce fruits after the initial large harvests. I think it's the variety we planted. Last year we had a harvest of melons and as soon as they were done the vines died. I thought for sure that the same thing would happen this year, but I am pleasantly surprised it did not!

The watermelon patch is doing great and we should be able to harvest this big boy by the end of next week. It is due to my own fault that we aren't enjoying the melons right now. I planted about three weeks too late!

My okra is finally having a bit of a boom in production. I was getting sporadic stalks here and there but it looks like all the plants have coordinated their efforts and we'll finally be able to eat a big batch of the stuff soon! I've been sneaking bits and pieces of it into soups and stir frys so the kids will be so excited to eat it FRIED!

And after a non-production year last year, our pecan trees are finally giving us some pecans! I'm looking forward to these babies for my Christmas baking. When I went out this morning, the @#$%* squirrel was munching on a trio of the immature nuts.

We are still getting an occasional squash and zucchini, but the plants are pretty spent. I'm going to replant my cukes today and pray for a second harvest. The beginning of August I'm going start seeds for my fall/winter garden.
So now I'm going to go brew a hot cup of tea, climb back in bed, and spend the rest of my Sunday afternoon pouring over seed catalogs (yeah, I'm kind of *wild and crazy* that way!)