That's right kiddies! Grab a spoon, grab a knife, or just go Gallagher style on 'em with a mallet... either way there is guaranteed to be a flavor explosion on your hands.
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| The first 2 Ha'Ogens, a green-fleshed variety. |
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| And the first Charantais was a pretty good size! |
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| And delicious! |
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| I tried a tomato variety called San Marzano Redorto this year and I have been really impressed with it's thick fleshiness, perfect for making sauce that isn't too water-y. It looks like sashimi in this picture! |
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| And of course, my all-time favorite fresh-eating tomato, Cherokee Purple... These have been doing great this year. |
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| Peppers are starting to come on. I love the glossy ruby red. Up front are Red Marconi, and in the back you can see the Jimmy Nardellos; both Italian heirlooms. Mom and Mark and I are planning a pepper pizza tomorrow night 😀 |
And here are a few critter pics from recent days...
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| I like the dubious sideways glance of this mantid... maybe annoyed that I got him wet. |
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| There are 2 baby fawns again, very cute. Here is one cleaning up our unharvested plums with his mama. |
And this young buck has made himself very comfortable residing much of the time in this dust bowl niche he created for himself under the Italian cypress tree against our house. At first I thought he had a bunch of cobwebs on his antlers, but Charlotte pointed out to me that this is actually the velvety stuff shluffing off of his growing antlers. Awwww, Buckminster is becoming a man.
I was surprised one morning to see 4 or more Western Bluebirds visiting this birdhouse (2 are on the roof in picture). They seemed to move on after a few minutes of flitting around. I wondered if this could have been the breeding pair with its offspring that were raised in this box earlier in the year. I am never sure if the fledglings survive their first flight lessons with cats in the yard. I hope they did!
Here was an interesting find at work a couple weeks ago. This is an Asian Jumping Worm. It is an introduced species in the U.S. that apparently can be damaging to the ecology of some of our forests, processing the soil in a different way than our plant and animal life is used to. They can be identified by their animated jumping when disturbed (this one actually caught some air when we poked it the first time!). They can also be identified by a small protruding mouth, that kind of looks like little lips.
Another bit of excitement at work this past month was the Dahlia show! Customers were encouraged to bring in their best specimens to compete for prizes... It felt like an elaborate scheme to have people bring us pretty things 😍. I was amazed with all the different types, so many I had never seen before.
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| This was my favorite and ended up winning runner-up for the Staff Favorite category. |
Well, a little bit of home decorating creativity to share...
Our house is constantly evolving in its decor. I have found that I enjoy making shelves (especially built into closets like this one, which makes it pretty easy) and Charlotte appreciates the space they provide for storage and display purposes. She actually had the cool idea of repurposing some of the old pieces of wood we have laying out in the yard that I have finally gotten around to cleaning up.
Here is the Before picture (well, one shelf is already installed in this pic):
And here is the After:
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| A most cozy corner. Featuring a couple pieces of Charlotte's uncle Robert Clark's paintings (the ladder and the one below it, although not too visible here). He was quite a successful painter of Americana scenes. |
We have a number of his paintings in our house and they are all stunning, partly because of the egg tempera he used that has some really vibrant color, and also because of his great contrasts of light and shadows.
Come to think of it, I took a few pictures from a gallery we popped into in Carmel recently that still has some of his work on display:
I will conclude with a floriferous picture from the garden. I love how much color we have going on this year as well as all the bug- and bird-life it attracts!
Cheers!
