Close Food: This time its personal!

Well finally got my plants in the ground and not a moment too soon since we just had a great rain storm that should help my stuff just leap out of the ground.

Here are a few random, crappy cell phone pictures of my WIP (Work In Progress).

This is my garden plot.  Much smaller than the previous three years, but will still keep us in fried okra, fried green tomatoes, fried squash, (do you detect a pattern here?).  Ok, I do eat raw stuff too, but fried stuff is just so freaking tasty!

I went to the dark side and got a few hybrid tomatoes.  Don't worry though because most of the plants are heirloom.

Here is my patch of garlic from the previous years.  (it doesn't really grow sideways, its just the camera angle LOL)

As you can see in this picture, my wife will have no excuse not to keep me well stocked with cherry cobbler!

Here is a small glimpse of part of how I keep my garden watered during the dry spells.  Its a rain water catch off of my well house.  Old DirecTV dishes make for a plethora of great hobby uses.  Here it is being repurposed as a funnel.  Inside the water drum I have a pump that I use to pump the water out through a hose.  It doesn't have great pressure, but does an acceptable job of watering the garden when needed.  It doesn't take long to capture 55 gallons (a few rains) and I can water the garden about 3 times out of this before its empty.

Our grapes are coming along nicely.  I am going to try some new recipes this year that call for grape leaves.  I have never eaten anything with grape leaves in it, but since my motto is "waste not want not", I am going to try a few.  Have plenty of grape leaves to experiment with.

During my "down time", I can usually be found behind my workshop starring at this.  Its my makeshift target range for my pistols.  Its only about 20 yards, but long enough for some decent pistol work. 


I truly love spring, summer and fall and enjoy every minute of being outside on my place.  Some folks like to take vacation to go places.  I like to stay home.  I feel that if everyone had as wonderful place as I do, there would be a lot more "stay-cations" in the world!

Addendum - 5-10-12:
Just walked around my garden last evening and the squash and cucumbers are already breaking through the ground.  Got some blooms on my tomatoes.