Home Grown Tomatoes

It's not about tomatoes, but I have that John Denver song stuck in my head whenever I think of our yard at this time of year. Why? Well, even though I planted the tomato plants in late April, we are just now getting Cherokee Purple tomatoes for eating. And, we all know how much better home grown tomatoes taste than those store bought ones.

Plus, this time of year the pear trees are bending over in fruit with a few ripe enough to pick. Our apple trees decided to bear fruit this year. Phill has had to battle large wasps for them. And, what makes it so much fun to have our own fruit is that Larien and Inwe love to eat anything from our yard. Two nights ago Phill peeled and cut a few apples for the girls as they played outside. They would come by the table and grab a slice of apple and resume playing. Neither of the girls ate much dinner that night, but they ate our apples!

Also, we are awash in figs from three bushes that came from Phill's grandmother's farm in North Carolina. Inwe loves to pick the figs and eat them right there. Larien hasn't quite acquired the taste for fig yet, but she eats everything else (that is edible) in the yard. I'm sure she'll come around.

So the total list of the edibles from the yard this year is: radishes, strawberries, green peas, carrots, tomatoes, beans, squash, watermelon, pumpkin (Inwe can't wait to make a pumpkin pie), plums, peaches, apples, pears, and figs. Inwe and Larien ate everything except the radishes. Cool. Really cool.