Autumn Arrives in the Garden

By my own admission back in August, I have not paid much attention to gardening this summer. My energy and attention have been spent on other fronts.

It shows.

The weather while we were recently out of town at Mayo didn't help. It rained a lot—not the torrential rains that hit other parts of Ohio and the Midwest, but enough. Ripe tomatoes split open, others dropped to the mud. The large pots on our deck (which we have spent too little time on this season) are full of tall grasses, courtesy (I assume) of the birds; those grasses are outperforming any of the flowers we planted. The flower seeds I sowed (casually) in the back of the garden came up and have spent weeks shoving one another out of the way. It is hard for zinnias to look beat to pieces, but mine do.

This week, which didn't start until we got a little bit of sleep after arriving home at about 1:15 a.m. Tuesday morning, has been full of all kinds of "must tend to" things—catching up on mail, catching up on email, dropping in to see my dad, a series of appointments and other obligations. But I hit a lull, a space, on Friday afternoon where I took clippers in hand, along with a large bowl, lugged the yard waste container around to the garden, and set to work.

Better late than never?

I clipped a lot of tomato vines, both those done with whatever they had produced or those sending out late blooms that clearly would not mature. I picked up and tossed the rotted, split open tomatoes into the container, some of them splitting even further as they landed. I was grateful to see that there are still a few (very few, but a few!) of the larger tomatoes (Best Girls, maybe) still green on the vine, so I hope yet for a few big tomatoes this season. ("Big" compared to cherry tomatoes, which are still coming on, small compared to beefsteak varieties.) I picked peppers—a peck of them? If not literally, certainly figuratively. Those will head to the freezer for meals all winter.

And then I sat down and took a long break. Blue sky, thin wispy clouds. Crowded flowers. Bees in and out. 

Butterflies in and out.

In the past, I have referred to this time as "bee therapy." As I travel through Buddhist realms each day with Thich Nhat Hanh, with his focus on mindful breathing, I wonder if I shouldn't call it bee meditation?

Whatever I call it, I need it. 

I'm penning this out Friday night, to type out Saturday morning. We have an almost full moon and the thin clouds are illuminated from behind. The daylight has changed as the sun moves south. My favorite season is on our doorstep. In a few more weeks, the changing times will bring the 2026 garden to a close.

And that is enough for now.

Eating Out

Warren and I eat out a lot.

A. Lot.

How much is a lot? 

Heck, some weeks anywhere from 8-14 times.

Lunches and suppers only. Never breakfast.

Before you clutch your chest and exclaim, "But April said they live frugally!" or "April told me they never eat out," take a deep breath.

Here is our favorite lunch spot:

That's Cafe Hyer there. It faces our street, is in the shade in the morning, and in front of it is the now blooming sedum bed, which fills up with bees during the day. Not just any old dining establishment will serve you lunch and bee therapy at the same time. On occasion, we are out there eating when our mail carrier comes with our mail. 

For our evening repast ("supper" to me, "dinner" to others), we head to our very favorite diner, the W & A Restaurant. This spot, conveniently located on our back deck, is in the shade by late afternoon. There we can see clouds scud by, listen to children playing, watch birds on the ground, in the trees, and in the sky, and wave at neighbors (well, we do that out front too). On occasion, Warren, who typically sits facing south towards our garden, will say, "A hummingbird!" and I will turn and catch a glimpse of one. I typically sit facing east, gazing at our backyard. 

Meals at W & A Restaurant tend to be a little more classy. We usually have a tablecloth over the table. Instead of just throwing together a sandwich and grabbing some chips for lunch at Cafe Hyer, we typically have serving plates and bowls. We both are more at ease using breakable tableware and glasses. In comparison, at Cafe Hyer, we tend towards plastic as the serving table is much smaller and the possibility of something being knocked over is a bit higher; neither of us want to clean up shattered glass.

Warren and I try hard to have all of our meals together. Sharing meals carves out time in which it is just us, not us and Warren's class, or us and my tasks for my dad, or us and Warren's booming business. 

So there you have it: we dine out a lot. Especially this time of year. And as I finish typing these words, I see it is just about noon here. Cafe Hyer awaits! 

On the Far Side of Summer

We are in the last few weeks of summer and I am conscious of the changes. Our weather has (most blessedly) started cooling. Yes, we have had a lot of rain, but our community did not get the brutal rains, tornadoes, and flooding that Indiana, parts of Ohio (including Columbus 25 miles south of us), and Kentucky did.

The days are getting shorter. I don't notice the change from day to day, but I can tell it week by week. As I pen this out Tuesday night, it is already dark at 8:40 p.m. and probably was dark earlier than that. I just did not notice. 

No surprise given the time of year, there has been a lot going on on the garden. Tomatoes tomatoes tomatoes. In an experiment for the winter, I slow-roasted trays of tomato slices (brushed with olive oil, sprinkled with herbs and kosher salt), packing them in containers to freeze. My hope is to be able to pull them out this winter, thaw them slightly, and put them on a homemade pizza.

There are lots and lots of peppers to do...something with.

Last week Warren and I did a second basil cutting. We had done one back in mid-July that I turned into pesto: some for our freezer, some for friends. Some five weeks after the first, let's just say there was a lot of basil. I grow several types (and pay no attention to what types I plant) so the cut collection was wildly varied in size of leaves, texture of leaves, and color of leaves. Several has large curly leaves, like a garden fairy had gotten to them with a crimping iron. I made more pesto with about half of it on Sunday. On Tuesday, I washed and de-stemmed and dried the rest of it, then very slow-baked the individual leaves for a fresh jar of dried basil for cooking.

Crumbling the dried leaves was an olfactory gift.

As for the pesto, I had in mind where it would head. The next door neighbors on the south had been away on an extended trip and were coming home Monday night. They both love my pesto. I was cat-sitting for them while they were away, so on the last evening of my cat duties, I slipped a small container of fresh pesto in their fridge to welcome them back.

A larger container went to our next door neighbors on the north side, Adam and Maura and their girls, Alice and Margaux. Our two households share lots back and forth—baked goods, vegetables, pesto, fruit, books, laughter, and more. Alice and Margaux, Alice just shy of 11 and Margaux 7, are already skilled bakers and had brought over on Saturday some to-die-for homemade cinnamon rolls. Later on Sunday Margaux and Maura delivered some sweet corn as both homes look for farm stands with it this time of year. 

When I carried the container of pesto next door, Margaux, playing outside with another neighbor, jumped up. "Is that the pesto?!" She is a huge pesto fan.

Yep, that's the pesto. I hope she shared.

There was something else I did with the pesto this Sunday—something long overdue. I shared two small containers with our neighbors who live directly across the street from us. We are all on a smiling and waving basis (and remember, I have lived in this house now for almost 18 years) but seeing Joan out that morning made me walk across and ask if they would like some pesto.

Joan had heard of pesto, but had not had it before. We talked about it, and Ed, her husband, joined us. (Warren was busy loading steel, so he was not in on the conversation.) We talked about their house, the torrential rains several days ago and the water damage, about cooking (Ed is the head cook of the two), about this and that. They told me what they were cooking that night; it sounded like a perfect match with the pesto. Then Joan said "I'd love to share what we're making with you and Warren. Would that be okay?"

Oh yes.

So mid-afternoon I walked the pesto over to their house. In the early evening, Joan knocked on our door with two servings of their main dish: roasted chicken breast/tomato/spinach/onion. We had already husked some of the sweet corn that had arrived earlier in the afternoon. The sweet corn delivery had also included two freshly baked blueberry muffins (I'm telling you: the girls bake a lot!), so we had quite a feast, finishing the dessert muffins on our front porch. Ed and Joan were arriving home from walking their dog, and we all four waved and called out appreciation for the shared food.

As we savored the muffins, I started laughing.

"This meal was entirely free. How's that for being frugal?"

The meal was wonderful.The sense of community, of connecting with others, was the special sauce, the deluxe icing, that made it even better.

A Mid-August Garden Report

Let's face it: I have not been a good gardener this year.

At all.

I have occasionally weeded the garden. Very occasionally. During the heat dome and the heat waves (hot but not a heat dome), I kinda sorta kept it watered. In fact, my dear husband has been more attentive to watering and weeding it than I have this year. (And his pet project is deadheading the marigolds that march around the border, so Warren gets credit for that too.)

But, as I have noted more than once over the years, plants tend to know what to do, regardless of my actions. 

There are tomatoes:

And peppers:

There have been so many peppers so far that, as I did last summer and the summer before, I made pepper-onion relish; hot packed so we can enjoy it through the winter. There was one casualty during the hot bath (I couldn't figure out why there was suddenly bits of chopped onions and peppers in the bath: had a lid come off? Nope!):

but everything else came through with flying colors:

The beautiful cabbage head that leads off this post? Coleslaw for supper tonight. (And for several more days to come, of course.) Not unlike last summer and fall, when I found great satisfaction and focus in performing little things, concentrating on making the slaw today was most satisfying. 

There are more (many, many more) tomatoes to come, and still quite a few peppers as well. The basil is about ready for a second picking; I may make more pesto or I may dry the leave for cooking herbs or both. After that, I will let the basil go to flower so the bees can enjoy the fragrant bed. Besides, given my trying to get my internal rhythms reset, I could totally use some bee therapy.

Some bee therapy? Who am I kidding? I could use a lot (A. Lot.) of bee therapy. It is interesting just now, as I looked back to catch the link to last year's post, that last October I was—guess what?—dealing with some of the very same issues that I am struggling with now. I'll just leave that on the table for now. 

I am grateful that the garden decided to do what it does best: grow. And produce food for our table (and other tables too) and food for my soul. If that's not a win, I don't know what is. 

Another Garden Update

The first one: not great.

It is hot. We are entering (maybe in already?) another heat dome—not as vicious as the one at the end of June (at least not yet) but still nothing to mess with. And, of course, I hate heat. 

BUT to keep my mind off the heat, here is a garden update!

The first cherry tomato, at the top of this post, was an ehhhh. Ripe but not ripe, A little hard. A little lacking. But a few days later the first Early Girl came in (which I ate promptly) and now I have THREE of them waiting to be enjoyed! (And remember, I am the only person in this household who eats fresh tomatoes.)

Yum! 

On the other side of the garden, the basil, after its weedy start, was ready to pick. So yesterday morning, while it was still cool, I got out there with shears and cut most of it, filling a huge pan. I stuffed it into a garbage bag, put it in the refrigerator, and this morning I turned my attention to making the first pesto of 2026.

Just waiting for me to dive in

This photo shows my work area before the pesto making commenced. Nice, neat, clean. The hammer? That's to smash (okay, hit firmly) garlic so I can get the skin off and throw it into the food processor. No wasting time with a garlic press for me! 

Ready to go!

I did not take a photo of my work area after I finished the pesto, but trust me, it was not nice, it was not neat.

But there IS pesto!

As I told Warren and then shared with my friend David, it was harder making the pesto this year. Age does take its toll, and my "real" age is more than the 70 years shown on my birth certificate. But I made it to the other side. Tonight I will put the pesto into containers, carry some to our neighbors on both sides, and then sit down and smile.

And maybe, just maybe, enjoy one of those tomatoes! 

Pesto! 

An Early July Garden Update

The tiger lilies are just starting to bloom

Well, let's just say the news is mixed. Not bad, mind you, just mixed.

Like many of the midwestern and eastern states, we had a massive heat dome last week. High temperatures here (in the mid to upper 90s) and higher heat index numbers—102, 105—those kind of numbers. For the garden, that meant watering it at, oh, 6:00 a.m. or so before the heat got too intense to be outside. 

Despite that battering, the garden came through. My biggest surprise is that the lettuce bed did not throw its hands up and surrender. That day is coming, but for now this household and our neighbors are still eating fresh lettuce.

From an earlier picking

We've had a few peppers already too.

The first tomato is almost ready to pick. (The rest are lagging behind.)

And the zinnias are starting to open up too. 

Trust me, there are more. 

The biggest obstacle with the garden this year? Yours truly. While never a strong weeder, this year I am downright pathetic. The basil has suffered the most from the neglect, although I did get enough weeded out that the basil pushed up and over the weeds. They have done well enough that I can probably make the first batch of pesto.

And an update on that earlier update: the basil seeds that I bought and sowed? Warren did not know I had sowed a small bed, saw pigweed coming up in that area, and hacked the "new" basil bed up to get rid of the weeds. Those seeds never had a chance. 

I almost hesitate to write this, but might as well throw it out here: gardening this year from my viewpoint has been difficult. Not just the weeding: everything. I have even had the heretical thought that next year, we have even a smaller garden. Fewer tomatoes (this year there were 5), fewer peppers (this year there were 14). I know, I know. It is only July. And some (many?) of the physical challenges I am dealing with this spring/summer may improve or even resolve.

Time will tell, both for me and for this year's garden. Here's to more tomatoes! 

Watching the Groceries: Halfway Through 2026!

Really? We are already halfway through the year? Yeah, right. That's like telling me my youngest son, Sam, is 36 years old.

Oh, wait. Sam did just turn 36! And yes, 2026 is halfway over!

So where is our household on grocery spending for not only the second quarter but also the first half of the year?

Better than I dared hope. 

As I have often written, "groceries" means food and common household items such as toilet paper, tissues, and cleaning supplies. "Groceries" does not mean eating out, which for us, unless we are on the road, tends to be very minimal. (How minimal? Maybe three to four times in any given quarter.) 

Like so many of us, I continue to watch many prices rise. In April, when I was totaling up our first quarter spending, I noted that milk was $3.19, a new high. Not anymore. A gallon of milk yesterday at Kroger? $3.29.  Now, I like milk. A. Lot. I watch for sales, of course, but the reality is I will continue to buy milk. It is a small luxury I am grateful I can afford. 

Another kink in the shopping, and it will take another quarter to figure our what, if any, impact there may be, is the re-emergence of diabetes. Things have changed since I wrote about this at the end of March. I have a new family physician who I just had my first appointment with yesterday and she and Warren and I had a long discussion about where my A1C is (too high and barely down from March), what changes I am willing to make to my diet and lifestyle on my own (the diet is the bigger issue), and how she would like to see if and how much I can bring that troublesome A1C down before I see her again in late September. My doctor wants me to focus on eating more complex carbohydrates, starting with something as simple as brown rice. (But we are finishing the white rice first. Just saying.) So there's that.

Okay. What did the second quarter hold?

From April to June, we spent $561.63 on groceries. $32.03, or just about 6%, of that was on household items, ranging from toilet paper to (my favorite) 5¢ on Dawn dish soap at CVS. The rest was on food. May was our most expensive month, as we had a big stock-up at Aldi that came in at about $98.00 and then a later trip that I thought would be small, but still topped out at over $65.00. In June, we had one Aldi stock-up that came in around $105.00, but that was the only one. Our second quarter spending averaged out to $177.21 a month. 

Combined grocery spending for the first half of 2026? $1226.42, or a monthly average of $204.40. 

Not bad. not bad at all.

We have been making a concerted effort to eat out of our pantry and freezer. The good news of that? We don't have to buy much. The downside? At some point, we will be restocking both the freezer and the pantry. I am watching the grocery ads for sales on chicken (our primary meat in this household); I'm hoping for a "Buy One Get Two" sale, but have not seen any of those recently. And both of us continue to be very, very vigilant about food waste. So much so that when the occasion presented itself recently, I trash picked a gorgeous apple (with one medium bruise) out of our shared compost, brought it in, washed it off, cut off the bruise, and enjoyed every single bite with Warren. Just saying.

So that's where we are at the half. The 4th of July is upon us; of course, there's a concert that night. We have just come under a heat dome (and I really, really hate heat) but it is supposed to break before the 4th. I certainly hope so.

On to the third quarter!

A long-ago Sam celebrating the 4th! 

Community

Sammie 

When my longtime friend Katrina was here earlier this month, she commented more than once on the sense of community she felt in Delaware. Things like the older neighborhood homes with spacious front porches where people called out hellos from their swings and chairs. People walking by smiling and saying hello. The walkability.  The community-focused events we took her to: the 3rd birthday of our remarkable TreeHouse program (Young Adult Transitional Housing) created by our amazing, groundbreaking United Way of Delaware County, the June Justice Bus—these gave her a closer look at how some of us ("us" being both agencies and their staffers as well as volunteers) work to strengthen this community.

Community.

Another friend, Maike, made a similar comment about community in a recent letter. She marveled that an across-the-street neighbor walked over and offered to share tomato plants with us and our neighbors (Ryan grows his own from seed). I took one solely for its name: Pink Bumblebee. (I mean, how could I not take that one?) Maike wrote that she thinks she is the only person in their suburban neighborhood that even has a vegetable garden, calling herself an outlier. In replying, after offering sympathy for her situation, I noted that there are multiple vegetable gardens just in our block, let alone in our city, whether we are talking a plot like ours, raised beds like our neighbors on either side, or even a well-tended tomato in a pot on a front porch.

Community.

Yesterday, I took a morning walk while Warren worked, and the sense of community played out fully. Dog walkers nodding and smiling as we passed. A man clipping a shrub who waved as I walked by. About a block and a half from our home, I stopped to talk to Joe, who I've known for years and who recently turned his lightly sloped front yard from grass into all native plantings, inspired by Doug Tallamy and the Homegrown National Park movement and committing to taking the leap when he realized that Andrews House has a native plant garden on its sloped front yard. The sprinkler was going, the sky was blue, the sun was out, and we both celebrated the freshness of the morning, the joy of being retired, and his hopes for his native plants yard. "Tell Warren I said hi," Joe said as I walked away, waving goodbye. Closer to our home, Andy and another neighbor were on Andy's front porch; they both waved and called hello.

Community.

We spent a large part of yesterday afternoon exploring a nearby community, Newark, its downtown as well as the Earthworks nearby. We ate locally (Moe's BBQ; superb), I spent time reading with Mark Twain, toured the Earthworks (a UNESCO site), and, on the way home, stopped at a Whit's (a frozen custard chain) in a small town on our route, for a treat. (June 21 is a special day for us, and not because of the solstice.) A little boy, maybe 5, maybe slightly older, was there with his grandparents—running in and out (they were eating outside as were we), grabbing napkins, saying hello to everyone. They departed and three bikers (motorcycles, not bicycles) came out with their orders and reveled in the day, the friendships, and the treats. As we came back into town, we made a quick stop at Aldi for ONE item that I needed. Walking in (quickly), I passed a friend, Bennie, who was devouring a candy bar while he hustled his groceries to his car. I quipped about him not waiting until he got home or at least to his car, before digging in, and Bennie grinned, then said, ferociously,  "I EARNED this!"

Mark Twain reading to me

Community.

I am writing this out by pen at our local library while Warren uses the facility's laser cutter to make engraved end caps for a crotale stand order. We were here at 9:00 when it opens, after my going next door where I am cat-sitting Sammie while Mark and Mary are out of town. I reminded Warren we still had baked wonders in our refrigerator, sent over Saturday evening when Margaux next door had a birthday party.

Birthday delights! 

Cat-sitting. Cookies. 

Community.

What the Garden Looks Like After One Month

Two of three deck planters, the largest not in the photo! 

Back in mid-May, I wrote about how Warren and I had labored to get our basic vegetable garden in and done. After that post, we spent another weekend putting together the Big Flower Pots that we set out on the deck. They are all annuals; we do for color and variety. 

And that is about it.

I wrote last year about giving up the Hej Garden in the rear of the property and how we both decided it was okay to let it go.We made some similar decisions this year about extra "stuff" we had on hand, ranging from more tomato cages than I will ever use in my life again to more (MORE) planters ranging from medium small to BIG. Warren and I reached agreement very quickly: let them go. So they ended up on our curb—the cages on a Saturday, the planters the next day—and guess what? They went to new homes in no time!

So what do we have?

This:

Our vegetable garden, June 2026

The peppers, cabbage, and tomatoes are coming on. With luck, I might have a tomato by end of the month. Time will tell.

Maybe?

The lettuce, in the lower lefthand corner of the garden, came on like gangbusters and I picked some this morning to add to our salads later today. We are having a series of hot days, so I do not know how much longer the lettuce will last. I told my neighbor to please pick some for her and her husband to enjoy.

Salad! 

The basil is struggling to get through the weeds. Yes, I know; I should have been WEEDING. I have decided that if I go out very early in the morning with my gardening stool and a fork (yes, a fork, as in "out of our silverware drawer"), I may be able to knock down the weeds and give the basil a chance.

Yes, there is basil in that mess! 

Stay tuned on that one.

And finally, in a nod to our bees and pollinators, I am delighted to see that the milkweed I curate (I say "curate" because our yard is not a butterfly garden and I limit the milkweed I let grow to maturity) has begun blooming. No bees in this photo, but I have seen them burrowing headfirst into the blooms already.

Milkweed blossoming

While I was visiting my dad earlier today. one of the workers and I talked about gardening: what did I grow? I told her, then focused on the basil, explaining that I had not weeded but needed to do so, because I make a lot (A. Lot.) of pesto in the late summer. I then told her how I let the basil go to flower for the bees, adding that last year I decided one of the best things I could do for myself was sit and listen to them, my own bee therapy. She nodded approvingly. 

"We could all use that, I think," she said. 

Indeed we could. 

Inch Ten: The 2026 Garden Season Begins

How about a pot of tomatoes? 

And what a beginning it was!

Between all the "stuff" going on around here (which I have described from time to time) and concerts and visitors and anything else we had going on, I didn't have a whole lot of bandwidth for gardening. Yes, I'd bought some seeds, yes, we'd gone out to our very favorite locally owned farm center (Miller's Country Gardens) and bought pepper, tomato, and red cabbage starts several days back, but...yeah. That was about all the farther we had gotten, with the exception of Warren tilling the kitchen garden, the 10 x 16 plot that will be THE garden this year. 

The plants from Miller's waiting for their time

Last weekend Warren gently nudged me. "Maybe this is a good weekend to get the garden going."

Yeah, it probably was. And so we did, first going to our local Meijer for potting soil (more for flower pots, but needed all the same) and compost. 

And marigolds, of course, for bordering the garden.

In keeping with discoveries (and lessons learned) of years past, I did NOT indulge in tomatoes. Three Early Girl and two Husky Cherries, one of which is in a pot. In they went, nice and quiet.

Tomatoes in (except for the pot; you can see it above)

The peppers and cabbages followed suit. Three cabbages, all in a row; 13 peppers, all sweet. Warren then raked off a bed for lettuce on the far side, and one for basil. These are on the left side as you look at the photo below.

Saturday's efforts

The very back of the garden, with a metal pole temporarily marking the area, we (I) reserved for flowers: zinnias and bee/pollinator mixes. But after Saturday's efforts, I looked at Warren and said, "I can't do anything more today."

And I couldn't. I was exhausted. I was feeling every minute of 70 years old and then some. I was sad a bit about that, but also realistic. Yeah, I'm 70 chronologically, but closer to my early 80s physiologically thanks to 22 years of cancer. And yes, that makes me disabled to boot! 

How disabled? I got those plants in using a gardening stool to sit on, because kneeling or bending over 20 times was 20 times too many.

That being said, I finished it off in fine style on Sunday. 40 marigolds planted along the border, and the flower seeds hand-sown with joy. Again, I had to sit on the gardening stool to get those marigolds in, but it was with great pleasure I tamped No. 40 down and announced "Done!" 

Warren and I did some more yard-related work on Sunday, which resulted in a new holly bush being planted in the front of the house (a sentimental favorite for Warren; the one that died over the winter had been planted by his mother, Ellen, decades ago). Both of us hit Sunday early evening worn out but satisfied. 

There are still seeds, including a hefty amount of cosmos seeds I collected last fall. We will get the cosmos broadcast; Warren wants to move them to a backyard flower bed where we can see their brilliant colors easily from the house. As for the other seeds...well, they may wait until next year's garden.

But the vegetable garden is in. The plants look happy and are standing up straight. Yes, there is more work to be done in the other flower/plant beds, but the vegetable garden is in.

And that is enough for now! 

Waiting to grow

This Year's Gardens: Last Chapter

The garden is down.

The garden is officially down and 2025 outside is done, done, done.

We have had a few "light frost" nights and for those we brought some potted plants in from the deck and covered the larger planters and the vegetables. But Sunday is bringing rain changing to snow and temperatures down in the 20s.

The vegetable garden covered

No amount of covering is going to stave off temperatures in the 20s. In short, the 2025 gardening season is over. 

I tackled taking down the vegetable garden.  We had already taken down the Hej Garden back in August, so at least that was out of the way. Given all of the demands on our schedules this fall, and given my currently working through depression, I thought throwing myself into some basic outdoor work would do me good. And it did. I worked an hour and a half on Thursday and two hours on Friday, with good results both emotionally and garden-wise.

I started on the wild jungle of tomatoes. Originally, I had planted three (3!) larger tomato plants and four (4!) cherry tomato plants. Easy, right? Way less than in recent years, right? What I did not count on was all the "other" factors that impacted the garden: my hospitalization in June, for example. Nor did I expect the cherry tomatoes to go hog wild and grow up and over and around EVERYTHING. The three larger tomatoes, in the front row, became lost in the cherry vines. Even with both careful pruning and wholesale hacking on my part, the cherry tomatoes took over everything they could, going all the way over to the garage wall in their exuberance. So I knew before starting that I had a bit of a chore ahead of me.

"A bit of a chore." There's an understatement.

I also knew before wading into the garden that there were still cherries ripening and coming on, so I took along our dishpan to put them in. It filled up:

I also knew this project would generate a lot of yard waste and I was not mistaken on that front either:

The first of two containers

At the end of the Thursday afternoon session, I figured I was about halfway through the tomatoes with the peppers and basil yet to go. I had been at Justice Bus from 9:00 to 2:00 that day already, so I was pleased I had enough energy to get even that far. I also knew I wanted to finish it off on Friday, and so set my sights on getting an early start.

At 7:45 the next morning, I went outside and surveyed the scene. What if I start on the peppers first? I had planted 14 plants back in May, 13 of which were still intact. (The 14th? I had stepped on it way back in the late spring.)  As I had with the first attack on the tomatoes, I made sure to pick all the remaining peppers from the vines. Let's just say there were a lot. A. LOT.

Peppers! 

Plant by plant, I picked and pulled. The stakes piled up. So did the yard waste.

But I finished the peppers and yanked the basil. That left the remaining tomatoes. Again, I gathered many of them, red and green. (An aside: Why the green ones? Two reasons: (1) some of them will ripen inside, and (2) I may (may) make green tomato relish again this year. Maybe. We'll see.)

There were a lot of tomato vines: 

What made me smile the most was coming across several vines still putting out blossoms, letting me know that hope springs eternal even in a tomato plant:

Blossoms on the tomato vines

By the end of the two hours, I had completely filled both yard waste containers. In fact, there was some plants, mostly the basil (which died earlier, even covered; basil does NOT like cold temperatures) that I will go out later today and bag up. While I out there working, I took down the wind chimes and, of course, brought in the ceramics from Ben and Sam long long ago.

The chimes on the deck waiting to go inside

The ceramics ready to move inside

(In case you are wondering or remembering, the pottery fish that got broken back in June after a storm has been gracing our kitchen table ever since.) 

Next week, after the initial cold blast is over, I will go back out and rake things around. The zinnias and the agastache I will leave until the early spring, but everything else is gone gone gone.

All that is left to bag up

Over the next few days, I will look through my gardening notebook and make some notes following up from my earlier decision to rein in the gardens and just do the kitchen garden in 2026. Things to think about, things to remember, things to swirl around in my mind. I have peppers to cut and freeze. I have to make a decision about the green tomato relish. 

And I will enjoy every last bite of every last ripe tomato, grateful for the very last tomatoes until next summer's garden. 

P.S. After I wrote the above words, I went outside and finished bagging the vines, basil, and miscellaneous stalks, filling a yard waste bag. I then brought in the remaining gardening and summer items on and around our deck: the watering can, two stray pots, the deck chimes (not to be confused with the wind chimes), and such. I carried them down to the basement, making multiple trips. There are four pots of flowers we are wintering over inside, so I made room for those and brought them in; the other four pots (two LARGE deck planters make up half of that) will stay outside and end their season in a few days. The bees are gone; I have not seen one, despite the sunshine or warmth of the day, for over a week. As I type these words, Warren just mowed the backyard one last time. 

Time for winter.