How my garden grows

Thought I'd share another update on my backyard garden. So far, it's been a cool growing season. Temperatures tonight will dip down in the 50s. And we've had steady rain showers, so I haven't had to water the garden at all this summer.

It's definitely a postage stamp-size garden. This year, I planted carrots, bush beans, bush cucumbers and baby acorn squash from seed. It's looking nice and green in mid-July.

The cucumbers haven't fared well, however, which is disappointing. I was hoping to make lots of pickles from home-grown cucumbers. But I did end up with a few carrots. Quite surprising, since I planted these carrots in early April, and a week after planting, it snowed a couple inches.

I turned the carrots into raisin-carrot-oat muffins, a great breakfast treat. Despite a few setbacks, including squash bugs and squash borers (my husband had to cut out the white grubs from the inside of the vine), I'm actually starting to see the beginnings of an acorn squash.

The Swiss chard I planted last spring is also getting bigger by the day, although it was a little smothered by all the lettuce I planted in the same spot.

I planted more lettuce this weekend for a fall crop. I also planted edible flowers, nasturium this spring, just for fun. The yellow and orange blooms open up every night when I get home from work.

But I didn't plant just vegetables this year. I love a colorful garden, so I'm happy to see so many perennial flowers in bloom right now.

These white roses survived an extremely cold Iowa winter; it dropped down to -20 degrees Fahrenheith earlier this year. I'm so happy to see them blooming now, and they smell terrific.