Our garden and other summer stuff

Don't have any pictures to post this time. I waited too long to take any, and now you wouldn't want to see it! We have been growing the most beautiful vegetable garden. It is my VERY FIRST garden ever! The whole thing is about 32 feet by 21 feet. Unfortunately, last Saturday night we had a bad hailstorm. It did quite a bit of damage in the garden. We had six rows and were growing several vegetables:

lettuce - which didn't really come up at all, even after we re-planted it
spinach - came up great and I have been enjoying it on my sandwiches lately. Hoping to make a salad soon.
4 cherry tomato plants - enjoying lots of cherry tomatoes
4 Roma tomato plants - just a few so far
4 Beefsteak tomato plants - just starting to get a few fruits
2 watermelon plants - I knew watermelons grow on vines. I just had no idea how long and happy those vines get! YIKES! Now there are hardly any leaves or vines because of the hail. We do have a few watermelons growing. Hope they survive!
(Side note: I had a friend offer me some watermelon seeds when he found out we were going to plant a garden. He told me when the watermelons grow, there are only seeds on ONE side. I was so impressed. I asked, "Really?!?" And he replied, "Yea, on the inside.")
2 cantaloupe plants - same thing with cantaloupe vines. Those vines really like to stretch out.
8 broccoli plants - harvested some great broccoli. Ate some and froze some. I had never seen broccoli grow. Very interesting!
2 jalapeno plants - these have produced a couple of very small peppers. The peppers were so small, I didn't really notice them until they turned bright red. How do you spell H-O-T?
2 bell pepper plants - 1 died and the other has made the smallest bell peppers I have ever seen.
some pumpkin seeds - on which, the vines are more prolific than watermelon and the leaves are HUGE. However, there are a couple of pumpkins growing under there.
about 50 running feet of squash in 3 varieties, zucchini, yellow, and yellow crook-neck - (this being our first time, we really did not understand how much squash those plants will produce) We have harvested quite a lot of squash and given most of it away. The hail storm broke almost every leaf stem, so I don't know if the plants will recover or not. VERY SAD! I have picked some very large zucchini (picture small baseball bats) because I was picking in the evening at dusk and was not seeing them until they were gigantic. A friend told me they are great shredded up and used in zucchini bread.
10 feet of pickling cucumbers - the hail did a number on them as well
10 feet of okra - I think the okra was close enough to the fence that it will be ok.

So, I need to get back out there tonight and pull weeds. They LOVE all the rain we have had lately. Yesterday it rained gently and steadily for about 8 hours. I guess if the garden has a chance at coming back, that gentle, soaking rain was good for it.

Aleisha has been enjoying her summer. She spent a week at the ranch with her Grammie, Grandy, Aunt Carla and her twin girls, Emma and Ella, and Aunt Clora Ann and Uncle Dennis (my aunt and uncle). She rode 4-wheelers, did some needlepoint and entertained the twins. Each week she is doing some chores to help out around the house.

Richard is enjoying his new job as the Executive Salesperson for Accolade Home Care out of Morton. We are pleased to report we are selling our fundraising company to a very capable and talented young man. We will help him book several schools for the fall and get him going.

I am still enjoying working as a secretary/bookkeeper for Blackwater Agriculture Association in Muleshoe. The hardest thing about it is working during the summer. This is the first summer in 10 years I have had to work. Summer off...paycheck? Summer off...paycheck? Paycheck!!!

In June, I went to Summer Music Camp for Sweet Adelines. It was a great camp, and of course I learned a lot. I have taken on the job of Regional Communications Coordinator. My job includes publishing the regional roster (choruses and contact information for chorus officers), keeping the regional web site up to date (I have a web master who makes the changes I request), regional elections, and sending out information to/from choruses and International headquarters as needed.

Just in case I thought that wasn't enough to keep me busy with my full-time job, I also accepted the jobs of Assistant Director (1 of 4) of Prairie Winds Chorus, Assistant Lead Section Leader for Prairie Winds Chorus, and Costume Chairperson for Prairie Winds Chorus. I said yes to each of these things far enough apart from each other that I really didn't consider what else I had all ready said yes to. Dumb, dumb, dumb!

Other than staying really busy, we are enjoying the summer! Hope you are too!