Garden Along, But It's Not Pretty

Today is Garden Along update day, but I forgot to take any pictures before the sun went down. So, instead of lovely pictures, you get words and more words.

In the main garden, things are progressing slowly. There are at least two tomatoes that appear to be getting close to ripe. With a little luck, we should have BLTs on Sunday. Tomorrow we need to stake up one of the peppers. The poor little plant is producing loads of nice, long peppers and the little trunk just can't stand up to the weight. A few of the peppers are starting to turn red. They are so much more tasty when we leave them to ripen!

Moving out of the garden and into the orchard things are far more exciting. The lemon tree is in desperate need of a good pruning and it is weighted down with huge, yellow lemons. This is coming just in time because we always make several gallons of fresh-squeezed lemonade for our July 4th block party. The lime tree is quiet for a change. It has little green limes, but none are ready for margaritas. We finally started picking the oranges last week and have been drinking fresh-squeezed orange juice all week. It is pretty funny when Young Man asks if there is any juice in the house besides FSOJ!

The other tree begging for attention is the apple tree. Contrary to popular belief, it is possible to grow apples in Southern California. Our tree is an Anna and it doesn't require any chilling during the winter. This is good because we don't get any chilling around here! The Anna also doesn't require another tree around for pollination. Again, this is good because our "orchard" is full!