{Beans}

Our garden has been gloriously producing veggies over the past few weeks. In fact, it is so full of lush green plants that there is hardly room to walk in there! I have to part the vines in order to find a spot to plant my feet to pick all the goodies. Next year Cory and I will definitely rethink our planting and place the big spreading plants outside of the garden fence so there's room to get around in there. And if the groundhogs and bunnies DARE to help themselves to our greens, well, I don't know what I'll do. But it won't be pretty! :)

We've eaten our fill of yellow squash and zucchini. Seriously. We've had:

grilled squash and zucchini
squash and zucchini cakes (like crab cakes - delish!)
zucchini lasagna
chicken and zucchini pizza
fried cheesy hot zucchini sticks (a personal fav)
chocolate zucchini bread
zucchini and chicken casserole

On one day alone, I picked 17 zucchini and eight yellow squash! Cory grated up a bunch of the zucchini and we now have enough frozen zucchini to make 32 loaves of zucchini bread during the winter. Or we can use it for other yummy recipes. Who knows. We've also given arm loads of zucchini to our family. And the squash and zucchini are still growing.

We're ready for something new. Green Beans!

Today I barely beat a massive thunderstorm and picked a basket of these gorgeous beans. They are just beautiful, if I do say so myself. I want to plant more of these goodies next year so I have enough to can for the winter. But tonight we are going to enjoy them in Green Bean and Ham Slippery Pot Pie. I can't wait! The aroma is driving me nuts right now; I need to wipe the drool off of my keyboard.

It's so much fun to watch our garden grow and to eat the veggies that we've cared for over the past few months. Right now we have pumpkins that are the size of bowling balls, little watermellons that are about four inches long, green peppers, jalapenos, broccoli, tomatoes, corn, carrots, and all kinds of herbs just going gangbusters outside.

Home-grown veggies. One of the great thrills of summer. Now I'm off to dig in to my Pot Pie.