Into the Fall Rains

You know that Blind Melon song, No Rain? That's how Seattle is right now was. We surpassed the 65-year record for July-September. The nice weather was starting to get boring. I kept feeling like I had to go outside. Not a bad thing, but normally by October I'm doing a heckuva lot more knitting. It's weird.

I took these photos last week when the weather was still warm during the days and starting to get cool at night.

I really love this burning bush.  It looks so lush in the spring and summer and is full of "flava" in the fall.  He's definitely on my list to put in when I have my own yard to landscape.

I was sure that I failed at cucumbers this year. I started a bit late and then didn't fertilize soon enough, probably didn't water enough, blah blah blah. I do have one stunted little cucumber. I don't think I should consider that a win though. Still a fail.

This is the only healthy looking summer squash plant I have.  It didn't start flowering until a couple of weeks ago.  I know I should pull all my squash plants because they're so covered in powdery mildew and it's only going to get worse, but... they're all flowering so much I just can't bring myself to do it.  Maybe now that the rain has started I'll grit my teeth and just do it this weekend. But there is a wee itty bitty tiny delicata on the vine hiding under the yellow beefsteak plant...

I have a few tomatoes still on the vine.  I forgot to water them the last week because I was at a wedding then out of town for work, so I probably could have had a few more ripe and ready, but considering I still have two bowls full inside I think I'll be fine just harvesting the rest of the blushing green ones and letting them ripen inside.

This is the little sunflower that could.  He was planted at the end of the fence so he got shaded out by the tree on the corner, and probably got less water than he should have.  He has a skinny little stalk and I wasn't sure if he was going to bloom, but he managed to escape the neighborhood hooligan who has been hacking away at the flowers and has been perky for a few weeks now.  He makes me smile.

The roses from the ORG are kicking butt. They looked a little sad when transplanted, but now they're going crazy with blooms.  I need to get after them and dead head, but they're so pretty when they're in flower!

If you can see past the weeds that are starting to take over, a couple of the strawberry runners I liberated from the MG Demonstration Garden pathway (I tell myself its okay because they were in the pathway and were just going to be trampled or tossed) have dug in and decided to survive. I would love to have this entire patch around the roses and blueberry pots filled in with strawberries. I might finally have enough to make jam... but I would probably eat them as they came ripe instead.  Just like the blueberries.

That's it for the garden.  I'll have to do some work this weekend, but it will just be pulling dead plants and maybe planting some carrots, radishes, and lettuce.  I've done two rounds of fall planting  but I kept forgetting to keep them watered for the first week or so, so I don't think too many of those seeds will come up. With the weather changing, I'm hoping that all I will have to do is sow and weed!

I've been working on a few projects on the sly, but they're not completed so they'll have to wait to be blogged about.  Soon, I tell ya, soon!