I bought tomatoes

Yesterday I went grocery shopping and for the first time since July, I bought tomatoes. My chest freezer is filled to bursting with frozen tomato purée but we do sometimes need some raw ones. The last of my harvest went into the freezer on Sunday. The remaining green tomatoes are sitting in a big bucket in the back of the garden. I still have not figured out what to do with them so they remained where I left them when I did my last harvest. I still have some of my in-law's garlic left so I have not had to resort to buying garlic yet.

Some of my indoor peppers turned out to have aphids, though nothing was visible until recently. I made a batch of my soap and baking soda spray and hopefully will get it under control. I threw a few more out into the back yard, and some have lost all their leaves and are looking a bit yellowish brown, but some have leaves sprouting so I have not given up yet.

We have had a few sprinklings of snow, sleet and hard frost but nothing has stayed on the ground. The chrysanthemums have not completely given up but the flowers are not looking too glorious. Everything else has pretty much died.

Flowers in the snow

It started snowing tonight. I have spotted random snowflakes over the past week, but none seemed to have settled on the ground. Just a glimmer in the air that I am not sure was the real thing, but I have just had confirmation from three family members that there was some snow falling down. My pink chrysanthemums which bloomed back in the spring, and then put forth a big new growth last month budded and started blooming again today. Poor timing, chrysanthemums, but a bit exciting to give me something to blog about on this grey, cold November weekend. I still have one last row of carrots under hay which I may harvest tomorrow. Tonight we made Chinese stir fry for dinner and the store bought carrots I nibbled on while prepping tasted like cardboard compared to what I have become accustomed to. We have finished up our garlic, but Josh begged some from his parents so we are still using the good stuff. I have plenty of squirrels and birds visiting my garden to feast on what is left of my sunflowers. I even saw a cedar waxwing munching away. I have never seen one in the city before. I was really excited and ran to get the camera but a squirrel chased it away before I had a chance to get a good shot. Based on the squirrel population that has moved into my back yard, I feel fairly confident that our coyote urine aeration system did indeed work fairly well this summer. 

Because I had to plant the garlic, it forced me to quickly decide where I was going to rotate my crops for next year. We also put in more garlic which means I have to get creative in fitting in the tomatoes and all the rest. I also had a bunch of potatoes this year where I don't think I should be putting tomatoes next year. I am beginning to see the allure of slash and burn agriculture. 

I have uprooted the flowers which I hope to store and replant next year. I ignored the on-line advice about letting the roots dry, and I just chucked them in pots covered in perlite (the package said you can use it for this purpose).  I am back to my Darwinian gardening philosophy of survival of the fittest. If it can survive my ignorant and somewhat lazy approach, it deserves to come back. 

The pineapple sage has lost its flowers and a bunch of leaves, but is hanging on. I used some leaves in my salad dressing last night (I think of it as rent payment for taking up a big patch of my dining room). Some of the peppers lost all their leaves and I put them outside, keeping the ones that were a bit more resilient. Some of them have started growing new leaves, so there is hope.