Well, at least a small harvest can being…
Above is our first summertime harvest from the garden on Saturday. Small, I know…but things are just getting started. We picked our red Juliet tomato on Saturday afternoon before heading to the progressive dinner. We sliced it in two and toasted our first home-grown tomato. 
The peas were a little bit of a surprise, since they were planted in the Wild West portion of the garden and it’s hard to see what’s going on with them (a rookie mistake!) There are quite a few smaller peas still out there, but these three were ready to be picked and they were sweet and fresh and perfect.
In the “garden challenges” department…yesterday I received a tweet from Mr. Brownthumb about a fallen tomato plant. Sure enough, when I went to the garden later in the afternoon, I found this:
So, lesson learned…get larger, sturdier, more expensive tomato cages… At this point, it’s too late, but you can bet that Naoto and I will be doing some research over the winter to learn better ways to support our tomatoes next year! We just need to support them long enough to produce their little fruits and keep them out of the pathways. I re-staked the fallen Brandywine plant and tied up more wayward branches. The garden isn’t pretty at this point, but more tomatoes are turning and that’s really all we asked for in our rookie year!
In the picture above, the man with the peas and the angel on the cell phone are both part of the cathedral. The man with the peas is from the 14th century (he has been restored since then). According to Cath, “the story goes his wife had cooked him peas and put them on the stone floor to cool. As he saw them, he got angry and said this was a meal very much beneath his status as a building master.” The cell phone angel was added two years ago, and according to Cath, “you can call [a number] and she gives you information about the cathedral…And her phone only has one push button, for a direct line to heaven.”
