This year I rearranged the driveway garden to look a little more presentable. Instead of clusters of pots in the middle of the driveway, they're all lined up demurely along the retaining wall that separates us from our neighbors. The tomatoes are producing well - no doubt loving this stifling hot weather. We've harvested a perfectly shaped, gorgeous bell pepper that ripened to a brilliant orange; more peppers are on the way. And this year I've planted string beans in a pot - they're just starting to get flower buds.
In the backyard garden, even in the stupefying heat of the last few days, some of the vegetables that prefer cool weather are hanging in. The dinosaur kale looks pretty good, though the curly kale is not so happy. And this year I'm trying to coax brussels sprouts through their long growing season, all the way to fall maturity. (My fallback is to have planted another round of seeds for these indoors, to be planted out by the end of summer.)
A nice surprise: we cleared out the area where our new shed was to go, which also meant moving our compost piles. Look what seeded in from those piles: a miniature cucumber plant and some squash! Maybe next year I'll plant melons here!
