Final Harvest - '08

So about a week and a half ago, we were watching the temperature forecasts here in the area so we could get our last harvest in before the first big freeze here. So it looked like the temps were getting a little iffy so we decided we had better get in everything that we were still leaving on the vine for freshness and in the hopes that it all might get a little bigger. So, Mary had picked a lot of the stuff earlier in the day and it was up to Sarah, Nathan and I to get the stuff inside. The kids had a lot of fun using their wagon to get the butternut squash to the door where I would bring it inside and wash it.



Here is our butternut squash harvest (something I like a lot more then I thought I would... it's pretty good!
Here is our final pepper harvest, though this wasn't the first and only harvest of fruits for us. We hope to be more successful with these next year as they got a late start and struggled for a while before they got going. So none of them turned red and only some of them turned yellowish. But they were a good size and their were plenty of them.

Boy, we were really glad that we picked what we did. The next morning it did freeze and the plants just completely shut-down, as can be observed above. If you look at the first pic on this post you'll see how full and alive the garden was just 14 hours earlier. I couldn't believe how quickly they died as a result of the freezing temps.
Anyway, we were pretty happy and fortunate with our first garden. We look forward to doing it next year with some tweaks. We now have a freezer full of zuchini (yellow and green), peppers, and some butternut squash. And we also have a whole bunch of spaghetti and butternut squash in our cooler pantry (there's no heat in there so the stuff should last a good part of the winter). It was fun for our whole family and provided some good lessons for the kiddos.