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Fall Update from the Avalon Garden By Avalon
Garden Goddess, Katja Grace Dearest Avalon Plurk-ers, As the season now turns from the full on intensity of summer heat into the temperate fall climate, I want to take some time to reflect and describe to you all the fruits of your labors. The Avalon Garden has been such an abundant success in its first year thanks to all of you who pitched in with your enthusiasm and brawn to help dig the beds and prepare the soil.
Our eight raised beds (lined with hardware cloth to keep the gophers out) produced a delightful abundance of three kinds of kale, broccoli, and salad mix in the late spring/early summer. By mid summer, we started being inundated with bushel after bushel of heirloom tomatoes (some bigger than the palm of our hands), armenian cucumbers and basil. In the keyhole beds and where we buried individual baskets, our super hot climate ripened an abundance of watermelon, honeydew and cantaloups (making your mouths water yet?). What a treat to have our own yummy melons! We also had a brief flush of sweet corn.
The cosmos and zinnias has provided continual flushes of color in the garden and on our tables. The sunflowers were beautiful to watch come into full flower, and now they are laden with ripening seed. We also have a good crop of popcorn ready to be harvested soon. We have put away sun-dried tomatoes, some pickles and frozen pesto for the winter months. We also have in storage a stockpile of pumpkins and kabocha squash. Thanks again to all of you who made the Avalon Garden happen. We couldn't have done it without you! Last week we hosted our first natural building workshop, and were able to feed 25 people many meals that centered around the garden produce. So your contribution is nourishing others to contribute their gifts.
An inspiring spiraling cycle of giving and receiving! As if all of this were not enough, we have been really excited to see that as we have grown the garden produce, we have also been growing the soil. We have recently pulled out some of the summer crops to make room for fall planting, and have gotten to discover that alchemical magic has indeed occurred in the cultivated areas. Where there was hard, dry, lifeless soil before, each dark brown, friable shovelful is now teeming with earthworms (and surely a gazillion invisible forms of microbial life). This is equally as important as the actual harvest. Creating healthy soil where there was barrenness before. We have also created many compost piles, and are adding this soil to the beds now for fall planting.
So please know how much you are all appreciated for what you have contributed to this project, and enthusiastically invited to stay in touch and return when you are able. We will be ritually giving thanks for the bounty, and doing fall planting projects during the Plurks during the last Saturdays of September and October. We'd love to have you join us! Many Blessings,
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