My tomatoes have only attained the size of golf balls and remain hard little green orbs, never ripening or even showing any glimmer of a blush. Notice the withered fungified leaves.
I did spray an organic fungicide a couple of times and it seemed to help momentarily, but the effects were short lived. I try to keep things as organic as possible........which is somewhat a mute point considering that I live in the middle of corn fields that have crop dusters flying over.As soon as we got a few days with warmer temps my broccoli promptly bolted, leaving it only suitable to feed to the critters.
Most of my green beans also succumb to the evil fungus...well, that and the proliferation of weeds that have taken over.
One thing that has not been a problem this year though, bugs. I think I have some friends to thank for that. Rooster Cogburn and Charles Bronson spend their days combing the gardens for insects and gobbling up every little creepy crawly that crosses their path...they have to do something for excitement, since I don't let them in with the hens.
We also have tons of toads this year. The wet summer has provided them with plenty of places in which to lay eggs and an abundance of food.
It is hard to tell from the picture, but this toad is so fat that her skin is absolutely stretched as far as it can go to the point where it is shiny.
A few things are doing remarkably well. My pear tree is loaded to capacity again this year. This poor tree gets so heavy every year that branches break with the weight of the fruit.
The apple trees are equally laden. Some of the apples are a little buggy, but will still be good enough to cut the bad parts out and do some canning and freezing.
Although there are weeds as tall as I am in my potato patch, the potatoes are looking really good. I planted 20+ pounds of potatoes and should end up with about 150 pounds to store for the winter...there is nothing like fresh potatoes!
I have just a couple of pumpkin plants, this one is a white variety....you should know by now that I don't like "normal" things so I had to find something kind of funky to plant.
My Butternut squash is fighting the fungus as well. It has set some awesome fruit and I am hoping that the vines can survive until the fruit has ripened.
Fungus on cantalope as well :(.
The peppers are doing OK so far. I sell a lot of peppers at market and have around 60 pepper plants so I am hoping that they continue to do well.
OK, That was hard for my OCD self to show things that are not going well...it is even hard for me to look at those weedy pictures!Tomorrow we will be back to sheepie news. I am leaving this afternoon to take my ram to Juliann's Little Country Acres farm in Illinois so that she can give him a ride the rest of the way to his breeder in Michigan.....Marie is going with me, and that is always an adventure!
I was able to get the rest of the flowers for the wedding from my friend Cathy's place-Miss Effie's flower farm. It is a good thing that Cathy's lives only 3 miles up the gravel road from me, because organizing the flowers for the wedding entailed several trips up the gravel road to her farm over the past few weeks, and a lot of planning; with Nicole, without Nicole, with the floral designer, without the floral designer, consulting with Cathy as to which flowers we thought would be blooming by the wedding, and Cathy trying to steer her 'you-pick' people away from the flowers reserved for us. The final straw was the Friday morning before the wedding when we intended to meet the floral designer at the flower farm at 8am. When I got up at 6am I heard some faint rumblings of thunder, so I brought up the weather radar on the computer and saw that there was a huge blob of threatening weather on the way. I called the floral designer and decided that we had better meet right away to get the flowers picked before the storm started. We (quite literally) jumped in the truck in our pajamas and flew up to Cathy's place where she (also in her pajamas) came running out handing us buckets and scissors...all while her dear, sweet husband watched out the window (I am sure he was amused, but he knows Cath and I well enough by now that he rarely asks questions...he is a smart guy). We snipped the final stems just as the skies began to let loose.
I am not going to say that Nicole was a little stressed while waiting for the start of the ceremony on Saturday, but........
We also had a little anxiety wondering if Zach (our 4, almost 5-year-old, grand-nephew) would carry out his duties as the ring bearer, especially after I discovered that someone had tied the actual rings to the pillow, and expected said 4-year-old to safely deliver them to their destination at the end of the long aisle. I decided that we had better rectify that situation and remove the rings before his voyage to the alter and give them to the best man and maid of honor for safe keeping. Probably a wise move because, as you can see here, he decided that the pillow was best placed behind his back. That minor incident aside, both Zach and Aida (flower girl) did a great job.
Once the ceremony was over everyone was able to relax and enjoy the festivities and the fun of having all the family together.
Nicole and Gary
It's hard to believe what good friends Justin and Nicole are now. As siblings growing up they drove me absolutely crazy with their fighting!
It was so great to have lots of old friends join us for Nicole's special day and to spend some time with my sisters.....I know we look like a group of random strangers, but we are really sisters! Our brother was not able to make it to the wedding.
Not sure what Marie is doing here, but we say that a lot about her...so we mostly don't ask.
170 of Nicole and Andrew's closest friends and family.
Those of you that know me will be surprised that, not only did I wear a dress (an event that happens about once a decade or so) but I also wore these shoes! This attire is a far cry from my customary Carrhartts and muck boots, so I wasn't sure that I would be able to pull it off. I survived just fine and I even kept the shoes on while we were dancing from about 7pm until midnight! After midnight I ditched the shoes and danced in my bare feet......the carriage had to turn back into a pumpkin sooner or later!
I am just glad that I wasn't wearing these shoes that my niece, Lauren, was wearing. I wouldn't even be able to walk in them, let alone dance!
I thought that I would take advantage of the cooler temps and get started on some canning. It is much better to fill the kitchen with pots of boiling water and steam when the outside temps are in the 60's rather than when they are, say, 90ish where they would normally be this time of year...otherwise it leads to an activity that my friend, 
Hey, now just for fun, let's watch the Iowa corn grow, shall we? These pictures were taken 10 days apart. For this completely non-scientific experiment, you can look at the tower in the background to show just how wild and crazy the corn has grown. That, and the fact that the neighbor's house disappears.
Another experiment that I am conducting...........
Maybe I can talk her into some purple Cone Flowers instead...I have lots of those!
Lambies are growing too. Halley wanted to show you her new jewelery. 
We tagged all the lambs last weekend-my least favorite job ever, but it is done now until we have new lambs next year.
Then it got incredibly, unbearably, stifling hot. Of course Emma didn't mind the heat as long as she had her swimming pool...and her Jolly Ball.
Our grand-nephew Zach decided to accompany Emma for an afternoon swim...with all of his clothes on. In my opinion, this is how every child should spend their summer....splashing in a pool full of stinky farm dog, floating grass clippings and a slimy Jolly Ball....yeah, you might not want us to babysit for you.
Since Mama Llama doesn't have her own pool, she had to do the next best thing to contend with the heat. Llamas like to have cool bellies and Mama would love to stand there all day having her belly sprayed.
The air show always goes right over our farm every year in June. I am not a fan of aircraft of any kind, I hate to fly and I would never pay to go and watch the whole airshow....but boy do I love that big jet noise that the Blue Angels make when they fly over.....I'm not gonna lie...I think it's kinda hot.
The Blue Cochins are starting to feather out.
And who doesn't love a cute chicken bum? OK, maybe that's just me on that one...seriously though, look at that bum.
The Mille Fleur Leghorn chicks are really changing. These are the most precocious chicks ever! They are only a few weeks old and already go over, under and through the chicken fencing, wandering out into the horse pasture alone. Out of the 10 chicks that I got, it looks like about half are cockerels....anyone need a roo???? Please???? Anyone??
Flowers are finally blooming. And we have seen the return of some good insects.....
And some very baaaad insects! The Japanese beetles are back and loving my flowers, although, since we are surrounded by cornfields this year, they are much less of a threat than the years that soybeans are planted around us. They are drawn to soybeans like a magnet and are happy to hop right on over into my gardens while they are at it.
Some of the lambs have left for their new homes. Magnus was the first to go. He is really looking great and I am so happy with the way his horns are looking at this point. Strangely, his mother didn't seem very sad to see him go.....might have had something to do with those big horns and the fact that he was still trying to nurse......
Ande is just feeling altogether neglected with all these lambs and chicks running around.
The big news though, is that after having his job eliminated January first, and being at home looking for gainful employment... for the past six months...Gary is finally back to work! Yay! YAY! YAY! I'm just sayin'....that's a lot of together time......oops, sorry honey, did I say that out loud?
