Garden update

Josh and I are boring, and I just updated about Grayson yesterday, so all I really have left to blog about is the garden.

Let me just start off by saying that I never want to see another zucchini or crook-neck squash again in my life. I give about half away, I have 10 cups of shredded zucchini in the freezer, I've made two batches of chocolate zucchini bread and baked two batches of zucchini chocolate chip cookies. We eat at least one zuke and one squash every night with dinner, and even with all of that consumption, we have another 8 fruits in the fridge, and dozens more that will be ready for picking in the next day or two. I go out in the morning to pick what I can see and the very next day, zukes that were 2-3 inches long the morning before have suddenly grown to 10+ inches. It's absolutely maddening.

Anyway, we're done harvesting radishes, beets and lettuce and we've pulled those plants completely out. We get the occasional tomato, but most are still green. My red peppers aren't red yet, and I'm getting very impatient waiting for them to turn. In the meantime, we've grown some fabulous cucumbers, jalapeños, beans and carrots. I think the beans are on their way out, though, which is fine because I have a gallon size Ziploc of them in the freezer. Does anyone know how to freeze squash?

We have cantaloupe and watermelon that aren't ready yet, but they look so cute growing out there in our little corner. You see, our garden started out like this, but it quickly grew into this:
The cucumber, honeydew, and watermelon plants were vining out all over the place and we had to intervene. Josh had the brilliant idea to make a remesh arch across each box to let the vines grow up and over. Here's a pic of the cucumber arch when we first put it in July 29:Here's what it looks like now (can barely see it with the zukes growing so big and crazy in front):Anyway, since the plants are now growing along the arch, the fruits tend to hang down through the mesh squares. The little melons are so cute!
According to Mel, the vines will have a strong enough hold on the fruits to keep them attached until they're ripe, so we'll see.

And just for fun, here's a pic of this morning's loot: