Weekly update

As I am sure you have all noticed, I have been slacking. First it was a week spent hiking the trails and mountains of New Hampshire with evenings spent in the hot tub watching the sun go down or snuggled on a couch in front of the fire, reading with my hubby. Then I just got lazy. But I'm back!!! What an eventful time my garden had while I was away!
First off, as you can see from the picture, it is not the nasturtiums that are trying to take over the world, now its the squash. And mine seem to be being as promiscuous as Amy's are. I thought I had planted several yellow squash and several pattypan squash. I just found baby pattypans today. All the other ones seem to be green though.... Oh well, I like green squash just as much. Though I'm not actually sure if it is still considered squash, or if now I'm supposed to call it zucchini. I'll have to look up what the distinction is. Next year though I am only going to put in 2 or 3 squash plants. I need room for my cucumbers! (of course I say that, and yet somehow I will end up with just as many next year... I wonder where I will squeeze in the cukes!)
The nasturtiums have suffered a little bit in the heat, but I'm keeping them clipped back and I am guessing that they will continue for the summer, and as it goes back to being cool, will flourish again. They are still putting out enough flowers that with the butterfly bush I can keep a vase of flowers on the counter most days, that is if the cats don't decide that I put the flowers there solely for their entertainment and enjoyment while we are at work.
I had to pull a few things out. As I was saying, the squash are trying to take over, so I had to replant all the flowers that I had carefully put in their second little bed, in front of the main bed so they wouldn't get squished out. Oh well, now I know that when I build my raised beds that there will have to be a low section in the back so the beans can have as much climbing room as possible, a high section in the middle so the squash have a place of their own, and a low bed in the front so the flowers can still shine.
The flowers didn't go to waste though. I moved them over to the pots and beds that I had pulled lettuce out of. The plants had given me 2 good months of fresh lettuce daily, and it is my own fault that I didn't keep up with my succession plantings so I could be eating it all summer. My chard is still doing okay, so I will have to enjoy that for a few weeks while I wait for more lettuce to come up.
In addition to having had squash for dinner a few nights now, we had a handful of green beans. YUM. Right now I am getting Vortex beans. One of my mom's contributions. They're great. They grow about 6" long so you have less ends to snap in order to get enough for dinner (if you don't know how to snap green beans you are forbidden to be a gardener...) The other kind I planted have the pretty pink/coral blooms that the package promised. I need to put a few more seeds of each in and we'll be eating those well into the fall as well.
We have also had lots of peppers. I either chop them up and throw them on salads, or saute them with some onions and use them as quesadilla filling. Soon I'll be making fresh salsa from my own tomatoes to put on top!
So far, so good. I'm going to have to figure out how to make things a little more productive if I plan to get a family's worth of veggies out of the garden, but for being only the 3rd year, I'm really happy with production. Now that it is finally warm maybe we will be getting enough produce that I will only need to be getting fruit at the market!