We've had frost here in the southern Appalachians for the last few nights.
The summer garden is gone, the okra, peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes look so
sad. The sweet potatoes looked scorched over a week ago. This summers crop
was one of my best ever. 23 sweet potato plants survived and produced just
over 3 bushels, the largest being 7 pounds 1 ounce. Squash, tomatoes,
peppers were bountiful. Green beans and edamame were only fair. Weeds were
especially abundant due to the 2 truckloads of horse manure I think. The
fall garden is now in its' glory. The Florida broadleaf mustard is just
amazing, the leaves on some are 2 feet long and over a foot wide. The stems
are as big as my thumb and still tender. The turnips are the size of tennis
balls and very sweet. Carrots, collards and spinach will soon be ready. I
was gifted about 25 pounds of chestnuts, my hives gave me about 40 pounds of
honey. My fledgling blueberry enterprise produced almost 30 gallons. The
cider making crew will be here on Saturday. Life is good!

Sorry, don't mean to brag, I'm just feeling good about my endeavors this
year.

I hope your year was at least as good as mine,

Steve