"Yardin Garden"

With our garden in full swing, an update on the crops seems overdue.

Our spring planting of kale and collards still lingers, but has been a wonderful supplement to our green consumption. They are so hardy, we almost have to kill the plants to make room for our tomatoes.

Trying collards for the first time this year has been a nice surprise.

We were not sure how to use them, but Erik has made a great side dish with collards, red potatoes, red wine vinegar and Dijon mustard. The largest leaves also make awesome wraps!

For the third straight year, our tomato plants have been quite abundant, coming from our compost - amounting to a few hundred volunteer plants spring up when Erik turned the compost into the soil back in early March. They've had a slow start with the cool, rainy spring, but they have been getting out of control lately and ready for some support.

The back plot (one of six around the yard), holds more bountiful tomato plants and the squash varieties (also compost start-ups) have been taking over.

Erik found free bamboo on Craigslist and picked up as much as our Honda could hold...

paired it down to size...

while MJ looked on and played with the clippings...

and used them to hold up the tomato plants (right) while keeping the squash vines from invading. Eventually, they will snake their way up the bamboo wall! Stay posted for the first fruits of our summer planting - coming very soon.