What a Weekend!

It all started with these garlic bulbs.  With the garlic I planted a couple weeks ago and these, I now have about 90 cloves planted.  This is my first attempt at growing it and I may have gone a little overboard, but I am always increasing the magnitude of my gardening undertakings, so I am not overwhelmed.  Here is what I planted:

"Early Purple Italian" 21 cloves

"German Extra Hardy" 16 cloves

"German Red" 14 cloves & "Inchelim Red" 21 cloves.

I planted them according to the instructions that Seed Savers Exchange was so kind to include with my purchase.  The only guideline that I didn't follow was the time to plant.  They said to plant after the first light frost, but I don't know what I am always doing everything single day,  so I may have jumped the gun and little.   No big deal.  It's been getting pretty cool at night and I would not be surprised if we get frost in the next couple weeks. 

So, yeah.  I had to make room for all this garlic, I had to bite the bullet and rip out my cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers. Let's just say it right now,  it was a great year for gardening!  I got more peppers than I ever remember getting, and I pickled all the hots.  I got about 22 pints all together off of 12 plants.  Not bad in my book.

Sorry for the meal picture, I know that I said that these types of pictures are for a different social networking site, but it is the only photo I had of my canned peppers from today.  That was the first pepper that I took out of a jar, and it looked so good in had to capture it.  Let me tell you, in my slightly biased opinion, these were the best pickled peppers I have ever had.

I simmered these jalapeño and cherry peppers for 5 minutes ever so slightly that it almost looked like they weren't even bubbling at all.  I used a solution of 3 parts vinegar 1 part water and crushed some garlic in there with them.  The recipe was from allrecipes.com.  

I almost forgot to mention, I covered my garlic beds in straw about 8 inches deep.  Now my backyard looks like a hayloft.  I have a lot of time and money invested in this garden and I have to protect it.  I have to protect my way of life.