Peach Blossoms and Pigtails

Apple blossoms

February in Phoenix means spring! Our trees sprouted knobby buds a few weeks ago, and now the golden dorset apple and mid-pride peach are blooming with abandon. Jeremy bought new apple trees to line the western fence and (hopefully) provide somewhat of a hedge between us and our neighbors. Their bright new leaves are thrusting from the single-stick trunks, and a couple promise a few flowers.

First peach buds (Feb. 8th)

 Blooms! (Feb. 11th)

Lydia peeking 'round the peach tree

 Josiah wanted a picture with the peach blossoms (Feb. 17th)

 17th

17th

 The big peach tree today (22nd)

As you can see above, Jeremy pruned the established peach and apple trees fairly severely. We're still hoping for a good number of peaches from this beauty--but we'll see.

Abby and Lydia in the "party dresses" from Great-grandma Golda

Last weekend we tore out our huge broccoli plants--most of the main heads/florets we'd already eaten, and the side sprigs were starting to flower. What the kids didn't eat in the excavation process, we roasted and ate with a chicken dinner this past week.

Mature broccoli plant

Our broccoli was noticeably darker green than the stuff I buy at the grocery store--with bigger, looser florets, but smaller overall heads. (Some were individual-floret plants and didn't produce heads anyway.) Josiah has asked about the broccoli a couple times this week. He misses the fun of tearing off a leaf to chew as he rides by on his bike. All three regularly clamored for "flowers" when I harvested a crop for supper's salad or stir fry.

 The western garden bed before we tore out the winter crop and planted the summer garden--broccoli at the far end, beats and kale in between, and lettuce close up

 Overgrown broccoli!

Enthusiastic broccoli-eater

Salad from the garden!

But with the demise of the broccoli comes the excitement of new seedlings. Our much-beloved local nursery (Baker) closed down last month. The darn real estate market drove up the value for its land, and the original founder's daughters sold. Now we'll just have an ugly, expensive gated community where the lovely old nursery used to be. Oh well.

Pomegranate tree's new leaves

Anyway, we visited a couple other nurseries (not as good as the old) and bought vegetables and herbs to plant. Jeremy started cucumbers and squash from seed, too. So now we have tomatoes, zucchini, Swiss chard, Persian and Armenian and straight eight cucumbers, crookneck squash, watermelon, "fooled-you" jalapenos (without the heat), and bell peppers in our raised beds. I'm probably forgetting a few others. We still have the herbs in containers, ready to go into the ground--but we have to figure out where to put my herb garden.

We left the lettuce and onions and garlic from the winter garden. The former is still producing nicely, and the latter aren't mature yet. Nematodes destroyed our beet crop--they were only good for greens this year. I don't have any pictures of the summer garden yet.

Oh, have I mentioned our huge lemons?

We've been supplying friends and family and visitors for months, and still we have plenty on both trees (one is a Meyer lemon). The kids play "lemon-ball" and pick low-lying fruit. Josiah has attempted to pick from upper branches by climbing atop the coupe car--precarious and disallowed by the parents. My current favorite use of lemons is in hummus. This is the best hummus recipe I've found--it's closest to the wonderful stuff I grew up on in Dubai! And it uses a full 1/2 cup of lemon juice. Most "lemon" baked goods only call for some zest and a few tablespoons.

Some of them rounded out like grapefruit!

Josiah gave them a good cleaning

And pigtails? No, they don't have anything to do with the state of the garden. But with lengthening hair and a higher tolerance for hairbands, the girls kept pigtails in for a while the other day! I have high hopes of "doing" their hair properly someday soon. Maybe we'll let Aunt Hannah work on it when she's here in April. :)

 Abby

 Lydia

Aren't they just the cutest?