Garden Progress

We are well and truly into the hot weather now, and the plants are growing. Sometimes they grow several inches overnight. The beans are climbing the trellis, and the apples are already falling from the tree, which means I will be in the kitchen putting up applesauce pretty soon. I already put up the golden plums, and will get the puree out of the freezer and make jam when the weather is cooler.Here's a view of what the spouse calls 'The Back Forty'. It was an unused area in back of the playhouse that used to have a woodpile on it. It gets a lot of sun so we are growing winter squashes back there. I am trying tomatoes in a new location, right up against the white wall of the playhouse, and so far they are doing fine:

We went to the fireworks in Benicia last night and it was great fun. We asked the policeman if it was ok to set up our chairs right on the sidewalk next to the Bay, and it was. We soon found out why there weren't many people in that location yet : the wind off the Bay was freezing and included spray. Oh well, we endured and enjoyed it. The fireworks were right over our head, really huge bursts of fabulous color. I love sitting right under the blast, because the sparks fall down around you and it is like that scene inside the alien ship in Independence Day - a big empty sphere with sparkles all around. The crowd was friendly and funny. After one particularly huge fireball of firework beauty, some guy in a group of young people next to us shouted, "Up yours, England!!" Ah, the Glorious 4th!