… About the Appearance of the Giant Zucchini

Cautious as always, Leo isn’t sure what to think.

Pete’s not afraid of it!

Otis, as always, just doesn’t care.

The plight of our squash has been well documented up to this point, especially the scourge of the powdery mildew. So you’re probably surprised to see this giant zucchini — the cats certainly were! I used them in the photos so you could get an idea of how big this thing is.

Maybe it was a gift from Mother Nature to apologize for her part in the recent shed incident. Or maybe it was a reward from the plants for the tender loving care we give them, milk bath and all.

Or maybe it appeared on our back porch, already picked and in a bag, because it was grown by some friends and not us! (Thanks, Keith and Jeffrey — for the zucchini, for reading the blog and for wanting to be a part of it!) Keith said this was one of those “surprise” zucchini that you don’t know is growing and then it’s just there one day. And if you’ve never met our cats they are NOT small, so yes, this is huge! It was fun to try to get them next to it — when Leo first saw it he ran away (he’s our scaredy cat).

Now that it’s done being a prop, it can be dinner (and lunch, and dinner, and…). I’ll caramelize some onions, add this and some sauce (maybe homemade tomato sauce, if I get around to making some) add some cheese and toss it with some pasta. Yum! Or maybe I’ll fix it with some of the awesome pesto Rob made with our basil that we’ve been enjoying. We may have some to share when we make the next batch — the first batch made enough for us to have a tub of it in the fridge and another one in the freezer (it freezes well). Let us know if you’d be interested in having some.

As for our garden, the windowsill above our sink stays full with tomatoes and we’ve had enough to share as well. We didn’t pick the green ones — they were knocked down by the storm and are probably too green to ripen but we’re going to give them a few days. We found one under a panel of the shed just yesterday, and somehow it wasn’t even bruised. And we’re still harvesting lots and lots of lettuce but I didn’t snap a pic because I figured you’ve seen enough by now.

Speaking of the shed and storm, we realized we’re missing one thing: the padlock that was on the shed. It’s one of those heavy-duty ones that’s not supposed to rust when you use it outside, so it’s got some weight to it. We’ve looked through the shed debris and all over the yard. We were afraid we’d find it with the lawnmower but we mowed today and never ran across it. (The mower and trimmer that were in the shed still work fine — hooray!) We just can’t believe the lock would have traveled that far, so it’s weird that we can’t find it.

And the garden is bouncing back — the plants that fell over and had to be propped back up seem to be OK (so far). So all that’s left is to get a new shed…

Our makeshift “shack” is holding up well, as is the garden.