Returning From the Beach

Clay and I just returned from a week's vacation to the Outer Banks in North Carolina. We had beautiful weather the whole week and warm, Caribbean blue water. We spent most of our time out on the beach getting toasty in the sun and cooling off in the water. Rick took some of us crabbing at the Roanoke Sound. We caught and released several small fellows. They had to be 5 in. across the shell to keep and we didn't net enough for dinner, but had fun trying. We also did some kayaking on the sound and on the ocean. We didn't have any spills this year and although I don't have and pictures, dad made it out in the ocean just in time to hang out with the dolphins swimming by. We went to Roanoke Island and toured the Elizabethan Gardens one morning. Minus the mosquitoes we were really impressed with the variety of plants and how well maintained the gardens were. Their most showy flowers were all of the Hydrangeas. We took several pictures that I may try to post at some point, but I thought this view of the boxwood edged flower beds, through the archway was a nice one.

Clay and I spent one day driving from Nags Head to the Hatteras Inlet and rode the ferry over to Ocracoke Island. We lucked out on the way back and caught a beautiful sunset from the ferry.

The garden was not too out of control when we returned, thanks to Clay's parents for checking on it for us a couple of times while we were gone. We had 5 large yellow squash to harvest, one zucchini (our poor zucchini plants are looking pitiful), and 10 cucumbers. The cucs are coming in great, but the plants look like they may not last long. We directly planted some seeds to have plants producing later in the season, but they didn't survive the long week of hot days with no rain. Although they don't exactly look very pretty in the picture, our best surprise when we got back, would be the potatoes. I was afraid that the potato beetles would take over while we were gone and they did a fine job trying (I probably picked off over 50 easily, I couldn't find any rubbing alcohol on hand so I used a cup with vinegar and it did the trick), but they didn't keep the potatoes from growing down below. We dug up one plant and found six tennis ball sized, red potatoes and a couple smaller ones. The roots still had several buds waiting to grow, so I think we will have a good crop to harvest later in the season.
Our last red cabbage was harvested while we were gone, I will have to try to plant those more spaced out next year to extend the season.
The corn silks are showing up, so we need to add some mineral oil to them asap, to help keep the worms out.
The tomato plants do have signs of the blight, but still look pretty good at this point. I've been trimming the bottom leaves that are looking spotty. There are tons of small green tomatoes, but I have noticed a few that appear to have the blossom end rot problem.
Peppers look ok - not a lot happening with them so far.
We have a ton of weeding to do tomorrow and some other general maintenance.