Been a While; Random Garden Pics

Its been a while since I've posted, although I'm sure my blog is rarely traveled, so all should be forgiven. Anyway, I've been doing more portraiture lately of my family and I haven't yet grown comfortable posting their pics in a public forum. I'm sure that will wane as time goes by, but haven't quite reached that comfort level yet. So because of that, haven't been able to blog too much, but thought I'd throw a few random pics out there that I've taken.

My Garden

I'm not too much of an avid gardener, but we do have some plants. Living in Houston, in the actual city, we don't have a whole lot of land to do much with. But its enough to plant some things and relax in. Its been a work in progress for quite a while. We do grow a few veggies and fruit though and there is nothing like fresh fruit/veggies. Nothing like it! My favorite is our long dead strawberry plant. Unfortunately, it didn't produce a whole lot of fruit, usually just a couple a season! And more often than not, the possums ate them right when they'd be ripe. We didn't have this problem for the first few years but I guess they realized we grew food. So, as of now, we have a banana tree that produces a really good amount of bananas, a tomato plant, and a bell pepper plant.

Our banana tree, pictured to the left produces a lot of fruit. In fact this tree is like a weed. I don't think we could get rid of it if we wanted to. We planted this tree probably about 4 or 5 years ago. It was a single stalk, almost dead that we got from our neighbors when they sold their lot to a developer. This tree got big, then the Hurricane swept through Houston and although it missed up, the wind was enough to knock our fence over, on top of the banana tree. So we were left with a few small stumps. Now, the tree is probably well over 35 feet and consists of no fewer than 10 "trunks." Its not really a tree, doesn't have a trunk per se, but basically the "trunk" is made up a layers and layers of leaf growth and it gets thicker and thicker. I honestly don't think you can get rid of these!

Unfortunately, I don't have a pic of my favorite tree. Maybe I'll add it on a later post. Its not fruit producing, I don't even know what kind of tree it is. Its my favorite because it was a plant we received when my wife was in the hospital delivering our daughter. it was a small, potted plant, probably about 6 inches tall. We planted this tree in one area, it almost died a few years ago, so I transplanted it to another area, gave it new soil and within 6 years, it has gotten to be about 30 feet tall. Truly a beautiful tree.

Another favorite is our bell pepper plant. This plant is low maintenance, produces a good amount of peppers, and seems like it produces nearly year round here in Houston! Some times of the year are certainly more bountiful, but it always seems like it has a couple of peppers at least. We have so many peppers we usually give a lot away. But its great to cook with. My daughter will even eat it straight off the vine. The stuff you get in the store is so bland. You don't realize it until you grow your own food. Store bought peppers are fairly tasteless, does have a small hint of flavor but nothing impressive. These peppers are juicy and sweet. Great to cook with of course. And it packs a crunch.

Unpictured is my daughter's tomato plant. She takes care of it and planted it. Its simply in a pot and produces a couple of tomatoes a year. She will eat these right off the vine. She absolutely loves tomatoes and even more so off the vine. I love the smell of them, very sweet. I'm not a tomato fan myself so I don't usually eat these. But they smell delicious.

Anyway, thought I'd throw some random gardening pics in since I didn't have much else to offer. Still getting better with teh camera but far from being proficient. I just picked up a 430EX Canon flash last week and I love it. But its something else to learn too, but that's the fun of it. Hopefully I'll have more material soon, for the audience that doesn't exist.