Fall garden envy

Yesterday was the first Saturday of the month, which means it was time for the informal gathering of gardeners at Schlafly Gardenworks. It's always so inspirational to visit this well-tended urban edibles garden, but I'm wondering if maybe I shouldn't have gone. So jealous!

It was bad enough seeing their quite lush summer garden while mine struggled with the heat and not enough water, but at least I could tell myself that they had more time to spend and were able to turn on the sprinklers more often. Now though, what's my excuse?

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I should be able to have a fall garden as lush, green, and wonderful as this one -- albeit on a smaller scale. I didn't get my fall edibles started early enough though it seems.

Let's take a look at the fantastic plants in this garden, as you don't want to see mine right now:

I jazzed up some of the photos that I wasn't too excited about:

But some of them were pretty jazzy already:

Oh, to be able to plant on a larger scale!

Such beauty! The fact that these were being grown to be eaten doesn't exclude the fact that these are some fascinating, stunning plants:

What's better than looking at fantastic edibles? Eating them! Nolan prepared a "green drink" for us to try:

Better than juicing, pulverizing the fresh-from-the-garden ingredients in a blender (a really nice, strong one) gives you all of the available nutrients and fiber:

Some of the gardeners wished he wouldn't have put so much ice into it on this cold morning, but the blender creates quite a bit of heat and Nolan didn't want the contents to cook at all -- heat destroys many of the nutrients.

It could have used a little more flavor (somebody commented that they wished they had thrown in a few apples), but you can almost feel the good stuff coursing through your veins!

What else did this morning gathering have to offer?

There were used hops to take for compost piles:

And a load of aged manure arrived and was quickly bagged up and loaded up into cars and trucks:

Even though it's all about the eating in this garden, for me the masses of healthy, happy plants are just as exciting. What a nice way to spend a morning!

click for larger

Schlafly Gardenworks will be having their Fall gardening event on October 20. Always a good night of garden talk!

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