Christmas In Summertime

Having a garden at this time of year is a lot like having an advent calendar. Every day, there's a new surprise and treat waiting for me. It's not quite the wealth of riches that we'll have in a month or so, when we're drowning in zucchini and tomatoes, but in a lot of ways it's even more fun, because I never know quite what I'm going to find when I go outside and look.

A week ago, everything was just barely starting to bloom. There were buds on our snapdragons and tiny green berries on the blueberry bushes, but that was about it. Last Tuesday there were three or four edible blueberries, and one yellow squash about the size of my thumbnail. By Thursday the snapdragons were in full bloom (and they're absolutely gorgeous - dark green/almost black leaves, and deep burgundy flowers), and the tomato plants were covered with tiny green fruit. Saturday the peas were covered in blossoms, and this morning there were peapods almost big enough to eat, and tiny heads on one of the broccoli.

This is half the fun of having a garden. Yes, there's the tastiness of the end products, and the sense of accomplishment, but, for me at least, there's a lot of fun just in watching everything grow and unfold. It's part holiday present, and part scavenger hunt, and part unexpected packages in the mail, and part time-lapse photography - I swear to all I hold holy that there were no pods on the peas 24 hours ago, and today the plants were covered with tiny pods almost an inch long.

If that's not magic, I don't know what is.....