September 12, 2009: Tomatoes, Tomatoes, Tomatoes...When Will It Stop?

Honestly, I have tomatoes coming out of my ears.  I've canned salsa, sauce, chili sauce, ketchup, juice, pasta sauce, pizza sauce.  I've eaten tomato sandwiches, made tomato soup, put tomatoes in every salad.  I've given tomatoes to neighbors and friends and family and strangers.  I had to put boxes of canned tomato products under the bed when I ran out of room in the kitchen and laundry rooms.  I have harvested over 300 pounds of tomatoes, and that's not counting a bunch I've given to my neighbor without weighing.  Thank heavens I had to pull up 8 of my tomato plants, due to early blight.  And it's not going to stop for at least another month. I'd bet there are easily another hundred pounds or more on the vines.   If they don't freeze around October 15th, they will have to be uprooted to clean up the beds, then we'll be leaving for Arizona on the 18th.














And those are just some of the indeterminate tomatoes!  Believe me, there are a lot I didn't photograph.

18 comments:

  1. I envy your tomato excess. How are you going to bring all those jars down to AZ? I suppose you brought some tomato starts up from AZ and you should bring the fruits down.

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  2. Well, at least you found all those extra jars in the attic (crawl space...wherever) this year!!

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  3. ha granny! you're like bubba from forrest gump but with tomatoes instead of shrimp...

    tomater sauce, tomater sandwiches, tomater salad, friiied tomatoes... (hehe)

    ps make sure you get some pampering for grandparent's day tomorrow!

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  4. Daphne, at first we decided to take the car, which meant maybe a couple of boxes of canned goods. Now Mr. H thinks we'll take the pickup, so I can take quite a bit with me. He'll change his mind a few times between now and then.

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    Ribbit, also my son bought me three dozen, and my neighbor gave me a couple dozen. I actually have some jars left to fill!

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    Kelli Ann, like I was sayin', tomatoes is the fruit of the garden. You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey's uh, tomato-kabobs, tomato creole, tomato gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's cucumbers and tomatoes, onions and tomatoes, lettuce and tomatoes, peppered tomatoes, tomato soup, tomato stew, tomato salad, tomatoes and potatoes, tomato burger, tomato sandwich. That- that's about it.

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  5. HA!!!! i'm in tears laughing over here. you are TOO FUNNY! that was great. =)

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  6. Great photos! Tell the truth now....do you grow tomatoes again in AZ??? LOL, I might be tempted...

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  7. Ha AG....too funny!! We decided the other day that we will definitely plant less tomatoes next year. The only problem with that is--I will see a new kind and want to 'try' it! That's how we ended up with so many this year.

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  8. Erin, good heavens, no! In AZ I'll just have a tiny 3'x3' garden for some lettuce, spinach, carrots and radishes. I have a lot of land down there, but with very poor soil. If I had started a garden area five years ago, I might have made something of it. Now I'm too old and too tired. One garden is enough, I'll rest my body in the winter.

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    That's my problem, MissyM. I was going to plant one of each variety, and I had 15 varieties started. Then I lost some seedlings, and some of the others didn't look like they were going to survive, so I bought another dozen plants of three different varieties...and almost everything lived! I ended up with around two dozen plants! I did lose 8 to early blight, but not before I got a pretty good crop from them. I'll probably plant 10-12 next year, just because I want to try some other varieties plus grow my favorites from this year.

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  9. You are so lucky! I lost all of mine to late blight.

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  10. Jen, I know. so many did lose theirs this year...I wish I could share!

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  11. Mine, too....I'm about gardened out! I made 9 pints of salsa today, and it was more work than I thought. Oh! and that relish was a pain in the butt, too!

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  12. Hurry up and get to Arizona so I can STEAL some of your tomatoes, lucky lucky gal.

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  13. Has it really been almost a year already? I remember your trek from Arizona with the tomato and pepper seedlings and babying them until you could get them in the ground. It's obvious the plants appreciated all your hard work.

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  14. You have one heck of a green thumb A.G.!

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  15. EG, I loved making the relish, it was so easy. Don't you use a food processor to chop all the veggies? It's a real time saver. If I had to chop by hand, I just wouldn't do it, and the old hand cranked food chopper is so messy when all the juices run out the back end of it.

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    Sue...so are you going to sneak into my WA garden and steal them, or do you actually think I'm going to take them to AZ? Well, I just might take a few to AZ to ripen there. I wish you would steal them. All of them. Of course, by December I'll be lusting for them again.

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    Cheryl, actually the only AZ tomatoes that survived were the two Tumbling Toms, and I don't like them at all (Mr. H says they taste fine to him). And the four surviving pepper plants are big and pretty, but haven't yielded the beautiful peppers that the WA planted ones have. They've had a lot of peppers on them, but very small ones. The same variety, planted here in April, have normal sized peppers. I do wish I could take my potted jalapeno south with me, but I doubt I'll have room for it. If I take anything, it would be the rosemary. I've lost the last two due to freezing, so I'd sure like to protect this one.

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    Kelly, I'm almost to the point of wishing my thumb weren't quite so green. But as many successes as I have in gardening, I also have some failures. My fall lettuce didn't germinate, I can't seem to grow a radish on a bet, and my spring peas were a real bust.

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  16. LOL! Honestly, I can't imagine trying to deal with 300 lbs of tomatoes. I'd probably rent a stall at the Farmer's Market, or make a deal with one of the vendors. The neighbors would probably hide if they saw me coming with more tomatoes.

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  17. SB, I've canned about 98 pints of tomato products (ketchup, sauce, salsa, etc), eaten a lot and given a lot away. I've also made juice out of most of the cherry and grape tomatoes. It's been fine up until now, but I really don't need any more!

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  18. I wish you were closer. I would take some off your hands! Another tomato bust year here. When I was living and gardening in sunny central Washington, I used to feel the same way (overwhelmed)by the huge tomato harvests. It was a good problem to have though.

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