Harvests

We had delicious time standing in the garden eating peas. Molly loved to practice her standing balance and pull a pea pod off the vine. She preferred to open the pods and eat each individual pea—unfortunately her fine motor skill coordination isn't as refined as she'd like it to be and some would inevitably end up on the ground. No problem though she'll eat them from there too.

The very first ripe peas went to our Joy School group. Several of the kids—Thomas and Evan—took a keen interest in checking up on the garden every time they came to our house. I had hoped to reward them each with one pea pod, but no luck, they got the idea and soon devoured everything that had any size to it at all. But their exuberance was wonderful.

We had our friends the Howells over and compared notes on our small gardens. Neither had ever grown peas, so we took them out and introduced them. Amanda really liked the fresh garden peas, but Brandon, a true Carolinian (i.e. Southern) complained that they were too crisp and crunchy. He admitted to preferring his vegetables mushy—even wanting to send back the "uncooked" vegetables that you get at expensive restaurants.

The hot weather came early this year and we only got to fully enjoy the first of my three successive plantings of peas. We got about half of the second bunch. The plants in the thrid planting didn't do much at all. So, next year I think I'll put more squres into the first planting. Despite Mel's warnings, I think it's hard to have too many peas.

These sugar snap peas were fantasic. We even had a few that we chopped up and added to two suppers. The pods were delicious!