Harvest Helpers

Back when I was working in Toronto, doing a lot of packaging design in my graphic design career, I worked on a product by Bernardin called "Harvest Helpers." I came up with a bunch of wordmarks for them, and I can't even recall if they actually used one of them! Anyway, I've got different harvest helpers in m life now....

... like my beloved chicken Charlotte, who loves to sit on my shoulder and snuggle! She also looks to me to rescue her when she's being pursued by an overly-randy rooster. Wait, I think "overly-randy rooster" is redundant!

We were supposed to get a frost last night (and we did) so we brought in all our squash, pumpkins, potatoes, tomatoes and peppers. I got lots of pumpkins, including white ones called "Lumina." 

We got a couple of wheelbarrow loads full of these beautiues. The greyish one on the right is a Grey Ghost squash, from seeds given to me by my friend Ronna. She grew some last year from seeds given to her by our mutual friend Sigrun. She even made an amazing garden birthday cake with some of the squash!

I accidentally pulled the stem off the squash in this pic, so I plan to eat it soon.

Here's my other harvest helper with some of the bounty!

We also dug up some the Yukon gold potatoes, and the red ones whose "breed" I forget! And I found some tomatillos lurking out there too.

(Note chicken butt sticking up near top of wheelbarrow!)

These year I tried growing red seeded citron, which is a heritage melon. 

Very pretty, but they aren't eaten raw. Traditionally they were used in citron preserves. My friend Eugene has promised me his secret family recipe!

I thought the vines were particularly pretty. That old carpet on the left is being used to mulch weeds.

Here's Gordon digging for taters. The chickens LOVE it when we garden. They run around snapping up the worms and other bugs we unearth.

A boy and his chickens. You can see Lord Gaga and Beaker in there. We fenced my vegetable garden this year, not to keep out the deer, but to keep out the dogs. My dogs are FIENDS for tomatoes. They don't care if they're green or red, unripe or bursting. They were decimating my tomato plants every summer, so I finally got fed up. Gordon and our friend Bruce put up a great fence. On the downside, I think I may have created a bunny sanctuary in there, but they do less damage than the dogs! Many a summer, we'd be looking for Tristan (or Sophie!) after putting him out for a bedtime pee. I'd take a flashlight down behind the barn, and find him happily inhaling tomatoes in the dark!

Gordon found some old kale in there, which he gave to the ducks.

 And here's my favourite chicken again. Ssssh, don't tell the others!

She's really sweet and will sit on my shoulder or lap for ages. She likes to be petted. 

Holding this pose is a good shoulder exercise! Excuse my filthy shirt, the result of the aforementioned potato digging.

The macro got a nice shot of her beak!

And I couldn't resist a picture of handsome Beaker...

Hope you're enjoying some autumn bounty, wherever you are!

And here's a lovely shot from the pumpkin harvest in 2009...

Yes, no shame. Not at all. I'm oh-so-classy!