First Fruits (and Leaves and Roots): the Garden in June

First strawberry of the season!

As I was weeding, I spotted it: the first ripe strawberry of the season. I picked it, then had a brief internal argument with myself about whether I should just eat it on the spot or share it with Justin and Junie. 

Generosity won out. I ran inside to show what I had found, then sliced it in thirds so we could all enjoy that first delicious taste of summer. 

And now, the strawberries are ripening at a fast pace, much to everyone's delight. They're big, juicy, and beautiful! It amazes me that a bed that started out the season looking like this:

The strawberry bed in May

Has blossomed into this:

The strawberry bed in June

And if that amount of growth amazes you, take a look at my greens bed before I planted anything:

The greens bed in early spring

And compare it to this green, leafy goodness:

The greens bed in June

We've been enjoying plenty of fresh salads as I thin the lettuce. We've also pulled up a rainbow of beautiful radishes. And just last night I made a stir fry with bok choi and garlic scapes. So much to be excited about in the garden this time of year!

 

bok choi and garlic scapes!

Staying warm when it's colder than the South Pole

Yikes!

When the forecasted HIGH for the day is -11 and your thermometer reads -20 at 8 AM, you know it's gonna be a cold day. How cold? Colder than the South Pole, it turns out (a balmy -11). Cold winters are nothing new to the Midwest, but this is quite the extreme! To prepare for this arctic blast, we worked on buttoning up the house this weekend as best we could. 

When in doubt, put on more hats. 

I finished shrinkwrapping all our windows (a project I started in November) and stuffed insulation under our drafty dining room window seat. 

Nice shelving space, but it's uninsulated and juts out into open air, so it's pretty drafty!

Justin sealed up the frames of our outside doors and installed door sweeps; this made a big difference almost immediately! I knew those doors were drafty, but didn't realize how much. 

We then made major headway on insulating the attic (Look how far we've come!). Last spring, we installed insulation baffles and fiberglass batts. We had picked up foil-faced foam a while back and we wanted to wait to finish replacing the attic floor before we finished the walls. But we knew these would make a big difference in keeping the house warm, so Justin worked hard to get them all hung before the cold settled in.

Starting to install foil-faced foam 

Foam installation nearly complete. Welcome to our spaceship! 

With the foam in place, our unheated attic was comfortably warm yesterday. As was the rest of our house. I was even able to turn the thermostat down and have it stay toasty--so our efforts were a success!