Tuesday, October 13, 2009

DIY Fence Idea

I was in Williamsburg this past weekend and saw this fantastic little decorative DIY fence.

cool fence for garden in williamsburg

It's just made from twigs and small branches. It's very cute, and I bet if you made it a little taller, it would keep out rabbits (and Pugs) too.

Here's a little closer view for your inspiration ... The twigs are pressure set - no glue or nails required!

cool fence for garden in williamsburg

I don't know how many tomato plants they have piled up on each other in this section of the garden, but I would NOT want to be the one going in there to harvest!

huge tomatoes in williamsburg

Maybe I'll build a scaled-down version of this fence next year to keep the squirrels out of my seed beds!

fence in williamsburg

Innovative method of creating tee-pee trellises from sticks and string.

crops in williamsburg

Their gardens were very tidy. I was surprised that they have so many crops still growing. Mine have all died back for the Winter!

garden in williamsburg

At least their perennials were unruly, just like mine!

perennials in williamsburg

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

"Sun-Dried" Tomatoes

If you visit the farmer's market in October, you can get a big box of tomatoes for just $8! The box WAS full when we bought it.

box of roma tomatoes

We decided to dry these romas up for use throughout the Winter. So, we hauled the ronco dryer out of the garage and put it to use. We bought our "ronco" for just $15 at a yard sale about 10 years ago. It can dehydrate just about anything.

ronco drying tomatoes

It took three days to dehydrate 5 racks of tomatoes. We then packed them up using our vacuum sealer. It looks a lot like beef jerky!

vacuum sealed sun dried tomatoes

We're not sure what all we will use these for, so if you have some recipe suggestions, let me hear them!