Hugel Update (Wow)

So, uh, our hugel has turned into what I now call The Food Jungle. Don't believe me? Check this out:

Every single day I come back to the house with armfuls of yellow squashes, zucchini, and cucumbers. Some days I have a butternut squash and some tomatoes. It's crazy. 

So basically this means we've been eating a lot of squash and cukes. Nbd here, though. We've found some great recipes and since we're vegetarians, this is saving us a lot on groceries! 

Last week I made some kosher dill pickles from some of our cucumbers. I've made cucumber sandwiches and Benedictine for crackers and bread. Husband has made some amazing meals that are squash-heavy (Classic Calabacitas being one of our favorites!). 

All in all, we are very grateful to our mighty hugel for providing us with so much food. We've never gotten this much food out of a garden before and we've tried for years! Even when I am picking armloads of vegetables, I can see all of the things that will be pickable the next day. 

Long live the hugel! 

All Hail Our Mighty Hugel!

Wow. So, hugel update: the hugel is master of gardens. You may remember the pictures from when we first built our burial mound...uh, I mean hugelkultur. Now look at it!

Here lies our ancient king. Kidding, kidding...

Just look at it!

We aren't pulling the grasses up, because they are holding in the soil on the mound. These plants are getting enormous. Check it out! 

...and that's with my hand slightly closer to the camera!

Mr. Gnomey is being dwarfed by the plants. Heh.
(Don't even act like I don't know the difference between gnomes and dwarves. I'm just using some fanciful language.)

Plant fight! Intense!

So many flowers!

We planted three tiny tomato sprouts that we grew from seeds into the east side of the hugel, just to see how well they would do. Here are some small tomato plants we sprouted from seed that we planted in the normal old non-hugel ground:

There, in the center of the tomato cage. =/

Now look at them in the hugel:

Woah.

These were started from the same seeds at the same time, planted at the same time, and basically everything is the same except the first picture is in the ground and the second is in the hugelkultur. !!

So there you have it. I'm convinced. Hugel > normal ol' dumb ol' flat ground. Anyone who has been using the hugel method, I would love to hear about your progress!

Shop News from Annaliese's Emporium and Life Stuff from Annaliese!

Hey there!

I have a bunch of fun stuff going on with my shop right now! I have been adding new items, one of which are bow tie pasta hair bows, which are buy three get the fourth one free. You pick the color and I'll make 'em for you!

These are great for party favors! I'm actually going to be making some for Miss G's birthday party, which is coming up in the next couple of weeks!

How are my kids getting so old?? Eek! 

Here is a sneak peek at the new dolls that will be in my shop soon! If you follow me on Instagram, you might have seen these:

I love their cute little faces!

They will be in the shop very sooooonnnn!!!

I've been making a few fun Etsy treasuries you might check out, too.

And our family has been really working hard on our yards and garden, and spending as much time outside as possible in this nice spring weather. We have lots of little green sprouts coming up in our starter trays and containers inside and they should be ready to plant outside soon! We're also building a hugelkultur garden and we planted two apple trees! I'm hoping for a mini food forest at our house someday. ^_^

Not a burial mound. A hugel!

Even though we are in the middle of a city, I'm trying to make our backyard a bit of a lush oasis. The privacy fence helps. :) We should soon have some exciting news about our outdoor adventures! 

Lots of fun stuff going on around here. I hope everyone is getting some warmer weather, too!