Fall has snuck up on me. All through August and September I had a list of garden chores in the back of my mind, things I wanted to get done before October. Even so it seemed very far away until late Friday night, when it suddenly hit me that Monday would be October 1st. That meant my seed garlic would be arriving in the mail this week and probably the flower bulbs I ordered many months ago too. There were beds to be cleared and bales of straw to procure and cold frames to build.
Saturday was a gloomy day, the perfect kind of day for an indoor project. We spent the better part of the day working on two big cold frames. We made them 4 feet square to fit over the existing garden beds.
We’ll put them over two of the beds where I have my fall greens planted. With any luck we should have mustard greens, tatsoi, chard, spinach, lettuce, and kale to eat well into the winter.
Today the rain let up long enough for me to spend a couple hours clearing out some of the beds. The tomatillos were still going strong, but at this point there are more tomatillos than I know what to do with squirreled away in the freezer and I need some place to put all the garlic that will be arriving shortly. I carted two wheelbarrow loads of tomatillo plants and sunflowers and squash vines off to the compost. Now I have two big beds cleared out for the garlic, and I just need to work some compost in and they’ll be ready for planting.
forgottenpickles.com 
Love your blog name!
Love the cold frames – something I’ve wanted to do for a while, now, but haven’t gotten to!
When do you usually plant your garlic?
I’ll probably plant the garlic around mid-October. I think last year I planted it a little too early, and it kept growing and was already poking up through the straw in November. (Although with such a weird winter last year I don’t know when the right time would have been!)
Productive weekend! Good for you. I keep asking myself where did July and August go? And now it’s October.
Thanks! I know how you feel. The summer just flew right by, and I’m sure the fall will too!
I’ve got the garlic to plant next weekend only I’m nowhere near as ready as you! Still need to put soil in the new beds and it’s Thanksgiving here too – which means turkey for 17! Wish me luck!
Sounds like you’re going to have a busy month! Good luck!
Sounds like you’ve got a good amount of veg for the winter months. Hope you have a good season. I need to get out and buy my garlic last year – used cloves from the year before last year and it didn’t work terribly well, so I’ve already run out of garlic for this winter onwards. I won’t make that mistake again!
I don’t have nearly enough garlic to get me through this winter either. I hope you have better luck this time around!
Thank you!
I have a bit of work to do myself – I’m envious of your cold frames – I need to make some of those!
Next time you go “shopping” at the dump, keep your eye out for some old windows!
yes, good idea – thanks so much!
Like others, I’m also envious of your cold frame! Don’t worry about the months marching on… you’re still way ahead of me!
I am in such need of a productive weekend. Need to put up wire to keep the rabbits out and till and plant!