How does your garden grow?

Ever since Justin and I got married (7 years ago, in case you missed the last post), we have had a garden in the summer.  They started out small: a few tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers, and things grew (no pun intended) from there.  We've tried all sorts of things, but we generally stick with the basics.  In our red clay, some things just won't grow.  (Like my beloved purple hulls.:( ) Some years we've had good results, some years not so much.  We have been very fortunate this year, in that we've gotten plenty of rain along with ample sunshine, and we've had a pretty awesome harvest this year.  By no means are we Doomsday Preppers, nor are we overly concerned with that zombie apocalypse the kids are talking about these days.  We just think it's kind of a smart idea, for a lot of reasons.  We know where our food comes from and what is (and isn't) in it.  We can pick things when they're ripe and ready.  We can put up what can't immediately eat for later.  The list goes on.  We've been very blessed with plenty of veggies this year, so we've been able to share the extras with family and friends, which we love to do.  It's also great for trading: salsa for berries to make jelly, cucumbers for pickles (we've not had much luck making our own).  Plus, homegrown and homemade stuff just tastes better than the stuff you find at the grocery store.  We have fresh eggs every day, our beef traveled less than 5 miles round trip before it got to our freezer, the girls love their "deer meat" as much as we do, and we make our own sausage that, in my opinion, is better than any you could buy at the store.  I would encourage anyone who doesn't grow or raise at least some of their own food to try it.  It is a lot of work, but the benefits are totally worth it! Here are a few pics from this year:

Getting the ground ready!  Every year he says we're going to downsize, every year he lies. ;)

This pic was taken at the beginning of June.  Our tomato plants were looking great before they turned into a jungle!  Justin is about 6' tall, so this shows how big they were at the time.

These last two pictures were taken yesterday.  Even after the hail storm last week, we were still able to pick 5 gallons of tomatoes, several quarts of peppers, cucumbers, and a monster zucchini which will soon be turned into several loaves of zucchini bread!  Tomorrow we'll be making salsa and chow chow, and maybe just canning some stewed tomatoes if I can convince the hubby.