And, How About These?

Black Krim Heirloom Tomatoes

Come On Now, Aren't These Pretty?

I've spent hours already this morning tending the tomato section of my garden - 100 Heirlooms and while tending - lo and behold, I've got some sweet pretties to show you.

Great White, Lemon Boys and Valencia and this is just the beginning.

Planning for Fall Already

This fall, a friend and I will be venturing into the world of growing a gourmet garden here at the farm.

At the recommendation of a local Scottsdale Chef, I ordered some very French specialties such as Ficoide glaciale, aruguala roqueette sauvage, along with lettuce such as merveille des quatre saisons, goutte de sang and sucrine.

We can barely wait for cooler weather to seed these in the Gucci section of our garden here at Cactus Road Farm.

Beautiful Borage

One thing I know for sure - it's good to be back home. India was an intensely amazing place full of conflicts for my soul - beauty and color shadowed by gray and grief.

So, on a happy note, I thought I'd share the beauty of borage - an edible herb - flowers and all. I've got spots of it growing through our garden and have simply fallen in love with the beauty of this plant. It's like a delicate blue star.

Heading to the Place I Call Home

I'm spending a few last minutes, taking up restless time, at the Cyber Cafe across the street from Pie Vijay - the hotel we've been at the past week. In 1.5 hours we take another taxi ride to the Bangalore Airport and wait for 3 hours to board our flight bound for Frankfurt. After a few hours in Frankfurt, we head to Dallas for a second 10 hour flight. There we'll go through customs and catch our flight with is 2.5 hours (or so) headed for Phoenix.

I can hardly wait.

This trip has been good and hard. I'm trying to process all that I've taken in and in this moment not sure how to do that. Perhaps I'm conflicted in my soul because India's beauty is so conflicted - it seems - at least through my Western eyes.

Processing the culture, the food, the people and Jersey cows strolling down the street midst auto rickshaws and smokey buses. I'm not sure where to store that. They wander aimlessly toward the next heap of garbage trying to find anything to eat. Aren't cows supposed to be in fields of green?

Anyway, I'm tired and buzzed and just rambling and can't wait to be in the place I call home.

I'm a Little Absent From My Garden . . .

. . . and my home because I'm spending a tad bit of time in India. We arrived several days ago where my husband almost got killed by a bus (they drive crazy here) and I almost got us killed by an angry man with a monkey).We are here to see friends in Dehli and attend a wedding of one of our Indian daughters in Bangalore.

I'm attempting to blog this amazing experience over at my Lylah Blog - www.lylahledner.blogspot.com.  Fortunately, my son in law is taking care of the farm life. What a guy!

Interesting You Should Ask

I'm nuts for arugula and often crave it. It's common to find me going around my garden finding little baby arugula that's just ready for the pickings. It says, "eat me please."

For the past two plus years of gardening, the arugula I've planted has been this Mediterranean kind and today I'll seed Wild Arugula, Rustic and as soon as my order from Grow Italian where I'm expecting a three packets of certified organic Arugula and Arugula ortolani. Can't wait.

When the sun got a little too hot, my gardening partner and I came inside to sip some Apricot sun tea and evaluate our loot of European seeds for now and for the fall planting.

Prior to Anita coming to the farm, little Roman, his sister and I did a bit of outside watering. He probably did more than watering of himself than necessary. Had to strip the little guy down. He was so cute in that diaper and high tops I needed to run to get the camera.

Back to seeds. I just planted a stash of these yesterday and have a few more spots to fill. Did you know that gardening and looking at seeds can be addicting? My new thing is the French seeds. I've stalked French Gardening for the past year and today after a little prodding made my first order. Uh, more arugula and a few other amazing seeds.

In case you missed it - here's one of my prized possessions.

Ta Da . . . Introducing Soon Lavender and Cinnamon

Excitement is brewing - at least for me - as we work tirelessly - well sorta getting ready to introduce you to Lavender and Cinnamon. Can't wait for you to meet them.

Have a wonderful Saturday.