Goodbye Garden

I thought the garden we planted two years ago, was the worst year, but I'm starting to feel it's this year's garden.  This photo was taken on July 17th.  Yesterday, I checked them, and they are still wet, and gone to rot.

Warning:  This is a reality post.  The reality that self-sufficient/homesteading life is not always "peaches and cream." 


We've lost everything now, but a few squash plants.  The remaining collards, and even my rhubarb are gone to bugs, possibly ants.  Not sure, and I'm not going to do a thorough check until fall.  Maybe not until spring.  

We attempted to dig potatoes last night, fighting the thick swarm of mosquitoes, and failed.  The ground smelled so bad, I gave up.  I don't think they'll be edible by the awful foul odor they gave anyway. Hubby gave up before me, marching in, saying the he's never seen so many mosquitoes. 

Although I had hopes, picked beetles and picked weeds where I could, it's time to throw off the garden gloves and walk away.  I feel like my garden mojo has been ripped out of me.

I'm sure I know what the pioneers felt like when they had nothing to put in the cellar for winter.  Sure we can go buy stuff, but you know there is no guarantee that organic is also non-gmo in the stores.  We live in crop country - nothing but corn and soy beans, and a bit of wheat fields here.  So....finding farm-stands with food to buy, is slim pickin's.

Also, organic/non-gmo is not cheap here.  This is also, not just a loss of food supply, but a financial loss.  With Hubby having been on strike for 4 months, and our last bit of money going into the garden, there isn't much for buying such expensive food.  This year was the largest garden we've planted yet.  It's a set back for us.

We are the not the norm (self-sufficient) for this type of living in our area, and with the goats gone, and now the garden, and another pet, I am slowly becoming that person that no one wants to be around.

It's been a "goodbye" year this year - goodbye Sadie, goodbye Mattie, goodbye goats, goodbye Alias, goodbye garden.

I don't need to be reminded that this time will pass, but it's the going through it, that stinks.