Well, as you’ve seen, I’ve been kind of on a tirade in regards to the fraud in the government programs, and the IRS. I’m sorry, but in today’s economy I find such wastefulness and complete unconcern by our elected leaders appalling! This statement being true in good times, or bad. Why…because it’s OUR money!

Here we are, the taxpayers or the funders of our Country’s economic system, faced with tremendous challenges of keeping our own family’s fed, a roof over our heads, and all the other costs we incur in our daily lives.

Yet, our elected officials have decided that what we do…is still not enough. Take, take, take from the producers to give to the non-producers, and even ILLEGALS, and further burden us with such total incompetency to even be accountable for the money’s we give them?? What have we come to at this point in our Country?

But, let’s change gears again and get back more on topic of what our site is about…gardening, canning, sharing a recipe or two, and just kinda having a good time. Jerking each other’s chains, and hopefully, many times you guys leaving with a smile on your face! I know through your e-mails you sure put one on our faces! Thanks!

I’ve got a meeting first thing this morning, so I’ll be short winded. Yeah, yeah, I know that’s hard to believe, BUT, I am capable of that…in a pinch! LOL! We’ll see though, won’t we?

Our first video is of the greenhouse again, and ole Deb pickin a few cucumbers. They’re Japanese cucumbers, which we’d never grown before, shoot, I might as well own up that I’d never even heard of them before!

But, we both love the taste, and even when they become very large they still are tender. Most times though we make pickles out of the larger ones. Same with our squash. If you’ve never eaten them, squash pickles are very, very good, and I personally prefer them over cucumber pickles anymore.

Here’s the video…

Ole Deb’s looking pretty good, huh? Honestly though, she’s doing good! The Good Lord smiles on my Deb, doesn’t he? Good night, we are so blessed!

The other video is of our juicing. We’d done a video of this before, but we felt it appropriate to show once more. This, juicing, is one thing we think ALL you guys need to at least consider.

Again, although Deb was diagnosed with Stage 4 breast cancer 13 months ago, every blood test we do comes back perfect. She’s aced every one of them! We do another next week.

Anyway, several of our friends and family are now juicing, even some of our fellow YouTubers, and every bit of feedback we get all praise the benefits they’re seein from the juicing!

All speak of the energy they now have, and how well they feel as a whole. Most all speak of weight loss they’re experiencing as well. Personally, I’ve lost 50 pounds. Talk about feeling better, Phew, I’m like a new man!

I tell Deb I feel like the 6 million dollar man, and she says I ought too…that’s about what the juice has cost us! LOL!!

Juicing, when you juice the quantity and variety that we do each morning is fairly expensive. Actually when we started out it was costing about 100 bucks a week, and recently went to about 160-180 bucks a week. No kidding.

But, Deb’s health can have no cost put on it, and this is the reason for our greenhouse…year round vegetables in a climate controlled area. We of course, supplement our juicing with our other gardens as well.

A couple reasons for this…first off the cost of food today. I know you guys are all seeing this firsthand!

The second is the AMOUNT of fruits and veggies we juice each morning. The reason is because in Deb’s regard, we’re trying to build…a SUPER immune system, and we feel this is exactly what we are doing. It’s working for us.

Now juicing is not the only treatment she’s decided upon with her alternative cancer treatment, BUT, it is one of THE major players.

Our point though is that we feel juicing is so beneficial, you guys may just want to give it a try, healthy or not!

You would not have to juice anywhere near what Deb and I do, again, we do so many for a reason. But, research your fruits and veggies, see for yourself the nutritional value of each, then juice the ones you feel would benefit YOU, the most!

Here’s the video…

As you can see, Deb was having a little problem. Our juicer is beginning to…get tired. That dern thing is a workhorse though, and has been doing just what you just witnessed for over a year now! Plus, we’ll pick enough oranges, tangerines and grapefruit to juice about 4 gallons at a time…on top of what you see we do daily.

So, we love the type of juicer we use, and are very, very satisfied with the job it does, and the longevity of the machine.

By the way, there’s a brand new one under the stairway, still in the box. We’re going to order a new cutter blade though, and we both feel that will make our old one just like brand new. It has, we know, become dull from all the use it’s gotten!

We’d by this brand again, and again, and…well, you get the message!

Well, I’ve got to run!

You guys have a great day, and God bless! Deb says to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

As you see by today’s title, Deb’s Garden, then it has to be obvious to you all just exactly who wears the britches in this household…and it ain’t me! Basically I’m just “the hired help,” and also she claims on her tax return that I’m…sub-contract labor.

By this she has no tax liability on my account, but this in itself, ALMOST throws me in another tax bracket in regards to my taxes. But by her only paying me $3.50 a day, no not per hour, but a day, I just barely stay under going into another tax bracket.

Her philosophy to me is simply, “Look Dub, I’m really doin you a favor here. If I paid you more, you’d end up paying more taxes, right? On top of this, I keep a roof over your head, let you borrow my vehicle IF, you need to go to town, and I cook your meals and wash your dern clothes. Ya got a pretty good thing going on here, so my advice to you is very simple…DON”T MESS UP A GOOD THING! Comprende?? I thought you might…cause I KNOW the judge would!”

Hence…IT IS, Deb’s garden, on top of everything else around here too! Marriage…isn’t it grand?? LOL!

The garden is doing very well, and my only complaint so far is…where’s the dern rain? Good night it’s been dry. Our pond is about 8 feet below where it should be, and may possibly be 10 feet. I believe it’s the lowest I’ve seen it before.

You know, I just got to thinkin, everything else around here is Deb’s to hear her tell it, so I wonder if she’s gone and took the water outta the pond too? I sure wouldn’t put it past her!

No, the greenhouse is doing great, the grow areas around the greenhouse are doing fine, and in our garden out in front of the house, what we’ve got in there so far, is doing good too! We’re blessed in all sorts of ways. The Good Lord does provide!

Well, here’s a few pictures for you guys to let you in on what’s going on…

Okay, this first picture is of, left to right, sweet peppers, squash (lemon and straight-neck), onions, and cucumbers. We’re getting squash pretty much daily now, and I’ll probably put up some squash pickles this weekend, or the first of the week. We’ve also been eatin some onions out of…Deb’s garden! LOL!

The next picture is of our tomatoes. If you notice, we cut the suckers and lower limbs off. Thanks for the tip Miz Sandy and Mr. Bill, from Mobile!

Inside the greenhouse now, check out our beets comin up between our okra sets. Beets are really, really good for you! Ours aren’t quite ready, but, they’re getting there! We planted Bulls Blood, Detroit Dark Red, Lutz Salad, and Golden.

Check out the height of those volunteer tomatoes. A couple are now bumpin the top of the greenhouse at the low end.

There’s the cucumbers. They’re the Japanese cucumbers. They get 22-26 inches long, but thin. We love the taste, and they’re supposed to be excellent pickling cucumbers…we’ll soon see! If you look closely, you can see some hanging off the vines. We’re fixing to have to tie more string across the rafters and let them run towards the center of the greenhouse.

There’s a close-up showing the cucumbers.

From left to right, watermelons, squash (crook and straight-neck) eggplants, and far left is hot peppers.

Another view of our tomatoes, again Sandy, we removed the suckers. And lower limbs. The cows ate good! I believe they’d of enjoyed us just pullin the whole dern plants up and chunkin em over the fence to them!

The missing spaces, a row and a half, will have black tomatoes planted in them by next week.

Here’s the garden out front, we’re planting a little as we go out there. Got irrigation to it too, now! YES!! The pictures out here were a little fuzzy, but you can see what we’ve done. Check out that water runnin!

This is a partial row of tomatoes, with eggplants finishing the row on the left, then squash and peppers in the right-hand row.

This is two full rows of tomatoes.

Last is a picture of the greenhouse from the other garden…

We hope you guys enjoyed the photos!

Please take care, and God Bless. I’m relaying a message from Deb for you to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

This is Dub…from Deb’s garden, out!

Dub and Deb

The wind though blew the squash around pretty good. We lost two, just broke em off at the ground, but surprisingly we have maybe 3-4 more that need a couple broken stems cut out, and I believe the rest weathered pretty well.

Watching those things blow around brought back memories of my killing those 50 + plants to get our growin season off to a great start! LOL!

I was talking to our good friends, Bill and Sandy, from Mobile Alabama, who by the way are… “Auburn Tiger” fans (hee-hee-hee Sandy), and she’d sent us some pictures of what’s goin on gardenin wise up in their “neck of the woods.”

Their garden was looking great, and I believe Sandy said they’d just brought in 50# of potatoes! They, like us, love piddlin around in a garden.

Both these guys have green thumbs. The proof in the pudding of their having green thumbs was evidenced to me last year. I called them in January, it was about 15 degrees out up there and I ask, “Sandy, where’s Bill?” Her answer, “Oh…he’s out in the garden pickin some tomatoes.”

“???? 15 degrees and Bill’s in the garden picking fresh tomatoes???”

Sandy’s like, “Yeah, he’s been a little disappointed with em though…he don’t think they’ve done quite right.”

“Okay…”

I have to tell you guys, although I hate to, they’re actually Alabama Crimson Tide fans. Gotcha Sandy! Roll Tide!

Anyway, I’ve got about three videos for you guys to look at if you’d like. One is our other garden we’d just prepped for planting, and one is of the greenhouse and grow area. Honestly, all these plants are doing well. We’re pleased.

The last video, which in reality will be the first was sent to us by a friend, this being Wayne, from Alma, Georgia.

Wayne’s a sport-model in his own right, and that scoundrel grows some great blueberries, but he’s pretty stingy with the dern things.

L:ast year as an example he told Debbie and I he’d send us down some blueberries by my brother, and he did. TWO! When I called he told me, “Shoot, that’s one apiece!” LOL!

Here Wayne’s video…

Not a bad idea actually, huh? If I still drank, I’d be takin a ride up to Ace Hardware!

The next is of our garden are we just prepped, followed by the grow area. Hope you enjoy them!

You guys all have a great day, and God Bless! Deb’s hollerin for ya’ll to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

So far, so good with the garden. After getting off to a flying start this year by immediately killing about 50 +plants, we’re going along pretty good now.

If you didn’t know, well, we’d put up a greenhouse, and started most of our plants from seed. We wanted to use all heirloom varieties mainly on account of Deb’s juicing, or, our juicing. By doing so we’d have no genetically altered seeds, but in essence, basically the food God provided for us, and in Deb’s regard we felt this vital.

Quickly, while going through a Sports Illustrated” the other day, I read something that floored me, really. There was a little write up on cancer, and it claimed that in the US, 1 out of every 2 men would contract cancer in their lifetime. ONE out of every TWO! Half!

I found that just incredible?? What’s up with that?

In women’s regard…1 out of every 3. Still, 33% of women in the US today will contract cancer. Why is becoming so rampant? Is this our diets? Is it from most produce today being genetically altered? Is it what is being applied to the crops for insect control?

How about our poultry? You guys taken a look at the size of chickens lately? Hard to find a small fryer these days, or have you noticed? Is this from growth hormones? I don’t know, but I am asking…help me out somebody.

Anyway, as a whole, we’re just trying to eat a little healthier, but I did find those numbers literally staggering!

Back to my killing our first plants…we didn’t have any idea that if you’d started them from seed in a greenhouse, you had to harden them up prior to setting them in the garden in full sun. This is just setting them out in the sun for a few hours a day until they harden, or toughen up to the elements, for about a week. Once that’s done, everything works out great!

By my not knowing this, I set that first bunch straight out of the greenhouse into the garden, and killed the dern things…graveyard dead!

We have been prepping our garden out front the last couple days, and we’re pretty much ready to get started setting out some plants there now as well.

I tilled it in yesterday, both directions, and man, the soil is really looking pretty good. We’re anxious to see how it grows things off this year. We’d added cow manure and leaves over the entire garden area a couple, three months back. We let it set for about 3 weeks then tilled it in.

We then put out more oak leaves over the entire area again, and after building our grow areas around the greenhouse we put about ¾ of a semi load of compost we had leftover in it as well. This and the leaves are what I tilled in yesterday. Honestly, it’s starting to look pretty rich now.

We’ll be planting tomatoes, peppers, and okra for sure, but probably a couple other things too. We almost decided on peas too, but backed off that. We do so well with planting our peas in August, we’ll just keep planting them then!

We’ll also run irrigation to it after planting. The irrigation around the grow areas beside, and in the greenhouse, has just absolutely RUINED me. No more hose draggin if I can help it! LOL!

I’ll share some pictures of how the greenhouse is coming along, and the grow areas too. The vegetables in both are now really taking off! Everything outside when we set the plants in their hole, we added ½ teaspoon bone meal, and then filled the hole up with Jungle Growth garden soil.

Evidently it was just what the doctor ordered getting the plants started off, as again, everything looks good!

I went out earlier to check things out, plus we’d had a pretty good couple of showers, and good night, it doesn’t matter how much water you put to your plants…NOTHING works as well as rainwater! It all just looked…so alive, after the showers!

Anyway, how bout a laugh before we take a look at the garden? This comes from my sister-in-law Patricia, but just plain ole Patty to us!

God Loves Drunks Too

A man and his wife were awakened at 3:00 am by a loud pounding on the door.

“Over here on the swing,” replied the drunk.

Here’s our watermelons on the right, our squash in the center, and eggplants on the left.

Cucumbers on the right, onions to the left, squash further left, and sweet peppers on the far left. Many of the onions we grew from seed.

Our tomatoes. Some are now on their third tie.

Red-seeded Simpson on the bottom left, iceberg in the center, and Romaine up top. Okra top right, beets scattered through it, and sweet peppers.

Japanese cucumbers…headed into the rafters.

The volunteer tomatoes headed into the rafters as well.

Another view of the tomatoes in the grow area.

Melons, squash, and eggplants again.

Melons, squash and eggplants taken from upstairs porch.

We hope you guys enjoyed the pictures! Take care and God Bless! Deb says to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

Ole Deb and I are planning to go to sunrise service, swing back by the house to change clothes, then headin up to my Mom and Dad’s for dinner, no not supper dinner, lunch dinner! My Mama loves to cook, and dern if her first born son…don’t love to eat!

Anway, we spend most Easter’s up there with them, and most all the family attends. You know Mama’s, if they have their kids around, especially when they’re getting to cook for them too, then they’re right in the middle of their environment! Ya gotta love them Mama’s! I know I love mine!

Well, we’ve bout finished up in the greenhouse. We have a little room left, but that will soon be taken by three more rows of tomatoes, some celery, and a few bell pepper plants. After that, it’s waitin on it to come in.

The grow area is complete, all but the row and a half we’re savin for the black tomatoes. All our squash, peppers, onions, cucumbers, tomatoes, eggplants, watermelons and cantaloupes are in the ground.

Good night a livin though, that dern topsoil we brought in is sproutin weeds, ALMOST as fast as Deb can talk. For those who don’t know Deb, she can bump them gums well. Actually, very, very well! LOL! So that ought to give ya a good idea as to how fast those little weeds are growin off.

That’s okay though…I got something for em! My hands, and my “hula hoe!” That’s a dirt bustin, aeratin, weed gettin, sucker. I’ll ATTEMPT to get Deb back behind that scoundrel again, but that hasn’t been workin out real well.

I take the derrn thing outta the shed, try and put it in her hands, and she takes a 9 mm. out of her back pocket…everytime! I ask her if she’d REALLY shoot me over the hula hoe, and she just grins and says, “Yeah, I’d shoot you, but not over the hula hoe.” Wonder what that means??

After that, let’s take a joke break…this from our buddy Wayne, in Alma, Georgia.

Pinocchio, Snow White, and Superman are out for a stroll in town one Day.

As they walk, they come across a sign:

“Beauty contest for the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“I am entering” said Snow White.

After half an hour she comes out and they ask her, “Well, how’d ya do?

“First Place,” said Snow White.

They continue walking and they see a sign:

“Contest for the strongest man in the world.”

“I’m entering,” says Superman.

After half an hour he returns and they ask him, “How did you make out?”

“First Place,” answers Superman. “Did you ever doubt?”

They continue walking when they see a sign:

“Contest! Who is the greatest liar in the world?”

Pinocchio enters.

After half an hour he returns with tears in his eyes.

“What happened?” they asked.

“Who the he.. is Barack Obama?” asked Pinocchio.

Okay, let’s share a few greenhouse pictures of how things are doin.

This, from left to right, are eggplants, crookneck squash, and watermelons. Look at the weeds coming up, but again, this Monday those will be…history. The new dirt must have been full of them, but, we’ll work through this and have em under control. We’d been so busy getting everything set out, these had to wait.

From left to right, sweet peppers, lemon and straight-neck squash, onions, and cucumbers…and weeds!

Our tomatoes. The left will be our black tomatoes when they’re ready to set out. In the pic, there’s 121 already out.

These are some tomatoes in the greenhouse.

Japanese cucumbers in the stands, with peas for our juice behind them, then some lettuces on the far end.

There’s our volunteer tomatoes on the left. In the middle bed are some vegetables Deb has put into 6” pots to sell. We first have to set them outside on the benches you see in the 3rd. picture from the top. This is to harden them, or get them used to the sun after being raised in the greenhouse. It takes about a week.
If you remember, I killed about 50 plants by not doing this.

Well, we once more would like to wish you all a Happy Easter. Take care, and God Bless! Deb’s hollerin for me to tell ya’ll to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb

We’ve gotten about three quarters of the grow area planted. Well, two thirds anyway. I believe I counted 101 tomato plants today, in the ground. There are seven different varieties in the ground, and two more hardening off to be planted.

We then have three different black tomatoes up, that are still in seed trays. Those are the Southern Nights, the Carbons, and the Sarah Black. Deb and I have never eaten a black tomato before, so we’re really looking forward to tryin those babies out!

By the time with finish settin out tomato plants, we’ll have in the neighborhood of around 170 in the grow area. Plus probably 35-40 will be in the greenhouse.

Deb’s convinced she’ll be able to sell the heck out of em, so…we’ll see, huh? I do know she’s having a good time with this so far, AND I haven’t killed anymore plants! There is something to that hardening your plants off after all!

We planted bout a half a row of onions, just yellow and Texas Red I believe, that we brought in from our other garden. We planted 14 lemon squash, 14 straight neck, and 17 crook necks. These are all in the grow areas beside the greenhouse.

We’ll be planting 4 types of sweet peppers, and two types of hot. We have some bell peppers in a seed tray. Watermelons and cantaloupes are in the ground, and just beginning to run a little.

Inside the greenhouse…good night a livin! It’s now about 2/3 full as well. Still some little plants yet, and we just planted 4 more types of lettuce to go along with our Romaine, Iceberg, and Black-Seeded Simpson. Honestly, even as hot as it is, they’re doing pretty dern good. These fresh salads are niceeee!

We just set out our second batch of radishes, and have 3 more beet types, and 3 types of carrots that are ready to go in the ground in the greenhouse too.

The end result will be lettuces, beets, carrots, radishes, cucumbers, peppers, tomatoes, onions, beans, peas, eggplants, broccoli, cabbage, spinach, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, mustard, collards, and arugula greens. All inside.

There’s not a lot of room for some of these things, but, it’ll supply us with juice supplies daily. Some of this, some of that, toss this in, and don’t forget that. It works for us.

Combine this with the cost savings, the freshness factor, the taste factor, the nutritional factor, AND the Deb’ll be doin most of the work factor, and shoot, I’m in hog heaven! LOL!

Thios is beginning to work out very well, and we’re trying to learn or pick up on something every day. We aren’t even scratching the surface good of just knowing a little about this type of gardening, but, it looks as if it can be very productive. We’ll keep you up to date.

You guys wanna see a few pictures? You don’t?? Well, ya are anyway! LOL!

This is the tomatoes we have planted so far. From right to left…a row of Beefsteak, a row of Green Pineapple, a half a row of Homestead, with a half of Rutgers. Then a half a row of Mini-Orange, with a half of Fox Cherry. Then a half a row of Isis Candy.

You see our hardening bench on the right? It’s obvious, YOU CAN teach an old dog new tricks!

Tomatoes on the inside.

A few more.

Some of our lettuces. Onions behind them against the wall.

Our “volunteer tomatoes” that came up in our compost pile from our juicing remnants of each day. The first stake on the left is 6’. That’s radishes ready on the right front, and new radishes to the left that we just planted.

Our watermelons, and crook neck squash on the left. We planted it today.

Well guys, that’s about all that’s goin on, besides finishing up the micro-jet irrigation. That is REALLY working out too!

Let’s start headin out today with a little food for thought.

Diane sent this to us, and I thought it very well said. We better wake up my friends…evil people are taking away our freedoms and liberties. We have to start standing up for what’s right, instead of sitting on the sidelines.

“Fathom the hypocrisy of a government

must prove they are a citizen.”

Ben Stein

Thank you all for stopping back by to visit with us today. God Bless each and every one of you. God Bless America, Merry Christmas, Happy Easter, and…In God We Trust!

Deb says to keep a smile on your face, and one in your heart!

Dub and Deb