Halloween, fires & Fall garden

Keep doing the things that make you live in the moment. Have a fire with friends, listen to gothic bluegrass music on Halloween 🎻🎃 , grow lime trees on your porch, stare at the moon🌙🍂 🍁 

Sunrise 7:45AM October 25, 2025

November 1st 8:44PM

Yellow & orange leaves

I collected the remaining tomatoes, peppers and Limes from the plants growing in the apartment. 

Purple tomatoes & Lime Harvest from porch garden

The Ever blooming Cactus 

Cactus blooming, against the Bird of Paradise plant

Found the mulberry tree! Food forest garden

I had the weekend off, so I took advantage of the nice weather to clean up the old garden, harvest some garden food and eat seasonal veg.

In the apartment garden, I've got some tomatoes and peppers still growing, as well as thr lime fruits maturing. The lime trees keep getting a black fungus on the leaves like soot. They also have been infested with white hairy bugs that I can't seem to ever get rid of. The same bugs were on our old Desert Rose bonsai no matter how many times we bathes in in peroxide or alcohol or just plain water and new soil. With that said, I'm not sure how much longer the lime trees have until they end up like our old bonsai.

Basil plants before a watering

With some Yellow squash, I made fritters mixed with flour, Ener-G egg replacer, nutritional yeast, salt, black pepper, onion & garlic powder. I also add a little miso paste and water to the mix and pour it in the skillet like batter. I serve these with chili crisps.

Yellow squash fritters 

While we've been cleaning the old garden, we came across some Ripe figs! They were delicious. 

Ripe Cold Hardy Fig

My second batch of fritters this week was with fresh cabbage and kimchi mix. I used plain flour, Ener-G egg replacer (not totally necessary- I just have it on hand), nutritional yeast (just makes it a bit cheesy), salt, black pepper, miso paste, onion & garlic powder. These were the best fritters I have ever made. These are really versatile, I've made them a million different ways. You can use zucchini, Carrot, potatoes, and probably any vegetable! I'm a southern woman, so anything fried is tasty to me.

I ate these with chili crisps again- chili crisps go on everything these days from Fried Kale to boiled potatoes.

Cabbage & kimchi fritters 

During the weekend off, I also went out of town to buy a Jackfruit. I wasn't on a mission to buy a Jackfruit, but, I had eaten a durian recently and felt like it was about time to endulge in another big tropical fruit that I don't always have access to eating. 

It wasn't the ripest it could have been, but it was pretty dang good.

Like I said, while we have been cleaning up the old garden, we picked a couple of Ripe figs, but we also managed to harvest more mulberries and pears 🍐 

Last week, I found my mulberry tree amongst the jungle of weeds. The only reason I realized what it was, was because of the berries on the tree. Otherwise, I'm sure I would have chopped it down completely! I'm not even sure when I transplanted this mulberry, and where I got it from! I'm sure it was a twig when I bought and transplanted it. Considering it's been nearly 5 years since I've planted anything at the old garden, I'm sure the mulberry has been growing little by little for the last 5 years, hiding and carefully becoming big and beautiful to produce its first batch of berries.

Mulberry tree growing berries in October 

Mulberry tree that grew for years with 
No care & maintenance

The mulberry survived amongst invasive
Ivy, thorns & other plants, growing 
Tall to reach the sun.

Second harvest of pears this year

Of course, I always like to stop by the fall scene every time I visit the grandparents. The gourds and colors are so inviting. 

December Houseplant Indoors Apartment Garden

We finally got through the perils of Thanksgiving and Christmas holiday! I'm thankful for getting through it. I wish it gone every year, but alas...

It has also been the most unbearably cold winter thus far. I'm lucky to have been able to buy a truck this winter that was 4WD. I can't believe I lived without it all my life in the Northeast! 

With that said, my broccoli,  lettuce, and cauliflower garden has frozen over. Despite keeping the garden mulched, watered, and covered with a plastic polytunnel system- they have withered away. That's what is absolutely devastating- that I worked hard to keep those babies growing big and healthy, and keeping pests off as well. All for nothing...that's how these days of gardening have been going for thr last couple years. It's become more of a waste than fruitful like in the past years. 

Of course, life is busier- and I no longer live right on top of my gardens...but, it has come a time where I'm rethinking this path, sadly.

Used to- gardening felt like my identity- now it just feels like my failure. I'm not sure how much longer I'll be doing it...or, if I do- it may be in a completely different state, different plants, different methods, different atmosphere. 

I'm still devoted to my houseplants. Thr houseplants are not happy to be inside since the cold has crept in. But, you ensure that they're staying warm, pruning dead leaves, add a little soil on top, water and fertilize sparingly. 

I have a large monstera plant that has produced lots of side shoots, and I've had to cut them back and propagate new plants. Today, I bought some container pots for the new propagated monstera plants. And I'm going to do a project- something I haven't done before- make a coconut coir tower for the monstera to climb! I'll show you all once I have it completed!

Don't let my groveling over my garden struggles stop you from starting your garden. I hope if you're reading this and are thinking about starting your garden- feel free to look back at my projects past 2019. Those were my best garden years. I'd produce massive hauls of cucumbers, tomatoes, potatoes, peppers, lettuce, kale, herbs, figs, and so much more unique little things!

Let me know what your garden New Years resolutions are! And as always, I hope you're all staying warm, dry, happy, and healthy. 

Have a safe New Year!