Ok, the green beans are going crazy.  Funny how it can look like there’s not much going on, and then all of a sudden there are SO MANY BEANS…..and they just keep coming!  It’s gratifying to finally have a really good bean year, after several mediocre years.  Part of the reason for our relative success so far this year is, I think, that we finally went back to bush beans, rather than planting only the pole beans that we opted for during the past several years in an effort to maximize our (minimal) growing space.  I know that lots of folks have great luck with pole beans, but the years that we’ve grown bush beans we always seem to get a bigger yield.  Unscientific observations for sure, but our observations none the less.  The other reason that we’re getting more this year is simply that we grew more plants.  We’ve always struggled with lack of light in this particular garden, and this year we finally decided to only plant stuff there that we knew from previous years experience could really thrive in that space.  So, green beans were it.  This year we planted ONLY green beans in our two raised beds, and moved all the other veggies that we’d planted there in years past over to our new community garden plot–which, thankfully, has full sun.  We’ll see how things pan out as we get further into the season, but for now things are looking good.  And the boys are LOVING the bean-picking.  They’re great helpers….especially when they can eat as they go.

Connor picking Green Beans, July 2010

Connor in the beans, July 2010

Basket of Bean, July 2010

Ian looking up from basket of beans, July 2010