And I love it.
Since this is a series about the top ten things that make me happy, I didn't really feel that I could include "living in San Diego" on the list. (Because that's more of an experience.)
There are many things that I have as a result of this experience, however, and that includes all of the fruit pictured below.
Backyard Fruit
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| Clockwise from upper-left: white wine grapes, red plums, red wine grapes, green pears |
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| Clockwise from upper-left: lemons, unripe peaches, unripe red table grapes and oranges. |
Needless to say, all of that fruit makes me very happy.
And it's pretty remarkable when you consider that, from the front, ours is a typical suburban tract home:
Step out back, however, and it's a little like stepping into an orchard. We have lemon, lime, orange, red plum, and peach trees. (And our very generous neighbors have apple, pear and Loquat trees.)
We also have a small vineyard consisting of 50 grape vines. We have red and green table grapes and a variety of red and white wine grapes--enough to produce two hundred bottles of wine.
(A little side note: we have never actually made wine but the woman who owned the house before us used to make it in the coat closet. No lie, my winter coat smelled like a nice Cabernet for the first year we lived here.)
Apparently wine-making is a bit labor-intensive. This surprised me because I have vivid memories of my Uncle Frank stomping grapes in the backyard of his Staten Island home. (And Uncle Frank was not a complicated man.) The wine-making books I've checked out make it sound a lot more difficult, though, and they recommend lots of pricey equipment. Despite this, I would love to make wine, or at the very least find someone who would make it for me. One year I went so far as to put an ad on Craig's List offering the grapes free to anyone who wanted them. All I asked for in return was a bottle of the wine. I didn't get any takers. If you're local, and you know an amateur vintner looking for some grapes, please leave me a comment or send me an email.
Because a bottle of wine made out of grapes from my very own backyard vineyard? Now that would totally make the top-ten list..
When can I come and visit? I am green with envy over your bounty. I would love one of your fresh lemons.
ReplyDeleteWow! I'm impressed that you grow so much! As for the wine grapes...I say Amy and I come out...check it out...help you figure out how to make fine wine cheaply and maybe visit a few vineyards while we're there!!
ReplyDeleteIm so jealous Id love to have fruit trees that are developed enough to have lots and lots of fruit. Oh and the grapes to make wine how amazing would that be! I have a young lemon tree and Im probably a few years off seeing any fruit on that, but I still check it out each week just in case :)
ReplyDeleteLove San Diego.. my brother lives there and we visited about 7 years ago but 3 kids and lack of vacation budget to fly there prevents us from visiting again! Your backyard is lovely and what you grow is just amazing! You make me soo jealous.. NJ is not nearly as nice.. although I do love my town!
ReplyDeleteThanks for joining in the under 300 followers blog hop.. I am your newest follower~
xoxo
Amie @ Pinkapotamus
I'll bet those grapes taste divine! Thanks for linking up for Flash Blog Friday :-)
ReplyDeleteWow I have a dream to have a garden growing lots of edible things in the future. All I have is a windowsill which is growing a lovely batch of herbs right now :-)
ReplyDeletehttp://myfroley.blogspot.com/
It's funny, while our fruit trees do very well, I have a terrible time growing herbs (outside) because of the bunnies. They eat everything (except mint) down to the nub. I might have to utilize my windowsill!
DeleteThanks for stopping by!
Love this post! You are so lucky to have all that in your back yard!
ReplyDeleteAnd San Diego is beautiful.
blessings,
karianne