Yeah, River, that's a good idea about the hay bales near the house. Wouldn't be workable for me as I have sidewalks in the way. I've got old shower doors on top of a wooden frame, set up inside one of my raised beds. It works for impromptu. Still growing my cabbage and lettuce. When the cabbage matures I will just try growing the lettuce for the remainder of the winter and see how far I can get. I never really thought, before, about trying to grow things for fall ripening, not to mention through the winter! My fall tomatoes didn't do so great. I only had one plant that got far enough along to make tomatoes before the freeze, and it had come up volunteer in the compost bin! I just left it there and dumped my compost in around it. I have two tomatoes that have just ripened so we'll be having salad soon. DH doesn't like salad without tomatoes so we've been using the home grown lettuce on sandwiches up to now. Even at that, it's kept us from having to buy a head of lettuce at the store and some of it going bad.

Last winter I borrowed a book from the library, I think the title was "Four Seasons Harvest". He had a greenhouse and everything, but what struck me was that he said that things like greens and cole crops can withstand some really cold temperatures and that what is damaging to them is being hit by the wind.

BTW, I got your e-mail and replied. If you don't get it, check your spam file. Sometimes my mail goes there when it's from someone I haven't had mail from before. --Ilene

River, I know the feeling of appreciating the garden while you're gone on vacation. We visited inlaws in Bishop, Ca this past summer and the prices there are outrageous, mostly because Bishop is in the middle of the desert side of Ca and it is a 5 hour trip either north or south to the nearest big town. San Bernardino south, Reno north. A lot of people in Bishop have backyard gardens, many more than say in Tulsa. Turnips are still doing fine in my garden but not much else, mainly because deer don't like turnips.