As they say

If you don't like the weather in Chicago, just wait ten minutes.  On Saturday May 18th I got a sunburn.  On Saturday May 25th I did not.  It was cold.  The fingers of our dedicated volunteers were also cold.  This did not prevent them from harvesting four pounds of chives and a medley of other herbs for our very first delivery of the year! 

 

We collected four pounds of chives with plenty more for future harvests.

Can you spot our mystery volunteer?  A regular who has no problem helping with the harvest? 

 

While the temperature plummeted this week, we don't seem to have fallen into a frost.  This is good news (I swear that I'm not counting chickens yet) for our fruit trees.  Last year's sudden late season frost did a number on apple crops across the Midwest.  Right now our trees appear laden with growing fruit.

Apple trees, pruned during dormancy, full of fruit.

Who can resist the appeal of a baby plum?  They are so cute at this age.

These apples deserve their own post... so if you need to know about this variety before then, drop by the garden and ask someone.

 

 

And the figs are growing and fruiting healthily too.  

 

Volunteers use leftover fence wood to cover a large divot left from Persephone's tomb.

I might be most excited by the buds and flowers on the red raspberries.

 Then again...
  

A lot of credit has to be given to the volunteers that pushed themselves to the garden on a day that warranted despondent checking and rechecking of weather apps.  Maybe it's the radishes that are about to pop out of the soil like inflating party balloons, but these are sunny people.  

The again...  The hard work and harvesting of our mystery volunteer, who is no doubt adorable and probably weighs less than a Purple Calabash tomato, continues all throughout week.  Which is why we have chicken wire.