We have long known that our yard is the despair of our elderly neighbor, who often gives us "tips" as he is down on his hands and knees with needle-nosed pliers removing stray crabgrass from his velvety kentucky bluegrass lawn. This summer while I was out in one of my few attempts to weed, he casually remarked that he had more snails in the last few years than he had ever seen in the last few years and how were we faring? I instantly felt guilty because we moved in a few years ago and seemingly brought a snail infestation with us. We aren't horrible homeowners though. Everything that faces the street gets cared for and the lawn is mowed and weed-whacked once a week, but we lack the pristine edges and completely weedless borders of our western neighbors. Our eastern neighbors make us feel a whole lot more normal.
Last year I tried to grow pumpkins. Nothing. I weeded, I watered, I fertilized, I prayed over them. Nothing. This year, one of the little pumpkins from our halloween decorations rolled off the porch and under a bush where it absolutely flourished this year. We now have five little pumpkins growing by our gate and I didn't do a thing for them. In our backyard pumpkin patch, I tried Jack-O-Lantern pumpkins again and basically ignored them. Weeds, snails and intermittent watering notwithstanding. Powdery mildew? So be it. They flourished and we had two pumpkins grow from the four we planted. Then last week, I saw a third which had managed to escape and grow outside the confines of my garden. I suspect it saw the rampant neglect going on and figured rather than take it's chances with the Miss Hannigan of gardners, it would take it's chances on the toddler/teenager infested park side of the fence. I'm not offended because in this case, the grass really IS greener on the other side. Good luck little pumpkin. We'll come get you for Halloween if no one else gets you first.
park side view
On the other hand, everything else has grown great under the new neglectful regime. I have more tomatoes than I can handle, the red and green peppers that I apparently planted too close to each other have born strange red and green streaked peppers, which Jay claims are awesome. Our onions might be small, but darn it, they grew! I haven't actually seen him do it, but I am pretty sure my neighbor shakes his head in sorrow daily for allowing such a travesty so near his immaculate yard. I do feel bad, but not bad enough to get out there and weed. Maybe I'll take over some tomatoes.
view from my side
Cute Thomas harvesting the fall crops.
Look at my baby's baby blues!
The boys, who had previously refused to set foot outside lately because the back yard (with its array of trampolines, balls, trucks, slides and dirt) was "boring and hot/cold," discovered that leaves are fun! 
When it actually did rain on Sunday, Sam wanted to go out. Wet leaves aren't nearly as much fun as dry ones!
