Going Tomato Hunting

We've actually had enough sunshine this summer for our tomatoes to ripen, unlike last summer. And this is despite having started a bit later than last year, because this year's tomatoes were grown from seeds of last year's tomatoes, rather than from plants from the nursery.

Today Benjamin went out to pick a big red Marmande tomato.

He knows he's only supposed to pick red ones, not green or orange, so he had to find it first. Here it is!

"This tomato's as big as my head!" Well, not quite.

The trophy.

So far Frederic has made green tomato pickles, sun-dried (well, oven-dried, we haven't had THAT much sun!) tomatoes, and we've had lots of tomatoes in other dishes. No fried green tomatoes yet this year, but I'm sure we will have some before tomato season is over. Benjamin prefers his tomatoes raw; he eats the little pear-tomatoes like apples. And those are some hot peppers from the garden also, we haven't tried them yet.

And just so Noah doesn't feel left out, here he is smiling away while Frederic and Benjamin were outside mowing the lawn.

He had his 5-month checkup yesterday - well, 5 1/2 months; we're a little slow with these things (second child syndrome?) and the doctor's office was closed for a week, too. He now weighs 15 lbs and is 25.5" long, and is finally keeping up on a normal growth curve. Normally he would only go back at 9 months now but the doctor wants to see him again next month for a weight check, to be sure he is still gaining normally. It looks like we will have to continue to supplement for the foreseeable future at this point, which is kind of annoying. He gets to start solids in a couple of weeks, though!