A Crafter Needs to Eat, Agriculture Report, Sunflowers!

Agriculture Report: The Sunflowers! (and other things)

What is an “Agriculture Report”? Well I was inspired by  @quiteayarnblog‘s ongoing series of posts titled “Agriculture Report” (and this title always cracks me up) that are actually updates of what is going on in her garden. I just had to adopt this same title for updates on what is going on in my garden/my “garden report” (and now @AlissaMakes has joined us in Agriculture reporting on her blog too!)

Oh the Sunflowers!

I love sunflowers, I am actually obsessed with them. When I was in Asheville, North Carolina in May 2025 (see post Concerting in the Carolinas and More), I became obsessed with the menu for the eatery we stopped at for breakfast one morning – Sunny Point Cafe with it’s sunflower art:

And the very kind manager on duty gave me a laminated copy of the front of the menu to take home!

(I have it up on my studio and it always makes me smile when I look at it)

In Spring our friends R and D gave us packages of heirloom seeds from a family collection which included packets of sunflower seeds.

We planted them in the raised bed that John built in the backyard last year (see post John gets “ScrapHappy” too – new raised bed) and they did very well! They are now pretty tall and blooming!

Other Agriculture

In the raised bed with the sunflowers is our “bumper crop” of basil also from the heirloom seeds our friends gave us:

There is going to be some pesto in the future!

Here are some happy flowers around my front and back gardens:

It is a delightful time of year in relation to “Agriculture”!

Lasagna From the Garden

We also have fresh herbs and tomatoes growing on our deck patio garden. Along with the basil in the raise bed and tomatoes from the patio John and I made some lasagna for dinner on Sunday with handmade noodles and sauce from scratch.

We roasted the tomatoes for the sauce with garden herbs, garlic, onions and carrots; and then blended the roasted tomatoes. We combined this blended mix with a large can of San Marzano tomatoes, red wine, pepperoni, beef and bacon (we didn’t have prosciutto handy) and let it simmer for hours (the house smelled yummy).

With John’s handmade thin pasta sheets we were able to make an 8 layer lasagna layering the sauce with a ricotta mixture and mozzarella.

It was delicious and partially made from our garden! We froze the leftovers for a future meal.

We enjoyed eating it outside on the patio on a lovely summer evening with a nice bottle of red wine, caesar salad and garlic bread.

17 thoughts on “Agriculture Report: The Sunflowers! (and other things)”

  1. I love sunflowers too. Unfortunately I always forget to plant the seeds until I see them blooming in other people’s gardens, and then, of course, it is way too late! Yours are tall and glorious 😍

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  2. What a beautiful stand of sunflowers — they are quite majestic. You have inspired me to try to grow them again this coming summer (it’s still winter here). Love the rest of your garden too. As for the pasta….. yum

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  3. Have you ever tried layering basil leaves inside the pasta sheets? I’ve seen it done but never tried it myself. Those sunflowers are splendid, I especially love the photo of the flower head against the blue sky.

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  4. Your agriculture is thriving – congratulations! All of your flowers are so lovely, and your sunflowers are the best of all! And wow! That lasagna looks delicious! It sounds like quite a process, but sometimes it is fun to really dig in and make a whole meal from scratch like that. 🙂

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