Over the Shoulder Galeux d’Eysines Holders

Well not exactly.

There are no shoulders involved.

Just the picket fence.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

We’ve got four (so far) Galeux D’Eysines babies.  Two are on the ground, but two are hanging from their stalks, which climbed from one part of the back yard over the fence toward the driveway.  Perhaps they thought they could make a quick getaway in the truck.  We’ve never grown these before, so I’m not familiar with their personalities.

I do, however, know that they grow quickly. 

And big.

Here are the two that hang from the fence.  (You can see another one through the fence toward the back right of the picture.)  They look bigger every day, and we’ve become concerned that the stalks they hang from will break, or, at the very least, will crush under all the weight and cut off the supply of nutrients to the fruit.

But how to help?

The squash needed…support.

Bill propped the lower squashling up with one of the basil buckets.  I cut back all our basil the other day and made pesto to freeze, so there was plenty of temporary space.

This would work in the short term, but we needed something long term.

The design fell to me, as Bill felt that this sort of thing was more up my alley than his. 

Then he went fishing.

Okay, not really.  Not right away.

And I thought about it and figured some sort of sling or hammock would work nicely.  Something soft that could expand along with the squashes.

This morning, while Bill and Alex were fishing, Julia and I looked through my stash of fabric and outgrown clothes until we found something suitable.

Several things, actually.  This is a bikini top that I don’t wear any more.  I cut out the padding things in each cup…

And pinned the two sides together down the middle, to create one cup out of the two.

I hand-stitched the seam in a zig-zag pattern so the fabric would remain stretchy throughout.

While I worked on that, I gave Julia a project.

I cut off the front of another old bathing suit and had Julia run string in and out through the mesh holes along the sides.

She set to work with a song in her heart and a smile on her face.

That lasted through about one stitch. 

Not as much fun as she’d expected.

“But I wanted to do some sewing!”

I told her this is sewing, just not with the machine.

She was not amused.

I made a third hammock/sling out of the mesh lining of a pair of pants Alex has outgrown. 

Julia cheered up a bit when it was time to go outside and test our creations.

I gave Julia my camera to hold and started hanging pumpkins.

Here’s one of them – in the bikini top. 

The straps are tied around the fence and fencepost up top:

There’s some stretch, of course, in the fabric, but it’s strong and will help prevent the stalk from breaking.  (Or that’s what we’re telling ourselves.)

On to the next one.

Julia took a few of the pictures, by the way.

I figure the bikini sling won’t really last very long – the pumpkin will grow too big for it before long.  So we’ll use the tan one instead, or maybe I’ll find something prettier to use.

But for now – problem solved!

Squash hammocks!

Julia approves of the red one, but the converted bikini top?

Not so much.

Apparently it’s icky.

Sigh.

Anyway, Bill and Alex returned from their fishing trip a little while ago (not so successful today) and Bill approved the hammocks.

So – mission accomplished!

Comments

[RoseAnn]

I love this, jayne!

[Donna B.]

Brilliant! I would never think to support them like that... I have some heavy 4lbs fruit just hanging there. I think if/when they fall from their stalks, that means they're ripe... right? I could be mistaken. Either way - *I* like the bikini one! hee hee.

[tracey]

You are so clever. And hilarious.