Forgive me...

I apologize for my absence.  August exploded and I've just begun piecing it back together.  Thing 1, my daughter, just started kindergarten (yea her!) and myself, the master of the house and Thing 2 have all had the creeping crud.  After 3 weeks I can't hear my lungs when I breathe at night.  This is a good thing. **
Basta!  Enough!  How about some canning?

Pick your own!

Today Thing 2 and I went to Gilcrease orchard, our local pick your own farm.  This place is amazing!  We got 20# of apples (Granny smith this year), 10# of pears, 10# of pickling cucumbers, 5# of ripe tomatoes, 1 gallon (and one pint for the Thing) fresh pressed apple cider, 3# of zucchini, and one giant zucchini suitable for self defense.  This haul cost all of $50 and is much fresher and tastier than the junk produce at the grocery store.  And we supported a local business (eat local!)

Well, what am I going to do with all this goodness?  The cucumbers are going to be made into pickles--some more of the garlic dills, but also some processed pickles that can be stored in the pantry.
The tomatoes will be turned into salsa (with a little help from my own garden) and I plan on a couple quarts of processed tomatoes to give us a little sunshine this winter.

The pears and apples will be made into butters and some applesauce.  The apple butter is my pride and joy; an old, old, oooold family recipe.  My first canning project was apple butter and I have made it every year for the past 20 or so.  So please wait patiently, I promise at least a half dozen new posts in the near future.

Farm life was hard...until it was soft.

**Thankfully we were not ill in any way that would have been helped by this ancient recipe found in Leta's collection to treat "running off of the bowels" [diarrhea].