busy, busy, busy

I haven't got many home improvement projects done due to canning these:


60 quarts of green beans in 1 day


15 quarts of blueberry jam + 5 freezer gallon bags of frozen berries.

We've also done some tomato sauce and tomatoes and are preparing to can some chili.

Sewed a curtain for the mudroom window


then realized it made it look to cute like a nursery so I raided my fabric stash and found this piece of an old skirt. The girls are visible through the window and are making a movie.


It's held up by a tension rod and some ties. Not exactly the look I was going for but it will do. I also repainted the window frame in a darker turquoise blue ($1.00 mistint from Home Depot). I like the intensity better.

Now I just need to put one more coat of yellow paint on the door and hang the pantry curtain and then I'm done!

canning

It's that time of year again - canning time. We were recently given a couple of boxes of apples so we took an afternoon and canned applesauce. It's so very easy to do and tastes so very good.


Peeling the apples.


Cooking the apples.


Pureeing the apples, putting them in the quart jars and then eventually processing them in the water bath.

I'm hoping to get a pressure canner so I can do some green beans and other yummy vegetables. We also need to go find a place to pick some apples and peaches. Oh and we need to go pick some more blueberries so we can make some blueberry jam. The strawberry freezer jam is already done and we're flying through it.

Although canning is easy, it's a lot of work. However there are few things more satisfying then seeing pantry shelves stocked with veggies and fruit that you canned. Tastes so much better than buying store bought cans.

that time of the year....

It's the second most wonderful time of the year with the first being our church's Family Camp week long vacation.

Here is what we do at the beginning of June every year. Take the best fresh Oregon strawberries in the world and combine them with fun, laughing, mess, sugar and pectin and you get freezer jam.



Graedon was delighted to help this year. I gave him a sharp knife to cut up the strawberries and then left to go get some more bowls. When I came back in the room Maddie had given him a butter knife. I'm pretty sure having Grae close by with a sharp knife didn't make Maddie feel very comfortable.

Wow!


Yum!