Plink!

This is the happy sound of my tomato jars sealing after a long-ish hour of canning! Okay maybe it was more like 2 hours. It sure didn't seem nearly as long as the peaches.. although I only did one batch of tomatoes and 3 of peaches...

Here's my final product:

I have about 10 cups of leftover prepared tomatoes. I was hoping they would fit in the smaller jars that I have, but it only filled about 4 jars and I need at least 6 to fill my canner. I decided that I would either buy more tomatoes tonight or buy the stuff to make salsa.

I might just do both! I took inventory of my jars this afternoon and after alll this I still have 7 large (like the tomato ones), 10 medium (500mL) and 21 jam-sized jars! I was thinking that I will definitely do salsa (probably tonight) and then maybe I would try out some pickles... Simon like sweet pickles (I don't yuck!) but he can't find the kind he likes out here... We bought them in BC, but I guess the stores here just don't carry his kind! I bought a Bernardin canning recipe book (Bernardin Complete Book of Home Preserving: 400 delicious and creative recipes for today) so it may be able to lead me in the right direction for pickles. I will probably consult my mom about it too....

MOM what do you think?? Are sweet pickles hard to do???

(I've called my mom probably at least 5 times in the past couple days with canning questions :p the Mennonite cookbook just isn't clear enough for beginners sometimes!)

These are the leftover tomatoes trying to save their friends from being boiled!!! They didn't quite make it.. not tall enough and plus it's hot!

I was kinda bored when the jars were boiling.... these extras didn't last long though..

Toooooomatoes!

Today I am tackling canning tomatoes! I succeeded at doing peaches so I figured I would do tomatoes today. It's cooler today so it won't be as bad/hot in the kitchen as Tuesday!

I have been checking on my garden daily and luckily we haven't had any more visits from sir.eats-a-lot! We've picked about 6 tomatoes from the plant and there are more just about ready to be picked! I left them for Simon to pick cause there's a HUGE spider living on the tomato plant.

These are my yellow beans. We've eaten some already and there's many more to come! I told the small green ones that I'd be back for them in a couple days and I encouraged the flowers to make beans! The beans in this picture are freakishly large cause we were away for a week and no one did any harvesting in that time!

I was surprised to find so many peas out there! I almost forgot about the peas we planted because they didn't grow up the chicken wire as we had planned, they kinda grew along the ground, like a creeping plant! I think they were just reaching for the sun and fell over!

Alll right time to watch a bit of TV then tidy up the kitchen and make a mess canning tomatoes! At least it won't be as sticky as doing peaches!!

August = fun times!

It's August!

This brings many-a-birthday-and-anniversary in my family!

It was Simon and my 4th anniversary on August 5th so we went on a vacation! We drove to Toronto to visit some friends then off to Niagara falls for a week! Simon's been there, but I hadn't and it was really fun! We went on the Maid of the Mist and did the Journey Behind the Falls, went on a winery tour in Niagara-on-the-Lake, watched fireworks, are WAY overpriced food and just relaxed a bit! Here are some of the highlights of the trip...

While we were in Niagara we picked up about 30lbs of peaches to can!

This is my mission today: Can as many peaches as possible! The first batch is currently in the canner and as I type I can feel that I am still sticky!



It's taking forever to boil though... I just called my mom and left a message.. We'll see if it starts to boil.. Its a good thing I didn't start the next batch right away! I might start another batch in my second canner cause Simon will be home from work in about an hour and half and I would like the kitchen to be clean by then!

OooOOooooOO It's boiling!

I'm hoping to also can tomatoes and make salsa and pasta sauce. We'll see how much I get done (not all today!) Luckily for me I'm not working much this week!

P.S. this is me filling up the canner with water...

Thunder, canning, golf, etc..

Hello all!

Here's some stuff I've been thinking about blogging, but haven't felt like lately :p

There was a big thunder storm the other night/evening. Simon had biked to the gym and by the time he got home most of the storm was passed but we could see the storm clouds moving away. This is what it looked like:

This is looking across the street at the edge of the cloud

This is looking down the main road directly towards the middle of the storm.

It was strange for me cause there wasn't any rain, just thunder and lightning! And it got really dark for about half an hour to an hour then it was nice out again!



This is my latest large-ish purchase! (It's not a very good picture since I took it on my phone) I bought all this for $50! It's 6 boxes of jars, 2 canners (the second is inside the one you can see there) and cool accessories! I especially like the magnet on a stick to get the sealer lids out of the boiling water.. for some reason I remember this as always being my job (without the magnet dooey) when mom and I would can :p



This is what I did today! Jam!



I went to the Byward Market yesterday to get some fresh local produce to make my jam... I liked the prices and the fact that it was local but today when I went to rinse my raspberries I found that about 1/3 of them were moldy and the rest weren't that nice! I managed to get 2 cups of raspberry mush for the jam, but I was prepared to make a mixed jam. I ended up making raspberry-peach jam! YUM! I had it on vanilla ice cream tonight for dessert.

I also just finished a really good book :)


My aunt told me about it and I happened into Chapters last week and it was sitting there looking at me, so I bought it. I figured if it was as good as my aunt said, I may as well buy it. Well! It was worth it! I didn't want it to end!

Also, a couple months ago I bought Simon some golf gift certificates from the CBCN fundraiser thingy and they expired July 27, so we went golfing last week!

I actually enjoyed it! I wasn't a big fan of golfing the previous 2 times I've gone, but this was good. It was a great day for golf and it was a super nice course. We rented a cart cause I was feeling lazy, Simon even let me drive! Although I liked to go "fast" then slam on the breaks :p I got 61 (on a par 36) hehe!

Well I think that's all for now...
I'll try and write more often from now on! I don't work until Thursday so we'll see!

Exciting days!

Hi

It's me again! I've been slacking lately, or there's nothing worth writing home about..

but today! woo! I'm home from work early! woo! okay but not on the greatest terms, there was an earthquake here today! Kinda freaked me out.. a lot! More earth quakey than anything I ever felt in Vancouver, and I remember feeling a few there! I was at work, on the 3rd floor of a like 6-7 floor older building and yeah it was shaking and I heard banging for a bit, on the news they say it was 30 seconds, that's a long time though! Anywho the power went out, I grabbed my purse and ran down the stairs! I'd like to state that I was the first out of the building! The others took a bit to come out.. I don't know why, I wouldn't trust the doorways etc in that building! It was kinda cool walking to the bus though, the street were filled with nicely dressed government workers... sidewalks were filled! So my bosses decided to close for the day since the power was out and such. By the time I got home I heard it was back on, but oh well I'm home now! At home all was okay, one cupboard door was open and all my willow tree angels had fallen over and my bubble bath that was on the window ledge was on the floor.

Enough of that! This weekend Simon and I spent quite a bit of time on the boat on the Ottawa River with Sophie and Jeff! Simon and I "caught" a fish each! Jeff just had his poles in the water and we each got to reel a fish in. I've never done that before!

This is us waiting to be picked up. We met Sophie and Jeff at a place where Jeff thought there was a dock.. but no luck! There used to be one, but its gone!

This is me reeling in my fishie!

Fishies are yucky! eewww I didn't touch it hehe

Simon got a fish too, and held it ewwww!

We were out on the boat almost all day on Sunday! It was nice to get away! Anywho I'm going to find something to do! I put Pocahontas on in the background, Simon works til 9 tonight.
later gators!

Bad Sir. Sneaks-a-lot!

Hi! Do I have a story for you!!!

So on Wednesday Simon and I got home from work and Simon was lighting the bbq (which we had left outside- its a hibachi- and was filled with earwigs cause it was sitting on the driveway..) so I went to check out my garden... I saw the plants that I had started from seed first and I noticed that the nice big broccoli plant that I was so proud of and was going to transplant very soon, was missing all its leaves!! I just figured an animal ate them cause it was just sitting on the ground with no protection...

So I called Simon over and together we walked down to the garden to check out the rest of the vegetables... Well weren't we surprised to find Sir. Sneaks-a-lot (our pet name for the groundhog who frequents our backyard- usually nibbling on the weeds and long grass) IN OUR GARDEN!!!!
This was a big deal since we kind of built a barrier around the garden with wood and that plastic netting stuff... I was very angry and worried cause sir sneaks-a-lot was stuck in the garden and was panicking cause we were there and he couldn't get out!!! Simon finally undid the plastic and he escaped! I hope we gave him the fright of his life and that he'll think twice before coming back to our garden!!!!

Here's the damage...

BEFORE
Yellow beans, but this was taken
a while back so they were bigger than this!

AFTER!
I guess he decided to leave us 2..

BEFORE
really nice looking brocolli plants

(from the store)

AFTER...
unrecognisable green sticks coming up from the dirt :(

I was very sad and very angry! We had befriended these animals and they betrayed us!!! I'm not sure what to do now... Any ideas? Will these plants grow again, or do I need to start over? I'm thinking of making a scare crow to put in the garden cause all the animals are scared of us...

It makes me sad just looking at these pictures.. I haven't been out to the garden since this happened.. and usually I'm out there every night..

still good the second day!

Hehehe

Since I'm a grown-up now and I was home alone for dinner... I ate the rest of my mousse-trifle dessert from last night while I cooked my food :P hehe sooo good!
That's all!