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November 29 and the peppers are done! They are no longer ripening properly, so I picked the peppers to finish ripening in the house and pulled the plants. It’s hard to believe that the weather has been this mild. By late October, they should have frozen. As soon as they ripen, the extras will go into the freezer to remind me of summer when I use them.
Here is a sink full of Swiss chard and a few carrots, I pulled on which to munch. The chard will also go into the freezer to be used in smoothies and other recipes. The carrots will be pulled throughout the winter as we need them. I would have been more than happy to share some of the produce, but it seems children don’t want food that they know comes out of the ground – they prefer food from the pretty racks in the store. And adults don’t want to pick their own food. It’s too much work. Interesting, isn’t it? So this year the sheep and chickens ate the extra pumpkins, cabbage, peppers, celery and other foods. They do enjoy them.
Tomorrow, the kale and parsley should be picked.
More canning today – the beans – pinto, great northern, and garbanzos – for now are finished. And while waiting on the pressure canner,
Just look at the beautiful sunset the Lord prepared for us to enjoy as we were preparing the sheep for the night. There are massive benefits to caring for animals.
All this rain has given me time to work in the kitchen. Between last night (cooked beans) and today, I have cooked and canned 4 dozen pints of beans. It is wonderful to be able to just open a can of beans and heat them or not to add to a meal. I still want to can another 3 dozen pints of beans and energy permitting, some potatoes. Potato soup is so tasty when it’s cold outside. I could do more if I had another pressure cooker, but then I’d have more to store. It takes about half an hour to heat up, 75 minutes to process and another half hour to remove the pressure, so there is a lot of time in each kettle full. And most of the time, we are very close by so that we can keep the temperature and pressure where it should be.
This package arrived – wonder how that happened. There are now 27 wash clothes waiting to be made. Or maybe these will turn into something else. This is the problem with internet. It is too easy to spend money. No, it wasn’t necessary, but the price was right and I can use it for small, easy projects. I did manage to ignore most of the weekend ads. However, I ran out of empty pint jars and went to buy some, when what to my wondering eyes, one of my enabling friends posted that Target was having a sale on Ball jars. I did order what I needed and will pick them up at the store tomorrow. I also need some ink for my printer, but that is not on sale this weekend. Therefore, I have not purchased that, yet. So really I have done very good at ignoring all those temptations that have been flowing into my email box. The ads will be coming in for awhile yet, so I still have to be careful. How about you? What tempted you that you yielded to?
The Autumn quilt is finished (except I for the hanging sleeve). Actually, I’m not sure if I’ll put the sleeve on, so maybe it is finished. It’s wonderful to have a finish as it has been awhile.
I wanted to share my daughter’s kitchen with you so you can see how much room she has after her remodel last summer. Isn’t all that space wonderful when one has guests? And it is so inviting, all the guests hang out here.
Gray skies and our errands started here. This is a marvelous store in Puyallup, WA. They have everything to make your dreams come true and I have to be very, VERY careful when I step inside.
Somehow (probably from a few escapes it made over the years, my bobbin holder was out of round and I had to acquire a new one at the cost of $75.00. These things are not inexpensive!
The Mock croc socks in the hand painted yarn are finished! I used the smaller size by accident, so I knit looser and I am delighted with the socks. I love the color and the pattern. Someday, I will make another pair. This is a free pattern from 
This autumn flimsy is finished and will go on a hanger until I have time to quilt it. See how far ahead I am. I know that I can finish this before next October. The corners were a bit of a challenge because I really wanted to use another fabric, but I didn’t have enough of it. Well, I guess that’s why so many are “scrap” quilts. And yes, for the most part I did use scraps. I’m happy with the way it turned out. Apples, corn, leaves, pumpkins = all speak “end of the harvest.
Today I spent some time doing my seed inventory. Some I have left over, some were from an end of the year sale and some I saved from my own plantings. It seems January 1, the seed catalogs start finding their way into my physical mailbox as well as my computer mailbox. And their offerings are so pretty that I tend to forget that I have any seeds at all and then ….you know the rest of the story. So this year, I’ll be ready. I don’t need many seeds – only perhaps some paste tomatoes and some foods I haven’t grown before. I still need to decide how much of each to plant as this year we will be planting for two families. I need to find out what they want to plant – this is new for them. The other thing for which I want to be ready this year is to replant the spring crops in the late summer again – things like broccoli and cauliflower. It seems we use a lot of them so it would be nice to have extra in the freezer.