Catching up

I finally figured out that I have to make Google my browser in order to download pictures onto my blog.  Now where have I been?  I'm way behind, I'll tell you that.  Sooooooooo,

I'm going to try to catch you up on what's been going on here.

Below are the ribbons I won at the County Fair last week.  I still did not get a blue for my Raspberry Jelly, which was my goal.  They tasted it and wrote "Yummy!" on the scorecard, but also indicated I was to have 1/4 inch of space at the top of the jar.  I guess I had 3/8ths inch.  Afterall, I sew.

Here is the afghan I made out of my own alpaca yarns, together with a few novelty yarns for interest.  I was docked 2 points for the novelty yarns because "texture is distracting".  I laughed at that, because texture and color are my mantra.  In these competitions, the judges get very confused by artistic application.

I had to harvest my first potatoes early because the chickens that are residing at my place, owned by an organic farmer, get loose and are destroying all of my beds.  They scratched so much around the potato plants, the potatoes were exposed to the sun, so I had to save what I could before they dug to China.

Then, I canned some cherries.  There is a story to this.  My Grandmother, who lived across the street from us my first 10 years, canned cherries, and called them Cherros.  My brother and I loved them, and would have contests to see who could eat the most.  Since the pits were still in, it was easy to keep track, but my brother always won.  These are for him.

Now, due to the 1000 chickens on my property, causing me nothing but grief with the smell and the mess in the barn, and the destruction of the gardens, the owner is bribing me with a CSA box of goodies every two weeks.  I'm not sure what CSA stands for, but it is a program that you can subscribe to by paying ahead of time for boxes of fresh goodies every two weeks.  By paying for it up front at the start of the season, it gives the Farmer the collateral needed to plant and grow the goods.

The picture below is last weeks box.  I made juice out of the peaches and nectarines and canned the tomatoes.  I also made pickled dilly beans, but added lots of garlic, hot chilis, anaheim chilis, and small onions.

The Gravenstein apples are ripe, and I have made lots of canned applesauce and apple juice for my Grandson, Cadel, who is now 6 months and trying out foods.

I have several people coming to pick apples today, so guess I'd best get on the ball.