Monday = "Spillday"???

It sure seems like it to me... last Monday I got doused in BBQ sauce... this week... well, let's start at the beginning!

I found out that the pork we ordered this summer was ready at the meat processor. I figured that since the meat processor was 10-12 miles southeast, and Warsaw (with its Wal-Mart and Save-A-Lot, two stores I wanted to get to today) was 22-24 miles in the same general direction, I'd make a big shopping trip out in that direction. My sister-in-law heard that I still needed to get some more tomatoes canned to meet my year's quota, so she told me I could come pick her tomatoes. I tossed a couple of baskets in the trunk, and I was off.

Well, my estimates were pretty far off... the meat processor was only 9.3 miles away from our house. I kept on driving, figuring since I'd come that far, I might was well drive the additional 13 miles or so to Wal-Mart. The miles kept rolling on... but when I got up to 17 miles from home, I saw a sign saying that Warsaw was still 10 miles away! Oh, well, so much for the "half-way there" idea.

I stopped at one plaza that had Wal-Mart, Tops, and a discount clothing store first. Nothing really interested me in the clothing store, but I picked up a few things in Wal-Mart, including a 10-pound bag of sugar. I tossed my purchases into the trunk and headed over to the next plaza, which had Save-A-Lot, Dollar General and a thrift shop.

My best find of the day came in the thrift shop. As soon as I walked in, I said "Oh, Bethany will LOVE those!"

Pink Camo Pants!

I also got a complete set of cassette tapes from a Christian weight loss workshop... I think we have a mini cassette tape player with headphone around here someplace. I'll have to dig that out so I can listen while I'm canning!

So... I head out to the car to put away my purchases from the Thrift Shop, and I find a neat little pile of sugar in the trunk! When I put the bag of sugar into the trunk, it brushed against a wire on the bushel basket, putting a nice slit through the plastic Wal-Mart bag AND the paper sugar bag! Okay, I'll just tip the bag over, so that the sugar stays inside the Wal-Mart plastic bag... WRONG! That bag had a hole in the bottom! (See why it should be "Spillday"?) I dumped out the bag from the clothes I just bought and double-bagged the sugar... and ended vacuuming the trunk when I got home!

It's off to piano lessons, then back home to get some canning done! This week's agenda: pickled sweet pepper rings, mincemeat, glazed carrots and tomatoes!

We're expecting a frost tonight, so I went out to the garden and picked ALL the sweet peppers (yes, this 8-quart basket is one peck, so you're looking at a peck of pickling peppers! Try to say that three times quickly!)

FRUITLESS!

As of tonight, I am caught up with canning! Apples are gone! For the first time since the beginning of September, there are not bags, baskets and boxes of fruit sitting around, waiting to be canned!

I woke up determined to finish apples today, but then Ron went out to the garden, and brought in the rest of the monster squash:

9 more of them!

The big ones are nearly a foot long, and weight about 5 pounds!

He also brought in cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers and green beans, so that kicked off a few other canning projects, like sweet pickle relish. We picked our grape vines clean (the vines are only about three years old, so this is the first year we've gotten grapes), and I made a batch of grape jam!  I've been canning all day, and the last of the apples are finally done, done, done!

Bethany had a few nice surprises this week. A woman from church asked if she could use a small table in her room. It fits right next to her bed, and gives Mr. Potato Head a whole new perspective on the room...

I found a new place to put Bethany's glasses when I tuck her in at night... don't they make Mr. Potato Head look older?

Last week, when I was tucking Bethany in, I noticed the book she was reading... and the author's name sounded familiar...Chris Fabry... Chris Fabry... where have I heard that name before? Then it hit me! In 1982, I took a summer missions trip to Germany, and worked with a Chris Fabry! As soon as I said my "Night, night, love you, see you in the morning!", I came out to the computer and did a web search for Chris Fabry, and thought "It looks like the same guy!" I sent him an e-mail, and the next morning, got a nice e-mail back. When he found out I had a 10-year-old fan of his books, he said he was going to send me a copy of his new novel, Dogwood, and a few books for Bethany. The package arrived today...

Fortunately, Bethany had some scissors at hand, as she worked on her beads!

She had to be careful not to cut the books!

Her response to her new books? "Sweet!"

 Do you smell something???

Some days are just more…. Interesting… than others!

Today was my day off, so I headed out the door this morning with a very organized list of errands and items to find. My first stop was a grocery store, where I picked up the items on my list that didn’t require refrigeration. I was putting the groceries into the trunk when I noticed a sour smell in the trunk. Oh, no, I thought, when I bought tomatoes at the auction last week, one must have rolled out of the box and it’s somewhere in the trunk!

As I started to push shopping bags aside to find the source of the smell, I noticed drops of brown liquid on the bumper… something had leaked as I was putting groceries into the trunk! I picked up the plastic bottle of Chiavetti’s BBQ sauce (a spice & vinegar sauce that’s really popular here in Buffalo), and sure enough, the front had sauce dripping down from the label. I held it up and tried to get a better look to see where the hole was, and accidentally squeezed the bottle, causing a gusher of vinegary sauce to spew out of the slit in the bottle over my sweatshirt and jeans, all the way down to my shoes! I tried to wipe off the stains with a tissue, but I smelled like a Chiavetti’s BBQ!

I took the bottle back into the store and back to the cashier who checked me out. When I told her that the bottle had a slash at the bottom of the label and was dripping, she said, “Oh, yeah, I saw that… you can get a new one.” Hmmm… you SAW that I bought a dripping bottle of BBQ sauce and didn’t say anything??? I think I’ll be going through another cashier’s line next time!

So off I go with my new, non-slashed bottle of Chiavetti’s carefully stowed in the trunk (yes, I did a squeeze test to make sure my new bottle didn’t suffer from the same affliction). The next stop was the bank. Was it just my imagination, or were people in line with me wrinkling up their noses a bit and sniffing, as if they smelled something like vinegar and couldn’t quite place the scent? When I went out to the car, I decided I needed to do something about the smell, so I pulled out my Raspberry hand sanitizer and used that. Great! Now I smelled like Raspberry Vinegar!!! It reminded me of the line from Aristocats... Basted? He's been MARINATED!  Yes, I smelled like I'd been marinating for a while!

I made a stop at AmVets to look for a few nice new blouses for work.  My wardrobe is getting boring, and it was easier to stop and buy a few new things than it is to break through my diet plateau and get into the box of new-to-me clothes in storage. I tried to keep moving so the vinegar fumes wouldn't build up in any one area!When I was checking out, the cashier gave me the Senior Citizen Discount. She must have seen the look of shock on my face (Do I really look 55????). She said, “I know you’re not old enough for the Senior Discount. I’m just so used to ringing it up on Mondays that I give it to everybody!” Oh, okay! I’ll have to remember to go through that cashier’s line whenever I’m in there on Monday!  I ended up getting 5 new tops for myself and one men’s Hawaiian shirt to donate to the Ladies’ Outreach (men working in the kitchen are supposed to wear Hawaiian shirts) for $14. Now I'm going to have an awful time trying to figure out which new top to wear to work tomorrow!!! Speaking of tomorrow, it's getting closer, so I need to get some sleep!

Can I Do It?

I'm down to three baskets of apples, and I want to finish them off today! 

This is what the garage looked like last Saturday: I got in a few good rounds of canning this week, but with out-of-town company, making dinner for a friend recovering from cancer surgery, and needing to work on my day off, I didn't get as much done as I would have liked!

I'm determined to finish up apples today... applesauce, more spiced apples, and hopefully one more batch of Bethany's favorite Cinnamon-Apple Syrup (if I get to the grocery store for more sugar). That presents a problem in itself. If I go to the grocery store, I will pass a farmer's market... and I still need tomatoes to make up another batch of salsa. Any trip to a farmer's market adds a few more hours of canning to my schedule!

I'm down to less than 200 canning jars in the laundry room (it seems so much bigger in there!), but I'm not sure if I'll use them all this year. My two major sources for free grapes must have been hit by a late frost: there are no grapes at either place!

See what Bethany got for having 20 100% papers at school? She was having a great time playing with it yesterday. She can make all sorts of cool shapes. I think if I see the same thing at the Dollar Store, I might get another set for her for Christmas... then she'll be able to make even bigger creations... but we'll have to find a good box to keep it in. Yesterday, she made a little design and was carrying it down to the basement to her desk, and dropped it. All those little balls just kept bouncing and bouncing down the stairs, all over the place! Fortunately, she was able to find all the pieces!

Okay, off to the kitchen! I'll try not to hurt myself today! The second-degree burns on two fingers from grabbing a melted spatula yesterday are feeling much better today! I'll be more careful with how I position the stirring utensils when I have two burners going on high heat!

Update: As I predicted, I ended up at the Farmer's Market... they had tomatoes and peppers on the bargain table, so I ended up with all the ingredients for making that last batch of Salsa I wanted to make... then I ran out of canning jar lids, so my mass production ended around 8 PM!

Time for the "Mystery Squash"!

Today I figured I'd try cooking up one of the "mystery squash" that grew in our garden this year. We didn't plant this one plant... it just sprouted up with some cucumber plants! It took over one end of the garden, and has produced about 8 very large fruits. I figured since it looks so much like a sweet potato squash, it has to be edible, right???

Well, for one thing, it has a VERY hard shell! It took a meat cleaver, a knife and a meat-tenderizer mallet to cut it in half!

Okay, you've got the meat cleaver halfway in, now what?

Once I got it opened up (I put a long knife in and tapped it through with the mallet), it looked like a regular squash inside.

I tossed it in the oven for two hours with the turkey breast I was cooking for dinner, and then scraped out the squash. I think the shells cooked up even harder than they were to begin with! We debated on whether to save one for a bike helmet, boat, or garden shoe... it sure seemed durable enough.

The squash seemed a little stringier than other varieties, but with some brown sugar and cinnamon, it was quite tasty! How tasty? I ate mine WITHOUT applesauce! That is unheard of in our house... I always drown my squash in applesauce!

Here's Bethany's new project. She got a book from the library on making animals and other projects with beads, so she borrowed a ball of yarn and got busy!

Okay, my break time is over! I need to get back to the kitchen and can more green beans! I have the kitchen all set up for maximum speed in canning:

Washed beans on one side, compost bucket on the other side... it's working pretty well...

Now, all I have to do is the same thing over and over and over again... 14 quarts so far today, ??? to go!

Update: 78 jars in two days... I don't think I EVER want to see a green bean again!