Catching Up

Shame, shame on me for being such a lazy blogger again.

Seems like things were really busy during the summer, with all the outside activities that come with it. Mowing the yard was pretty much a full-time job...there was only a short time where it got dry enough that you could skip a week or two.

So what have I been up to? Late in the summer my husband's folks gave us a big dishpan full of grapes from their vines that I made into jelly. I thought I'd never get all of them picked through so I could make the jelly, but finally I did.
Yum!

And remember in my previous post I talked about my newest addiction obsession hobby, digital scrapbooking? I've become so enamored with it, that quite a bit of my computer time has been spent learning software and doing layouts.

I'm also still working on going through our fleeces from this year's shearing. (See, I'm almost always behind.) I'm thinking this year I may have the wool spun into yarn at the mill instead of just roving. There's quite a bit of combed top still left to spin from last year's shearing.

This past Saturday was National Hug a Sheep Day. I'm embarrassed to say that I forgot it on Saturday (though our sheep get quite a few pets and scratches on a regular basis anyway). But I made up for it yesterday and hugged four or five of the ones that would let me. Maybe I'll try another one or two this evening. :)

Canning Potatoes

Over the weekend I tried out something new for me--canning potatoes. I've done some canning over the years, but not on a huge scale, and never potatoes. The canners I had used in the past were really old, though in good condition and good working order until their gaskets wore out. Gaskets are kind of expensive, and the canners were pretty small, so recently I ordered a new 16-quart canner. It's tall enough to be able to do quarts as well as pints.

I peeled almost 10 pounds of potatoes. There were a couple in the sack that were quite a bit bigger than the rest, so I left them in the sack, thinking they would cook more evenly if they were all about the same size. They just filled four quart jars.

We haven't tried them yet, but hopefully they'll be tasty and quick to fix some time when we're hungry for potatoes and in a hurry. (According to the instructions, though, be sure to boil canned foods for at least 15 minutes after opening and before tasting.)

I'm thinking maybe beef stew next?