A Summer Hiatus

Its been a full summer. The empty shelves have now been filled and restocked with scrumptious goodies. Five varieties of jam, tomatoes, salsa, peaches, apricots, pears, pear butter, pear sauce, cherries, green beans, carrots (from the garden) and pickles. We ran out of jars (and space) before we got around to canning apple sauce. But maybe in a few months when the jars begin to empty, we'll be able to remedy that situation.

 

The dehydrator is finally put away and all those berries (strawberries, blueberries, cherries and raspberries) are stored away for the winter. Dan sure is happy that he doesn't have to pierce any more blueberries by hand to help with the dehydration process. We've frozen berries for later use including strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and handpicked blackberries.

The ugly egg dresser (its missing the bright yellow knobs) has FINALLY been painted.


And yes, we did complete the job with new dresser knobs that aren't sooo ugly. Silver ones to be exact.

We've tried our hand at making yogurt in the crockpot. It turned out great, and is now added to our lovely repertoire of handmade things we enjoy.

I've spent endless hours putting books back onto the shelves. And yes, my desire for "perfection" and nicely lined up books has been thrown away. I've learned to "let it go" and I'm mostly just happy to have the books off the floor!

The cesspool of germs has commenced and the kids have infiltrated our house once again. Mostly just one or two additions. This picture shows the odd day, when I had three extras. (Have I mentioned how much I hate the slow integration of kindergarten? Worst idea ever!)

The garden has finally granted us some bounty. My first tomato of the year. It tasted about as good as it looked (which really wasn't that great). But no need to worry, we've had a few more since and they have been much better. This year's garden was pitiful due to late planting and bad weather. But we got beans, tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots and celery from the garden. I was disappointed that my zucchini failed again and that I only got a handful of peas before the plant died.

Our summer has been busy! We also went to three weddings, and took a two week road trip to Eastern BC/Alberta. Our lives have been full of winter preparation, raising a young man (and a few of his friends), and trying to rest in those days off. We hope to be more purposeful in blogging a bit more frequently (but that's no guarantee). Especially since we have succumb to the parental bedtime of 9 o'clock! But you would too if your kid didn't sleep well at night! So, we apologize for the summer hiatus. But we hope the fall and winter brings a "bounty" of blog posts.