Gardening

So, we have a bounty of cucumbers currently and we decided that we could not possibly gorge ourselves on fresh cucumber after cucumber morning, noon, and night. That led us to the conclusion that we needed to plan our first canning session of the summer. We haven't pickled cucumbers in the past. We've tried black raspberry jam from the berries down the hill from our house. That was delicious, thanks to Charley's expertise. And, we've canned tomatoes in the past, many years ago, from our small garden in the backyard when we lived a neighborhood. This year we have attempted to grow our largest garden to date. We only have about 6 cucumber plants, but just those few will allow us to eat, can and share cucs all summer. Below are pix of our process. We picked, cut, chilled on ice, and canned 9 jars of cucs last night. We put 7 jars in a hot water bath...we can store those jars for up to 1 year. We kept two jars out to refrigerate and eat this summer. In the midst of canning we began discussions on our goat pen and how we must reinforce our fencing before kids arrive in September. Ahhh...the joys of farming. It's wonderful and exhausting all at once! We wouldn't trade it for anything!

And, when I woke up this morning, this stay-at-home mom was greeted with a kiss and a congratulations! I was confused, as I don't refer to the calendar often except for John's dr. appointments, etc.! My dear husband reminded me that it's June 30th today, our anniversary! Oh dear, how time flies. So much has changed since that day 9 years ago when we wed on a hot Saturday and flew down to the Gulf coast of Florida for our honeymoon. I have to find our wedding pic! Next post!