Canning Up a Storm

This is just a representative of what has been happening around here. I have been so busy I keep forgetting to take pictures! Once it's all on the shelves in the garage, I'll take a photo of the whole thing.

In the past few weeks I have canned: 24 quarts of pickles, 16 pints of relish (both cucumber and zucchini), 8 pints pickled beets, 2 quarts pickled beans, and a great deal of spaghetti sauce. I am still in the process of making and canning the spaghetti sauce. I'm working in batches as the tomatoes get ripe (very late around here).

I have also frozen multiple quarts of strawberries, raspberries, blueberries, broccoli, and green beans (no one around here likes canned green beans). Apples are just starting to get ripe also, so I know I'll do a lot of applesauce and apple butter too.

I have to say, that although it's a lot of work and really messy, I love doing it! I wish I hadn't waited so many years to start canning my own food. For some reason I was scared of it, but it's really easy, even pressure canning is not this big monster difficult thing I was making it out to be.

The other night, we had a meal that included many of our garden and preserved items, and we had such a sense of satisfaction eating those foods.

On another note--Grace had been really sick for the past week with coxsackie virus (hand, foot, and mouth disease). She was utterly miserable because the entire inside of her mouth was covered with canker sores. She's finally better after a little over a week, two trips to the doctor, and every home remedy I could come up with. It's nice to have her back to her chipper self again.