Happy birthday to me

Today is my 50th birthday!

That's right, I'm half a century old.

And what happened on my birthday? My girls left! They flew down to California to visit my parents and three brothers.

Our day started at 4:45 am this morning when I hauled everyone out of bed. The girls were so excited (flying is a rare thing; they haven't been on a plane in six years) they could hardly sit still. And this time they would be flying by themselves, too.

We got on the road by 5:15 am, with the soundtrack to Riverdance blasting on the truck speakers to keep us alert. It takes an hour and a half to make the airport, and their flight departed at 8 am.

They flew Southwest.

We had shipped a box of clothes ahead of time, so the kids just had backpacks with books, a lunch (well, breakfast), etc.

They arrived safely in California, where my parents met them at the airport.  My brothers have all kinds of fun things planned over the next ten days.  More importantly, it's a chance for them to connect with their uncles and cousins, whom they seldom have a chance to see.

Up, up and away! Their first solo slight.

Interestingly, Don also had to be away today, so I had a rare day alone. While this might sound like a dire and depressing way to spend one's fiftieth birthday, solitude is such an unusual commodity that I rather enjoyed it. (And for those who wonder what I did, I spent the day cleaning the house. Oooh, the excitement never ends!)

In the evening some neighbors brought over a piece of pistachio pudding birthday pie and wished me happiness. Thanks!

Some people might feel sorrow upon reaching such a milestone, but I'm very content with where I am in my life. I have a phenomenal husband, two delightful daughters, we all have our health, we have our farm and our home business... yes, God is good and I'm grateful beyond words for these first fifty years He's granted me.

Poor Thor

Yesterday while Don and I repaired a fence, Thor came over to say hello.



Thor is our Jersey cow Matilda's yearling steer (see his birth here). He's a sweet-natured boy. But as he nuzzled Don's hand, we noticed something alarming: Poor Thor must have had an encounter with a porcupine.





Naturally we tried to pull a quill out, but Thor's nose is undoubtedly sore and sensitive, and we couldn't even begin to grab one.



So poor Thor is very sore at the moment.



So what are we going to do about this? I have no idea. We don't have a headgate, which is the only possible way to keep Thor's head still enough to snip and pull the quills. About the only option I see is to bring a vet out to knock Thor out cold, then pull the quills.

For the moment we won't do anything. There aren't many, and they aren't interfering with his eating or drinking. They're not in his nose. But we're going to keep a sharp eye out for infection or other serious complications.

We have a neighbor who loathes porcupines, calling them the most useless animals on God's green earth. A few years ago a porcupine got into our yard, and my old dog Gypsy got such a massive mouth-ful of quills that we had to rush her to an after-hours emergency vet clinic nearly an hour and a half away (naturally this encounter happened late on a Friday night). Yet despite that expensive and painful encounter, I don't dislike porcupines.

Yet.

Mentioned on Facebook

Reader Linda in SoCal alerted me to the fact that the Tattler canning lid folks had mentioned my Canning Peaches post on their Facebook page.

I'm not on Facebook (and have no interest in signing up) so I figured I wouldn't be able to see the posting. However I found to my delight I could view it even without being signed up.

For a little while, at least. After awhile an imperious blue screen came up with the ominous proclamation that I need to log in before I can view any more. Glad I got those screen shots when I did.

Thanks for letting me know, Linda!

Happy birthday mom!

My mom turns 81 today.

Oh, and she and my dad just celebrated their 54th wedding anniversary on August 30.

Cool, eh?

Canning peaches

A couple of weeks ago, a friend called. "A family from our church is heading to Yakima to pick up peaches," she told me. "Do you want some?"

Yakima is an agricultural city on the eastern side of the Cascade Range in mid-state Washington. Apparently this family was fetching back somewhere on the order of 700 boxes of peaches, and taking orders from anyone who wanted some.

At the astounding price of $14 per 25-lb box ($0.56/lb!) you bet I did! I ordered five boxes, 125 lbs. of peaches.

Well, five boxes in theory and five boxes in reality are two entirely different things. Quick, gotta can those peaches!

Peaches are, hands-down, my all time favorite fruit in the world. Having fresh canned peaches through the cold snowy days of winter would be a treat indeed.

I knew we had a lot of work in front of us.

I waited four or five days after getting the peaches, to let them ripen a bit. Then I got out some quart jars.

Peaches can be peeled easily if they're dipped in near-boiling water for a few minutes.

Then I dropped the hot peaches into a bowl of cool water for a couple minutes (sorry, forgot to get a photo) before draining them.

At this stage, peeling is a cinch. The skins just pull right off.

Peeled and ready to slice.

Sliced peaches and filling jars. To the right you can see the bowl where hot peaches are cooling. At this point I had peaches in all stages of production: dipping in hot water, cooling, draining, peeling, slicing, filling jars.

Younger Daughter is making syrup. I prefer to use a light syrup, which means a 2:1 ratio of water:sugar.

The sugar-water is heated until the sugar dissolves.

Here's the production line.

Targeted for the compost pile, making for happy ants and wasps!

Jars with peaches, ready for syrup.

Ladling hot syrup over the fruit.

24 quarts, ready to cap.

Naturally I used my biggest pots.

I use a rack at the bottom of each pot. Canning jars should never be in direct contact with the heat source or they're more likely to crack.

Time to pull out my buckets of Tattler gaskets, lids, and rings.

Tattler gaskets need to be heated prior to use. I boil some water, then turn off the heat and drop the gaskets and lids into the hot water for a few minutes.

Then it's time to start capping the jars.

Into the pots. When water-bath canning, water should cover the tops of the jars by about an inch. My biggest pots hold twelve quarts between them.

I covered the pots, turned up the heat, and waited for the water to come to a boil.

Rolling boil! Start timing. Peaches (in quart jars) need to be water-bathed for 30 minutes.

First 24 quarts done, about half the peaches. Enough for one day.

The next morning it was the same routine. Peaches peaches peaches.

Younger Daughter wanted to make lunch, but the only way she could reach a burner on the stove was from the back side.

While getting new jars ready to can, I washed the cooled jars to remove the sticky syrup residue. It's not unusual for jars to vent a bit of the contents upon removal, before they seal.

I also washed the rings before reusing.

After many hours of work, I finally got those five boxes empty.

Time to clean up the chaos.

Final tally by evening: 47 quarts, 8 pints, 1 pooped-out canner.

Ah, but the next morning, with the sun shining through those beautiful jars, I could stand back and admire my handiwork.

There's nothing prettier than jars of canned food, but I'm glad it's done!