New toys...

I know, I know, I know...I should be posting. Sorry....wait until you see what I've been up to!

Ready?????????????? I've been playing with some new 'toys'.

 So much faster!!!!!!!

 So  much easier....

So much bigger!

I have been having a blast! Even if I've done so many tomatoes that it gave me a trigger thumb, put me in a brace and kept me from knitting! OH NO! But not to worry....I've been doing my stretches and behaving and I'm back to knitting. 

 I grew some of this....

 and a few of these....

 made some stewed tomatoes...

 tomato garden juice

spaghetti sauce...

 Used some chicken broth and stewed tomatoes to make some chicken tortilla soup...

 

Today I made some more applesauce...

 I started with 1 C apple cider, 12 #'s of cortland and Macintosh apples, and 4 tbl of lemon juice. Cook it down gently and water bath for 20 minutes. No water, NO SUGAR! My best taste tester, MOM, said, "this is very good!" Now, you can't get a better review than that! 

I wanna try it with cinnamon and fresh cranberries, too. 

For coming to the 'table' late, I think I'm doing pretty well at filling up the shelves. 

 This whole process started with the gift of some really, really good raspberries!

Nothing like fresh, straight from the garden raspberries!

Plopped into a pot....

And turned into something soooooooooo freakin' good I'd have licked the pan had it not been so hot!

 But I waited for it to cool first. And that will be the last time I've used wax on jam. I have learned a lot!

Which led into the tomatoes (that take freakin' longggggggggggggggggggggggggggg when you're making spaghetti sauce, which is worth the whole four hours to cook them down giving you time to work on some knitting....)

 And more knitting while reading new canning books while waiting for the pressure canner to be finished in time to...

 eat cupcakes with...

the Tiger's biggest fan. Now, if they can just put a few more games in the win column! Yep...we can multitask here with the best of 'em these days...

The best part of the new canning life around here, is the ability to limit and remove sugar and chemicals from so many things I had no idea the grocery store puts in. Unbelievable! Mom's sugar levels are really good these days! So, yes, we let her have one-and only one of the little cupcakes in celebration of the start of the World Series! And now we're back to veggies, veggies, veggies! And stevia in the jam. And nothing in the applesauce. Yippee!!!!!!!! Here's to healthy dinners and no more trigger thumbs! (Take that tomatoes....your days are numbered! ahahhahaha)