100lbs

Thanks for the input about the tomatoes!  I did go ahead and pick yesterday but we chose to leave leave just a few on the vines to see what happens (good idea, Andrea).  I'm guessing (forgot to weigh) that we picked about 100lbs.  Could easily be more, but 100lbs "feels" about right... 5 large baskets and boxes, each weighing the same (some more) than a 20lb sack potatoes.  How's that for scientific accuracy?  lol

We've put some tomatoes on the windowsill and counter to ripen for immediate use and the rest went down into the cool basement storage pantry all laid out on newspaper and cardboard.  I have ripened tomatoes this way before and it worked very well.  As long as you check them frequently, and discard any that are rotting/mottled, the rest will slowly ripen on their own.   I'll be using them in our daily cooking but I'll also be making more tomato sauce if I end up with enough ripening at the same time.  I've got the jars ready to go, so I can easily do that as needed.

I picked another large bin of peas yesterday and we blanched them for the freezer.  These plants grew from seeds that I sowed after I pulled out my failed corn crop in mid-summer (making lemons from lemonade so to speak).  I should get another few good pickings off the plants - they have just stopped flowering, but have a decent amount of pods remaining and all of them are filling out nicely.

I received a reply to my freecycle post asking for unwanted fruit, so I'm going crabapple picking this morning!  I LOVE crabapple jelly and the kids like to eat them, not minding the sour"ish" taste.  Does anyone have a yummy crabapple recipe to share?

There are MORE beans to pick today (ack!), but I'll have to can them from here on out because my freezers are getting too full and I'm worried about not having enough room for our pork order which will be ready in early October.

What a wonderful problem to have - full freezers :)  All the hard work of growing and sourcing local food is paying off - it will be so nice to shop from our basement all winter - what a great feeling to be stocked up!

I'll leave you with his hilarious picture that my daughter took.  I picked some carrots yesterday, and because I didn't thin them very well this year, there are a few mis-shapen ones.  One of them looks like it's got arms and they were wrapped around 2 other carrots in a loving embrace when I pulled it out of the ground, lol.  Megan added faces and staged a picture...