Late September

The seemingly endless, hot days of summer have given way to cool, rainy, cloudy fall.  The leaves are slowly turning, and my garden has put forth its last fruits.  Technically, the fruits really ended, for all intensive purposes, a while back; the garden fell into disheveledness sometime in August, but I did make a valiant attempt at reinvigorating it a few weeks ago.  I cut off the all the tomato vines that were showing signs of early blight, pulled out all the squash plants, took down the pea fence and vines, and raked, mostly so that our landlords wouldn't be unhappy with us for bringing down the eye-appeal of their lawn.  The side-benefit was that the hot peppers put out enough of a final effort so that I was able to can two tiny half-pints of pickled peppers yesterday.

(I then spent all last evening with my hands *on fire* because I scoffed at the warnings to use rubber gloves while handling the peppers.  Never again!)

This is what fall looks like in my kitchen:

Essentially, my already non-existent counter space is completely overwhelmed with food preserving equipment - and, of course, coffee.

Apple butter in the crock pot, spearmint in the dehydrator; I dried nearly my entire bush of sage as well, leaving enough to bring some inside to see if it will last the winter. 

Two half-pints of pickled peppers, three one-pint zip lock bags of oven-dried cherry tomatoes, a jar of spearmint, a jar of sage; a summer's worth of lettuce and tomatoes for salad, enough peas for two rounds of pea-potato soup, plus a few dinner servings of snap pea pods; overwhelming amounts of summer squash, basil, sage, and chives; and one or two sweet peppers.  That is pretty much the tally of what our little garden plot yielded this summer.  I'm not sure if we really saved any money, but I had a lot of fun in the process, and I look forward to trying again next summer - I'll definitely know better what to focus on, and how much is enough, too little, or too much of various plants.

As for produce that I didn't plant, but did preserve: a bushel of apples yielded nine 4-oz jars of butter, 5 crisps, and enough extras for eating.  We also have the rhubarb marmalade jam from earlier in the year (my new favorite), and ginger peach jam (also good, but we have enough that some will probably make its way into Christmas baskets).

Anyway, I never expected to get that much canning done with a 15 month underfoot, so I'm pleased, and happy to hang up the apron for the winter.  Now I can turn my eyes to other crafty pursuits, such as Christmas presents.  I've already pumped out two skirts and a dress for myself, and a skirt for LW, but I'm sure there's more sewing on the horizon.



LW modeling her skirt.  Blurry because I had to snap quick in order to run across the room to save her.  This is what is *really* keeping me busy lately - she's developed quite a love for climbing.



Besides crafting, I'm turning my leisure time more towards reading again, and contemplating, and hopefully, more writing.

And coffee.  Lots of coffee.  Something about the light of morning creeping later and later into the day, and the grey weather, and my daughter's reluctance to nap, combined with my never-ending need to get work done, has me drinking large amounts of the stuff.  It doesn't do a ton of good because I can't really tolerate anything that isn't decaf, but there is a psychological boost just the same.  I blame my cousin for getting me hooked while she was here; there was something lovely about having a morning coffee quietly appear as I dug into my day's computer work.  The joke is on her though because it's a lot harder to come by coffee where she'll be for the next year :)

I have further thoughts on the nature of contentment vs. discontent, but I'll save those for a post all their own - I've been all over the map enough for one post already :)

Finally - I just heard that one of my favorite spiritual writers died on Sunday: Fr. Thomas Dubay.  If you haven't read any of his books, I highly recommend The Evidential Power of Beauty, and Happy Are You Poor.  Say a prayer for the repose of his soul!  Our loss is heaven's gain.