Busy Busy Busy

I'm not sure where the days have gone but here we are nearly at the middle of September. I guess the were eaten up by all the time we have spent processing fruit for jelly making this winter. So far this year we have gone through 75 pounds of peaches, 50 pounds of nectarines, 3 or 4 bushels of apples of various kinds, plums, and tomatoes. The grapes are just now turning ripe and we still have 50 pounds of peaches and a multitude of apples waiting for the paring knife. My sink is currently full of jalapeno peppers ready to be processed, and yes, I have the rubber gloves handy. We dried a couple of batches of garlic for the famous garlic powder we produce. With all this in the freezer or in jars, we should eat well this winter as we have chicken, rabbit, beef and goat in there as well. The chickens are slacking off on egg laying, but we still get enough to meet our sales and have some for ourselves. We have a few hens we are laying JUMBO eggs now and we keep those to eat. One egg will make a "3-egg" omelet. We actually outsmarted the squash bugs long enough this year to get a pretty good crop of yellow and acorn squash as well. Apparently they don't care for basil much. The basil got out of control since we didn't prune it often or soon enough. So when we did prune it, it had stems the size of small trees. We piled it on and around the squash plants. I must remember to plant plenty of basil next year! We have been eating tomatoes since April. Some of the folks in town are STILL waiting for their first ripe tomato from their vines. Needless to say, we have sold a lot of tomatoes this year. A bacon and fresh tomato sandwich still tastes good, even after the dozens or so I've already eaten this year.