NOT back-to-school activities

Everyone seems to be heading back to school this week.

Not us, though.

We're drying fruit.  (That's school, right?  The girls are helping.)

I *heart* those half-gallon Ball jars
Our bounty: mostly apples and prunes, but some bananas, blueberries and pears in the small jars
my early morning helper
Audra, my early-morning helper yesterday
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Adelia and Ella, my early-morning helpers this morning
I have several boxes of (free-to-us) apples and prunes sitting on my kitchen floor ---oh, and in my fridge, too, and in my mom's fridge!--- so our trusty dehydrator is hard at work.

Dehydrator

Mark has a hard time seeing any food go to waste, so as he's out delivering mail on his route, and walking through peoples' yards all day, he sees apples lying on the ground, and he knows the people who live there, obviously- so he'll ask them: "Are you going to use these apples?" and well, they aren't. So we've gone out to his route to pick some and my mom and brother-in-law have prune trees, so we've got plenty of fruit!


Homemade fruit leather
Homemade fruit leather
God has been so generous to us this season- our garden was more productive than ever, and we've been able to put up so much food, and we keep getting more from others, too.  A couple of weeks ago my aunt and uncle offered us green beans from their garden, and so we went out and picked and after canning it all we ended up with 16 quarts of beans.  Then this weekend they called again and had extra corn, so we got nearly 50 ears of corn, and my aunt had already done the work of husking it all.  What a gift!  So now we have corn in the freezer, too.

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Corn for the [exceedingly grateful] chickens!
I do hope to post more about school soon.  And next up is the "Part 2" of our chore system.

Oh, and: comments are back on.  In order to try the no-comment thing I have to remember to turn off the comments on each post, which I kept forgetting.  So nevermind that.

Hope you have a great day!
~Stacy

9 comments:

  1. Nice to peek on on you and your sweet family! I lost my RSS feed a while back and so haven't kept up with all the blogs I used to. Your kids are getting so big! Blessings...

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    1. Rebeca~
      Thanks for stopping by! Blessings to you and yours!

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  2. I'd be interested in the fruit leather recipe when you have time. We have a dehydrator too and now that fall is coming we are pulling it out. How long does your dried fruit store in the jars? We usually eat it all faster then we can make it but thinking of doing a box of apples.

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    1. Sandi~
      This is the way we do it: Pit or core whatever fruit it is you have, and then throw it in the blender, skins and all- and puree. Then pour. We've never added anything else. Just the fruit. Hope that helps! :) Heck, and what with your new Vitamix- you could get REALLY creative with different combinations! Have fun!

      We'll eat up the dried fruit within the year. I'm trying to save it up particularly for late fall and winter months. It would go really fast if I just let the kids (and Mark) have at it!

      ~Stacy

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  3. We haven't started back to our full routine yet either. And I apples to make applesauce with and corn to freeze as well. Whose modern idea was it to "go back to your school" during the harvest season anyway? :)

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    1. That's EXACTLY what I've been thinking, Heather! It's harvest season still!

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  4. I am beyond excited about all the food preservation you've been able to do! And free fruit that no one is using from their trees?! What an awesome perk to Mark's job! We asked an older (I think she is 90!) Woman here in our new neighborhood if we could help her pick her apples when they were ripe; she wasn't so sure that was a good idea. It made me laugh a little though. I have always wanted to get my nerve up to ask random neighbors if they had plans for their fruit trees and this particular lady had such a funny response. Happy Almost Fall!
    Rebecca Montgomery

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    1. Me too!
      Ugh. Sorry about the odd response.

      KEEP ASKING, Rebecca. Seriously. My guess is that more people than not would tell you to "take 'em". There are even a couple of places around town where people have hung up "free fruit" signs in their trees-- and random people just stop by and pick. :)

      Mark had asked one person on his route about their apples- and he said "take as many as you'd like" and then when we went back to pick, his next door neighbor came out and offered us figs and asian pears from his yard! So nice. Just keep at it.

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    2. I will! And we are already making plans for our yard for next year!

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