Apple Sauce Time

We've finally managed to eat our way through three years of overly enthusiastic apple sauce canning (my fault entirely... I must admit.. they were FREE for cryin' out loud. You have to accept free apples ..... or else.... or else..... well, they get wasted and just dumped in the dumpster. So I rescued them. But then I had more applesauce than any family in their right mind or appetite would consume. But we've finally reached bottom. So, it was time for more. )
First we wash de apples.

Er.. we.. well.... Elly May. Thank you Elly May. I love you to pieces.

Then you whack them all up with a sharp knife. Taking out the bad spots if you are dealing with seconds and rotten apples.. as we were. We meaning both of us this time because I did chop them up. (I don't make her do everything...)

Then you cook them down until they are really soft and then, if you are really really lucky , a friend from out of state just happens to drop by and say hi for a few minutes while they are in town and are kind enough to assemble your food mill thingy you haven't used since you were twelve because you insist on using IT this time instead of your mother's completely dependable and ancient Kitchen Aid sieve thing that is made, sadly , of aluminum. Anyway, she puts it together and saves the day and then disappears again. SO, you spoon, pour all the apple stuff in and Elly May eagerly volunteers to turn the crank so she can continue to build up her butch Cinderella biceps . We run the stuff through twice to get all the good stuff. This food mill leaks just as much as I remember. So we just stuck small bowls under the leaky parts and that seemed to work fine. So there you tempermental food mill!!

May we have some?? I think not.

Then it gets dumped (well ,carefully , you know... ) back into the heavy, precious , blue pot with cinnamon sticks and is cooked down to the desired consistancy. Which just happens to be when we have had enough of this apple cooking down/canning business and want to leave the kitchen and have it be over with already.

The apples were really sweet so there was no need to add sugar. Galas make the best sauce in my opinion... but I haven't had a lot of opportunity to use a zillion different varieties in my kitchen trials. But Galas are better than Fuji or Pink Lady.. but .. we had Fuji and Pink Lady today so.. so that is what we used. We are opportunistic canners .

Aren't they all pretty?

All done. Yay.. no more. This should last a few weeks. It is really good on toast in the morning. And way healthier than apple butter which is mostly sugar anyway. We are indebted to the guys at our farmers market who unload all their culls on us so generously each week.

Cuteness

What are you looking at?

Why they want to sit up there I'll never understand but they do.

At least they get a long.

In other news , we are busy pouring over seed catalogs , dreaming of spring and summer gardens, hoping against hope that it is a better year than last year... especially for tomatoes (and our energy levels and overall health) , trying to decide on varieties , trying to stay within our limited space . All that jazz. We planted onion sets in barrels. Punker Man insists on unplanting onion sets . We poked peas into the ground and scattered arugula seed. That is coming up. Still waiting on those peas. Cover crop is covering most of the growing area. It was planted fairly recently so it is still rather small. We still need a ton more soil up top in those new beds. Maybe a miracle will happen, who knows. But come April there better be a lot more soil up there or we are going to have some serious difficulties. There is a lot of serious composting being done but I'm unsure of whether that will be adequate. I'm going to grow strawberry spinach this year. I've wanted to for years and years because it just looked so weird and cool (berries come off the plant.. of all things!) but I never got to it. But THIS year. ... Yes indeed, I have great plans. If only half of them come to pass I'll be satisfied . I think. Maybe . I hope. We shall see.

On the food front, last night we made the best spaghetti sauce ever. Well, for here anyway. And over home grown spaghetti squash it is oooooh so good.

We have lots on the agenda , not sure if any of it will get accomplished or not, Elly May can only do so much and as long as my health is being so uncooperative , we have to let some things go. But that is okay. It is a season in life. God gives the strength to accomplish what he wants you too. If he doesn't give it, obviously you weren't meant to do it to begin with. Or something like that. Happy New Year.

How to Deal With Post Season Decorations..

So we really enjoyed our gingerbread outhouse centerpiece this year. Then one evening we were celebrating a birthday and had forgotten to light the candles on the table. That is just not excusable .. I mean FIRE people. You need it for special occasions. ANYway, dinner already being over, I lit them anyway, then being the thinking person that I am, that considers all future consequences to ones actions (ha ha and haaa) ... I lit the icicles on the outhouse on fire just to see if they would burn. Golly gee.. they do! With lots of screams and hollers from the more prudent members of the family, I blew it out. Geez people... it isn't like it was going to burn very fast anyway. But ... I had a brilliant idea. In other years we threw gingerbread houses off the roof too see how they smashed (not very impressive actually... then you just have a lot of candy powder to clean up afterwards. ) why not burn this one???? It would be a grand way to end the party. So with much excitement and happy squeals of anticipation , we whisked the singed creation outside to the concrete and brought all the dry pine greenery that had been adorning doorways and stuff. You know, just for a bigger show and all.

Before....

Then, being the Lady of the Flames , I got to start the proceedings.. Elly May documented. :-)

Kind of slow going , not very impressive ..

Ah.. .but pine burns really really well.

The big guns.. though not nearly as fun as matches (it is the smell .... magnesium... mmmmm) the torch got things going much faster.

Ahhh.. a tree has fallen on the privy!!

So we add more because it burns so well.

The roof caved in and melted.. the whole thing kind of melted actually. It was a grand show. I'm sure the neighbors were wondering what on earth was going on . There were delightful sparks flying all over the place (it was moist out from a previous rain.. don't worry.. we also had a hose ready) . Granted a huge bonfire would have been way more fun but we do the best we can under the circumstances.

The aftermath on the concrete.... shh.. don't tell Mom. Anyway, it was a grand send off for a privy.

Gingerbread the Elly May Way...

So.. I've (that is me , Annabelle) been terrible about posting anything lately. Chronic exhaustion has required mandatory resting... though Elly May has been extremely busy. I'm finally getting around to posting some of the things that were done before Christmas. Happy New Year everyone by the way. All two of you. :-)
This is about as cold as it gets here.. frost on the roof ouside my window . It is quite pretty. It has been warmer of late and there has been no frost but we are expecting a lot of rain here really soon in the coming week. Sounds like a deluge. We could really use it but maybe a bit more spread out so the hillsides don't all come washing down.

Oh why do they do this to me??

We switched the antlers to Punker Man and the hat to J.B. Don't they look thrilled? I thought so.

Oh yeah... the project .. and whole reason for this post. This is a special gingerbread house. Can you guess what this part is?

It goes in here..

Ah.. taking shape.

You can't seen the moon cut out but it is there in the door. She even used the extra white frosting for a squat snowman. I think he was melting..

And what is an outhouse without a Sears Roebuck and Co. catalog?? We couldn't get corn cobs that small....

Now ain't that purdy? So much better than an normal house. It got better though. When we were finished with it for the season , it got a grand send off.. but that is another post.

To Rest the Eyes....

After the previous two posts, here is a post with nothing objectionable to anyone. I don't think anyway.

Mr. Precious

I love the sky... and I love clouds.

The End of the Road

For this guy anyway. He was pinching chicken feed.

No more he ain't . Sorry buddy.

Squirrel Skinning 101..

I must give a little warning before you move on. If you have a squeamish stomach.. you might just want to skip this whole post. Well, you can look at Punker Man there but I think you just might be better off skipping the rest. So if you keep reading.. I did warn you.

He smells something....

Where is it?

Ahhh. the patient. Well , this poor guy had a run in with a car or something on the road and Dad found him the other day and brought him home since he was in such good shape. I mean, normally, roadkill is a big hit or miss kind of deal.. usually it is a pretty big mess and there isn't much to do but leave it for highway dressing , but this guy.... was totally perfect. He must have been bumped but not run over. Anyway, not wanting him to go to waste... he came home to Elly May and her very sharp skinning knife.

He should have brushed his teeth or something...

The first incision in....hmmmm . we'll call him Ivan for now .

She is skinning this guy cased for mounting. Gently the knife works to seperate the skin and flesh.

Biology 101..

The leg...

The toe nails remain with the pelt.. so she has to cut through the toe bones here.

This picture is just weird. It looks like a lot of different things.. none of which I will mention here. But what it really is.. is just the tail being slipped off.

Most of the pelt is off now...the tail came off beautifully in one piece. I tried it one time with another squirrel and the tail broke.... humph.

Just like a tube...

Okay, I am sorry, I know this is really gross.. but if you were curious as to what a squirrel looked like without its coat... now you know. If we were Southern and hungry... we could fry this baby up. But we have some scruples ... it wasn't bled out properly for one. And we don't eat rodents. Not unless we are desperate. And we aren't there yet so I can hang on to my snooty scruples for now.

It looks so deflated...

The end. She did a beautiful job and it went really quick. She saved the skull for the brain as this is going to be brain tanned. First it needs to be fleshed (all the little pieces of flesh/meat/fat still sticking to the skin have to be scraped off before tanning..). But right now it is in the freezer.