Pioneer Woman at Heart

  The area farmers are taking out their crops, and the dust is as thick as fog around here.  My eyes burn when I work outside (trying to stay inside for that).  It's very dry, and very hot right now.  Temperatures are soaring to the upper 80's.  It was 88°F the other day and the heat continues.  If we are lucky, the rain will finally be here this week.   We picked the very last of the tomatoes.  What is left on the plants are rotting before even ripening.  Very strange year overall.  We are thankful for what harvest we are getting. Exhausted.  I, ha ha! Am. Exhausted.  Taking a few days off canning, and trying to catch up with cleaning, dusting, putting things away, errands, sweeping, dishes, and laundry...... My favorite morning reading, is called "Just Breathe" Devotions and Prayer for the Overwhelmed Heart (and I am loving all of them so far).

  I'm putting together my barter for my husband's cousin.  She is the one who found me canning lids and had them shipped to my home.  I bought a red plastic basket and found this cute "canning" decor.  She'll get a jar of home canned tomato soup, home canned ketchup, and some other items I haven't yet decided on. There are two brands of whole dried elderberries being recalled, and one is certain batch numbers of organic starwest botanicals.  I received an email, but thankfully it is not the batch I bought. Tuesday was a much less stress over housework kind of day.  So thankful for that.   I had one daughter home early and the other home later.  We moved front porch furniture (some) into storage and hauled the wood we split to the porch.   The chainsaw parts have not arrived yet, and there has been no word on my car (going on week 4 of the car). I haven't found any copies of my "Teabag Tidbits" newsletters.  Yet.  I may hav...

I finally met Hubby's cousin "C" and she bartered with me - tomatoes for me and strawberry margarita jam for her.  She is a hoot too.  We are planning a meet and greet meal soon to meet more family members.  First up?  Tomato sauce.  If I have more after that, tomato soup or crushed tomatoes maybe.  I guess I'll find out when I weigh them. I also bartered with our 20 year-old daughter.  She came out yesterday to help me do more cleaning and picking up, and she got strawberry margarita jam and lunch.  Organic grilled cheese sandwiches and organic tomato soup with a dab of organic butter.  I miss my home canned tomato soup.  We got the living room back in order, some carpets vacuumed, master bath completely cleaned but the shower and tub (it's an overly big bathroom) and wood work still needs wiped down, finished the laundry, picked up stuff in the bedroom (oh my, craft stuff everywhere, which was still everywhere because we r...

Two weeks ago, I placed dried elderberries and raw honey in a canning jar.  I let it sit in a warm location to infuse.    The result?  

In the midst of a mad-woman cleaning day, I ran across a box of printed cardstock that was storing an unfinished project.

Remember all of this from last year?  Well, it's slowly dwindling.  However, the pepper mustard sauce (the yellow quart jars in the photo) will be a "keeper" recipe.  I canned the 4 jars using 36 hot banana peppers, and it's been wonderful.   How do I use it?