Yesterday, we canned peaches. 11 quarts of peaches. Four hours of peeling and pitting. The preparation process was long and finger-stiffening but it's really nice to know that all those pretty, yummy peaches won't go to waste. The actually canning process itself was much easier than I'd expected it to be. We went to my husband's grandmother's house to do it. She's been canning for decades so who better to learn from. I have my mother's old canner but it's a far different kind of canner. Grandma has a pressure canner and man but it was easy! It's something I think I could do down the road. If I only have enough to do two quarts of something - I might even be able to do it in my own little pressure cooker - the one I thought was BIG is tiny compared to her canner! For a few years, until we really get the hang of it - I'll go to grandma's to do the canning but I'm fairly confident that, after I get some good practice in, it's something I should be able to do on my own too. I'm hoping to make some pasta sauce when our tomatoes come on - the vines are full of them right now and they look like they're all going to rippen at once. If they do - there's no way we're going to be able to eat them all so, why not go ahead and make a big vat of sauce and stick it in jars for this winter? Makes me wish we'd planted a bigger garden. Or that the stinky groundhog didn't decide to attack our cucumbers. Pickles and relish would have been nice. But - maybe next year. It's definately something we'll continue to do. For all the prep work - it was really easy to do. What I need to do is hit up the farmer's markets and stuff and maybe get a bushel of peas, or beans, or something... I'm in the mood toplay Ant. stock stock stock the shelves - prepping for the winter... All these years playing grasshopper and the change is refreshing :)
Tomorrow, CrazyHorse goes back to school. I'm really looking forward to it. I hope we do as well with teachers as we have done in the past. Overall though, it doesn't matter too much just yet. He has his gifted program and I have no problem giving him things to do to keep him challenged without making it seem too much like work.
It will be interesting to see how Wolverine does with the change in schedule. Hopefully, it goes well. In a perfect world it will go well enough that the little guy will quit refusing to sleep in his own bed and I can stop sleeping on the couch. We've finally got him about as evened out as we can manage. Wolverine has his doctor's appointment next week and I'm really looking forward to hearing what she has to say now, about his skin issues and the diet we're following with him.
CrazyHorse is not particularly looking forward to going back to school - at least, not that he'll admit. I personally think he is but he just doesn't want to be that uncool.
I'm just at a loss with the little guy right now. Everything I try - it works for a little while but somehow, it just stops. Not the food thing though - the diet appears to be doing wonders. He's even eating more now than he used to and I can't help but wonder if removing the colors didn't help that a little bit. First he started reacting to certain kinds of Pampers. Not the whole diaper, just the waist band. Something about the waistband made him rashy. And not all Pampers just the one kind but they don't make swaddlers in his size I don't think and I can't keep baby dry and cruisers straight in my head. So, we switched to Huggies and did great for seven months that way. But he's itching at the waist again. Though I suppose it could be the soap again too but I'm doubting that. This time next year, it won't be a consideration anymore hopefully but I've tried them all and most of them aren't worth the time as they like to explode. I just can't win with this kid! In the end, I have a feeling I know where this is going but as much as it's environmentally friendly - cloth diapers... not my cup of tea. definately not. And, on this one issue - I'm not really inclined to be all that apologetic.
in the food! We were out of town and away from home. The soap and lotion hadn't changed a bit but it was much harder to keep to his diet while we were gone. I tried- I really did but in the end, I ran out of his stuff and had to order stuff and lo and behold - the scratching is back. So - we figure it has to be a color or a sweetener. Those have been the only things we've restricted so far and it made a huge difference apparently. A few days off his regular, no artificial stuff diet - and he's a mess of itchy. So - next time we go somewhere, I'll have to prepare better, make sure I have his stuff and that we use the plug into the car cooler for his stuff. Poor kid just can't win! On the upside, I suppose our questions about what works have been answered to some extent. And here I was hoping it was as simple as soap.
We've changed soaps again for him, a simple castille soap, and it seems to be working with no ill effect. Between that and restricting the artificial additives in his diet - the scratching has gone down dramatically. It's a struggle to keep those additives down when a kid doesn't want to eat anything but hotdogs... fortunately for me, anything that looks like a hotdog will generally do. I'd love to get my hands on a nitrate free hotdog brand. What I need to do eventually is get my own sausage stuffer - that way I have complete control of the contents.
Right now, we've changed most of his snacky stuff over to Earth's Best - no icky stuff PLUS he seems to really like them. He does NOT like the all natural gummy bears. But, can't win them all I suppose. There should be more companies out there that realize that people want alternatives to all the fillers, all the artificial colors and sweeteners. It shouldn't be so difficult to walk into a grocery store and find things that are compatible with that.
You would think it would be pretty self-explanatory, that all the artificial stuff doesn't always need to be there. that there are better ways. So what if it means putting sugar in the top list of ingrediants. I'd rather see sugar then three kinds of artificial sweeteners. I've learned a lot about the things we eat just by reading labels. So many companies fib by splitting their sugars. Where sugar would be the main ingrediant, it's much further down the list because those companies don't use just sugar. They split it up. You're still getting the same amount of sweeteners, it just doesn't look like it. Makes you wonder about the products that say 30% less sugar, etc. How many of those products have exactly the same amount of sweeteners but just use less real sugar? I'd rather have the real stuff than the crap. When did it get to be like this - everyone is tricky with their words and their ingredients. It's not right. But, they go with what will sell to moms that don't have time to read the labels. big banners with Less Sugar and Low Fat or 99% fat free or all that other nonsense - it's all tricky. New rules should be put in place - that they can't say less sugar when all they did was toss in more dextrose or which ever other sweetener they're using in sugar's stead. It's just not right.