I'm not sure how much more I'm going to do, but I've been trying for the last week or so to take advantage of all the fresh produce and start preserving some. Stored away for the winter, we currently have: frozen green peppers (sliced and chopped)
frozen chopped cabbage
pickled beets
frozen corn
canned tomato juice/soup
frozen peach pie filling (frozen in pie plates, then taken out, and wrapped); enough for 3 pies It's a lot of work. On one hand, I feel very proud and satisfied. On the other hand, I feel humbled and ridiculous, as I know so many women are doing so much more. Even if it is a smallish amount, I'm happy to do it. The product that we end up with is the highest quality, made with love in our own kitchen, using local produce, in small batches. 
I bought the sweet corn from a stand downtown, 3 dozen. Jacob and Grace helped me shuck. 
I boiled the ears for 4 minutes and let cool on towels. Sarah had an ear of corn for a snack. 
I cut the kernels off the cobs, and scraped out the sweet, milky juices with the edge of my knife. Grace helped me add melted butter to coat. 
We ended up with four quarts of frozen corn. We're eating lots of corn on the cob with dinner lately. It is sooooooooooooooooooo delicious! I hope this frozen corn will taste just like it this winter.  Carl (our gardening neighbor) brought me a bushel of tomatoes yesterday as I was working on the peach pie filling. As soon as I got up this morning, I set to work making tomato sauce. 
I tried to keep the little ones with me as much as possible, to keep them out of mischief. Seth helped me stir. Sarah had a tomato with breakfast. 
Hours and hours of chopping, boiling, straining, and boiling later, I ended up with 5 quarts of thin tomato sauce...useful for soup, recipes, or for cooking down for spaghetti sauce. I also roasted a tray of tomatoes. I halved them, put fresh garlic and dried basil on top of each, salted and peppered, and drizzled with olive oil. Roasted in a 400 degree oven until done. Can I say? Absolutely superb. Velvety, intense, served on sour dough toast. 
I wasn't 100% successful in keeping children out of mischief. Sarah got into the nail polish and I found her sitting on the children's play table, painting her nails! 
She said, "I painted my foot, and I painted my fingernail!" Thank goodness it was only the clear glittery kind and not red!  
| 
Now I try to keep life simpler. My oldest daughter is carrying on the tradition, though, and she inherited my canner and all my jars when we moved to Denmark. Have you ever heard of a Foley food mill? I had one, and it was so helpful for straining out the seeds and skins. I loved it for homemade applesauce. I just washed, quartered and cooked the apples and then cranked the resulting goop through the food mill. All the seeds, skin, stems were taken out! SO easy! I have also read that many of the important antioxidants in fruits and veggies are right under the skin, so it is good when you can NOT to peel stuff. Anyway, I love the pics of your produce all lined up. Plums are also easy to can. You just prick them with a fork, pour hot syrup over them, and process them. They look so pretty in the jars, too! Too bad my family didn't like them! LOL!
