It’s been almost two months since my last post. I have good reason…promise. I mentioned in my last post that I’d been feeling ill and exhausted…leaving me feeling slightly burnt out on the ways of simple livin’. You may have guessed …
Yep! Baby #5 will arrive in the Spring. I’m well into my second trimester at this point and feeling much, much better. Being able to eat again is such a gloriously glorious thing. Food. My BFF these days. I have pretty rough first trimesters. With the last two babies, I ended up in the hospital dehydrated because of the severe morning sickness. Thank goodness it wasn’t as bad this time around, but I was still feeling very lousy. Tired, moody, tired, sick, tired, moody, sick, sick, sick. You know the drill. Adding to this the fact that my husband was out of town for 3 weeks for work, and we really brought it down to survival mode in our household for the end of Summer.
I did eventually start feeling well enough to can the tomatoes when they came rolling in. Our harvest wasn’t as good as it was last year, but we still got enough for lots of salsa, stewed tomatoes, and tomato sauce. I tried this recipe for my tomato sauce. It requires no boiling/peeling of the tomatoes, which I really appreciated. Being efficient with my time is essential, especially when trying to can with 4 little ones running around. There’s nothing fast about canning. Anything I can do to make it faster or more efficient, I’ll try. I know that’s a slightly controversial thing…not peeling the tomatoes. I’m happy with the results, though. I’ll definitely do it again this way next year.
(Pictured here are San Marzano, Brandywine, and Black Cherry Heirloom Tomatoes. The San Marzano were my favorite for canning, brandywines were perfect for slicing, and the black cherry tomatoes were great for salads but were very very juicy)
Side Note: I will absolutely be growing San Marzano tomatoes again this year. They’re amazing! I was a little nervous earlier in the summer because it didn’t look like they were producing much. It turned out that they’re just late producers, though. I got a plentiful harvest from them in September, while my other tomatoes were putting forth their best fruit mostly in late August.
Part of preparing for Winter for us includes canning. I never do accomplish quite as much as I hope to. Here is pictured stewed tomatoes, tomato sauce, salsa, and orange peach marmalade. The marmalade didn’t set up very well. I’m not sure if I’ll end up recanning it with added pectin, or just use it as sauce for grilling meats. I think it’d be pretty tasty that way. I also made some hot pepper jelly, with also did not set up very well. That recipe already had commercial pectin added in, and I’ve read it can take up to 6 weeks for it to properly set up. So I’m going to wait and see if they set up at all.
So there’s a quick update on our family and what we’ve been up to! I’ll be back soon to share some more recipes (including elderberry syrup and sauerkraut!!), as well as wintertime preparedness. Thanks so much for taking time out of your busy life to stop by! 
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