Applesauce

This weekend I went down to my parents' house to make and can applesauce.  Earlier in the month we picked a lot of apples.  So we had a lot of apples to sauce.  My mom, sister and I all worked together to can applesauce.  Here are a few pictures I took.

I got a total of 52 Quarts!!

It is so good to see our shelves full of stuff I have canned!!!  It just makes everything taste better when you eat it.  Thanks mom for instilling a love of canning in me and teaching me how to do all of this.

It's a Masquerade!!

On Saturday October 19th we had our annual Halloween Party.  This year we decided to have a masquerade party.  We invited a lot of people.  Unfortunately that weekend a lot of people were out of town.  But those that came we had such a great time.  We decorated our house for the event. Here are some of the pictures from that night.

I decorated everything I could.

Our big purchase this year was a fog machine and a lighted skeleton to put in the ground.  It is really cool to see at night.

I found this idea on pinterest to make rice krispies treats as pumpkins.  They turned out so cute, and everybody loved them.

We got to use 2 wedding gifts that we hadn't gotten to use yet.  One was the 3 crock pot buffet in this picture.  I made 3 dips for different chips.  I made a spinach artichoke dip, a nacho cheese dip, and a chili and cream cheese dip.  They were all delicious.  Those that came also brought some fun treats.

My costume

Jon's costume

Zach, Kari and Mina Iroz

Jake, Stephanie and Gracie Hedgecock

Jon and Me

After we ate and talked for a little while, we cleared off the table and played catch phrase.  That was the second wedding gift we used that we hadn't opened yet.  We had such a blast.  Everyone left around 10:30.  Thanks everyone for coming, it always is so much fun to have people here.

Happy Birthday Lisa!!

Sunday October 6th, we had a birthday dinner for my sister Lisa.  Her birthday is the 8th but it is on a Tuesday and it is a lot easier for people to get down to my parents on Sunday.  It was extra special this year, because my sister Emily and her family were on their way home from a trip to southern Utah. They decided to stop in and have dinner.  Since all of us girls were there, my mom wanted to get pictures.

It was so fun to be able to get together.  It doesn't happen very often.  :)  Thanks Emily for stopping in and thanks Lisa for having a birthday so we could get together.  We love you!  Happy Birthday.

Fair Fun

The Central Washington State Fair was held in Yakima this last week.  For date night, Jon and I decided to spend an evening at the fair.  We had a lot of fun.  Jon had never been to the fair here in Yakima so I made sure we walked the entire fair.  It's a big fair!!!  I forgot how big.  We looked at everything.

I think one of Jon's favorite places was the Super Hero exhibit.  We spent quite a while in there.  They even had the bat mobile for the original Batman series in 1969.  That was pretty cool to see. 

Of course we enjoyed some of our favorite fair food, curly fries, elephant ears, and cotton candy.  We had such a great time.

It's harvest time, it's harvest time, there's canning all around!

That is what has been happening at our house this last month.  We have been very busy canning and getting our food storage ready for the winter.  I have really enjoyed canning as I have gotten older.  It always feels so good when I know I have put the hard work into it.  I have been very blessed to be able to get the things I need at a pretty good price.  Jon has helped me as much as he can. 

We started out the season canning peaches.   And boy were they good.  I started peaches a little earlier this year and used a different variety.  I was very pleased with them.

I skipped out on pears this year.  I decided since Jon doesn't really like them, I had plenty from the previous year. So the next thing we moved on to was beans.  I did beans for a really long time.  I grew my own beans this year.  I got so many I started to give them away.  Unfortunately I had to let them go to seed, because everyone seemed to be good with beans.  I'm excited to be able to grow them for next year.

After beans, it was time to can Tomatoes.  I needed a lot of tomatoes this year.  Jon and I had a fun time doing these.  It is so nice to have him help me.  I don't get quite so tired when he does.

Jon and I love Harvest Soup, so we also made some of that.  We only did one batch because we still had some from last year.

My garden this year did really great.  I planted 2 plants of cucumbers and got a LOT of cucumbers.  At one point I had 15 cucumbers sitting on my counter.  So I decided to try something new this year, and make pickles.  I sliced them all so they would be good for hamburgers.  I was a little worried about doing it, because I had never done it and didn't know how they would turn out.  But they turned out to be really good.  They weren't even that mushy.  If I plant cucumbers again next year, I will definitely do this again. 

Recently we just froze corn.  Boy was that a job.  Mom, Lisa and I got together in Grandview and went to work on all of our corn.  It ended up being an all day job because we had so much, but everyone helped out.  Even Grandpa and Grandma!!  We had such a good time working together.

The last thing I need to do this year is applesauce.  I'm not sure when we will be able to do that yet, but once the applesauce is done, I will be done canning for the year!!!  That will be good because the Holiday season is right around the corner.  Thanks to everyone who helped out, and provided ways for me to get the things I needed.