Day 3 - more plums & salsa

Today I made plum sauce out of the plums I cooked down on day 1. I made 1 batch using a Plum Sauce recipe and the 2nd batch using a Tangy Plum Sauce recipe. Then after having my own little taste test I decided to make the 3rd batch using the tangy recipe, only adding a little more plums to it. It made it a little more tart but still very tasty. We had some of it on our chicken tonight. Fantastic!
I made the salsa today using up most of the tomatoes, peppers and onions. Isn't this colorful?
Here it is all mixed together. After chopping everything by hand it has to cook for 2 hours. It's sure worth it, blister and all. I love this recipe. It's sweet with a little kick, but not too spicy. It's just right.

Here is the finished product: 7 jars of Plum sauce, 11 jars of salsa, 8 pint jars and 13 8oz. jars of Tangy plum sauce. The little ones are so cute, they're perfect for gifts, don't you think?

Day 2 - more of the same

The steamer/juicer is hard at work again today. I am juicing the rest of the plums to drink and make plum jelly later this winter. I love plum jelly.
Porter's favorite dessert is peach cobbler. He always asks for it for his birthday. The problem is Porter's birthday is the first of October when the "ripe off the tree" peaches are gone. I decided the left over peaches from yesterday would make the best cobbler. "If you make it, he will come" applied to this situation. Hence, Porter's birthday was celebrated today!
16 quarts of plum juice.

I also made a frozen peach pie with almond flavoring. My 2 favorite combinations! Wouldn't that make a great icecream flavor. Peach Almond Ding! hee hee

I always wanted to have the job of making up names of icecream and finger nail polish. As you can see, I'd better keep my day job.

Tonight I had the Activity Day girls over to make invitations and cookies to give to their dad's for the Daddy/Daughter night. Pictured clockwise from top: Kayle, Meg, Emily, Kiera, and Katie.
Pictured clockwise from bottom right: Vanessa, Kelyn, Kate, Ashley, Taylor, Julia, and Cassidy.

Here are the finished cookie's for their dads. Didn't they do a great job!
Oh and then they each got to make one for themselves to eat! Not a candy morsel was wasted.

Porter may have had his peach cobbler but Brittany has a fancy for frosted sugar cookies. I mean FROSTED sugar cookies. She made sure I had enough for the girls and then she hid the rest for us. What I mean is she hid the rest for her! After the girls left she frosted the left over hidden cookies with the left over frosting. It didn't matter if it was pretty, it just had to have plenty. I knew she liked the pink frosted cookies from Costco but I had no idea how much until last night when I realized its more like an obsession. By the way, I always put almond flavoring in my frosting as well. I guess you could say, I have an almond obsession!

Day 1 - and so it begins...

9 am and the grapes are in the steam/juicer.

Aren't they beautiful? The flavor is amazing.

While the grapes were steaming, I canned peaches and started cooking the plums
Here is the finished product 10 hours later.

18 quarts of peaches and 40 quarts of white grape juice.

About 9 pound of plums are cooked down and ready to make into sauce.

I was so exhausted that I headed for the tub. While I was soaking my aches and pains, Rick ran to the store and bought me a bouquet of flowers. What a guy! Even though fruit is his least favorite thing, he appreciates my efforts in storing the harvest.

Farmers Market

I had so much fun at the market on Saturday. It has such an amazing aroma; basil, lavendar, and even kettle corn. But that didn't distract me from what I came for. Tucked away in the back corner is Haas Farms fruit stand. I have been purchasing from them all summer. They have an amazing selection that changes with the season. Here is this weeks purchase:

Niagra grapes - Welch's purchases this variety for their white grape juice.

I bought 5 boxes!
O'Henry peaches! They are so flavorful and juicy.
I bought 2 boxes. Sorry the picture is so dark but these are dark purple plums - yum, yum!

I bought 2 boxes!

I bought 1 box of tomatoes and 1 box of onion/pepper combination to make more salsa!

and 1 box of Jonathan apples! Did anyone total that box count? That would be 12!

Now the work begins!

Lake Quinault & Quinault Rain Forest

Hiking trail to the lake on the north shore.

A break in the trees for a view of the mountains.
The sun shining through the rain forest. They get about 142 inches of rain a year. We had the most perfect day to explore the area.This waterfall is located on the south shore road just after crossing the bridge from the north shore.
Lake Quinault Lodge, built in the 1920's. The location and view are amazing and gave one the feeling of going back to a more leisurely time.

Kalaloch

As we got closer to the ocean the fog set in. The mysterious wall of fog ahead of us.
This is the Kalaloch Lodge. We spent the night here in one of the cabins near by. The fog was so thick the night before we didn't see the beauty of this location until the next morning when we awoke to this...

What a gorgeous location. We could have spent hours here.

Forks

You Twilight fanatics will love this...


Need I say more? The whole town is a buzz. Bella's birthday is coming up on Saturday and they expected thousands to show up for the event. Here is an interary of the days events.
We picked up t-shirts for some of the fans back home.
It was pretty entertaining to listen to the locals buzz about their NOW famous town.

Lake Crescent

This is the most gorgeous lake. The mountains extend right into the lake. The water is very cold and crystal clear.
This is Lake Crescent Lodge. We ate lunch here and enjoyed the view.
The property has darling little cottages to stay in as well.

Olympic Peninsula - Port Angeles

We stayed here at the George Washington Inn. They just opened in February of this year. It sits on the Straight of Juan de Fuca just east of Port Angeles.
What a gorgeous view from the balcony of our room.

The view from the front of the house looking toward the Olympic mountains. Sunny blue skies and 75 degrees - it was perfect!

Cooling off in HOT Ariziona

Tyler is fearless! He jumps in with great gusto! He's lovin' it and I'm loving him!
Ty and his Mom enjoying the refreshing coolness of the pool. Of course I thought the water was great. Those accustomed to Arizona weather thought it a little nippy.
He's number ONE!

(someone needs a little reminder of using his pointer finger for such exclamations)

Worthy Motto

I love this sign. I think it is very thought provoking. It has been a motto of mine throughout my life. (Just not quite stated that way or in print.) My parents instilled in me a desire to work hard, be engaged in good works and to enjoy the end result. With so much to see, do and enjoy in this life ~ I can't imagine idleing through it.

Family Photo Op

Jacob, Tyler & Alicia
Ty Man
Taking a nap
NOT!