My Grandma & Grampa

This is my GMA & GPA…

I miss them both.

They lived on a dairy.

 My GPA taught me about cows, HARD work, & what “silage” tasted like! ICK!

My Gma always wore a dress & heels. She was a petite little thing.

She wore toilet paper around her hair at night, so she would look “good” in the morning.

My Gpa didn’t give us candy.

 When we left his house, he would give us a teaspoonful of brown sugar

, from the jar in Gma’s kitchen.

 Nothing fancy..but it meant EVERYTHING to us!

They owned a peach orchard.

 40 acres of peaches.

I never really thought about it when I was little.

 It was just a “lot of trees”. HOW to keep it all together?

Mom & Dad’s ENGAGEMENT photo

This is my MOM & Dad ( I just found this engagement pic.) HAHA

59 years together!

They worked hard.

My dad went to work every day.

 Dressed in his suit & white shirt

( that my mom ironed..I know ..with an iron & ironing board! )

And my mom worked a self-owned business,

was ALWAYS there when we got home from school,

 and helped us with EVERYTHING we ever did ( sports, clubs, school, etc).

And I never asked HOW?

How do you do it ALL?

And now this…

Both my GMA & My MOM canned fruits, made pickles, and baked goodies!

Now I don’t bake ( leave that gene to my sister, Susie).

I have NEVER made pickles..& probably won’t… BUT

I   CAN  FRUIT!   

I CAN FRUIT, A LOT!

I  remember walking into GMA’s garage & seeing shelves FULL of canned goods.

I grabbed bottles of canned fruits from my mom’s shelves in our garage.

Peaches, pears, cherries, etc, etc, etc…  whenever we wanted!

Winter, Spring, Summer, Fall

It didn’t matter…it was always there.

HOW????

I never asked.

So now… I apologize to GMA & MOM.

I should have asked to help you peel, or slice, or wash, or……..or….or……

But, I cannot take it back.

SO?

I will follow in your steps.

I will teach MY DAUGHTER to can!

And my granddaughters!

I will continue the family tradition.

Only…we will use the recipe on my laptop.

( I know GMA & MOM didn’t do that!)

So here was my day TODAY ( from start to finish ).

Canning Peaches – jars

canning peaches

Wash the jars ( hot water & heated dry) in the dishwasher.

I know, GMA didn’t have a diswasher.

Hands and Hot water!

fresh peaches

washing peaches

blanched peaches

Wash..rinse…BLANCH (  Boil  whole peaches, then put in a pan of ICE WATER!)

Their peels just slide right off!

Slice, Slice, slice!

Hubbies canning station

Too hot to cook inside!

Set up our camp stove OUTSIDE!

Pan on the left is a sugar/water mixture.

Cook the peaches in for a short time, then pour them into jars!

Hubby is sooooo  good at this!

Peaches in jars

Sliced peaches in jars

peaches in jars

Then…

Boil in a water bath ( 25 minutes ) to seal.

seal the cans

Canned peaches

canned peaches

There we go!

11 quarts of fresh canned peaches!

They will be sooo  good this winter!

Daddy gave us more peaches

…so I am thinking of a peach cobbler for dinner!

or maybe…..

I SHOULD MAKE JAM!

Gma made jam……so did MOM…WOW!

This is HOW!

I should THANK them.   🙂

And I did. Gma hears my prayers. Mom gets my phone calls.

TELL THEM THANK YOU!

It gives me warm fuzzies. 🙂  Happy heart.

Here are some more posts to help me “get it all together!”

Planting Seeds