by This title about sums up the major points of my week from Sunday’s wedding to this moment.
Tonight I finished canning all the apple juice that we girls and my mom juiced from thousands of apples on Tuesday…okay, after six hours of processing apples, it felt like a thousand! And it’s unbelievable how many apples go into making a few gallons of juice. Also incredible is the taste! This juice needs NO sugar. It’s from three varieties of apples and SO mouth-watering good!
So we processed the juice on Tuesday, or I should say, my girls did…they ran the juicer while my mom and I kept the cored apples coming. Along with the juice we also made more apple pie filling and applesauce for the freezer, and filled my dehydrator trays with more apple slices. For the past two days the juice has been taking up all my available refrigerator space giving the sludge sediment time to settle to the bottoms of the pitchers. Before canning, I had to strain the juice through a double thickness of cheesecloth, and you wouldn’t believe what a slow process that was! Lots of gunk stopped up the cheesecloth, so I had to keep rinsing it out and going again. But we have a few gallons of the best ever apple juice to look forward to consuming! (problem is, I’ve talked about it too much to family, they all want some! my daughters keep shushing me!)
Yesterday was the triple baby shower we hosted for some homeschool mom friends who all gave birth within the same week’s time…a great reason to throw a party! After cleaning up from that, I headed to church to help cook meals for family camp…fun to cook on a grand scale with three other women! We worked the logistics for six meals for 65 people…
Then last night my hubby and I worked till 3 A.M. on these trophy halters for our town’s Junior Ranch Rodeo this weekend (pictured next to several jars of my apple juice)…he and my oldest finished them up tonight at 11:30 P.M. Yawn.
Today we went to town yet again, to participate in a Zoo Education experience that was totally worth it. See my 8 year old manning a fire hose at one of the learn
ing centers?
So, I’ve barely been keeping up with *my* life in between apples, trips to town and daily details like laundry that needs done each morning even when I’m too busy…
Hope you all have a great weekend! See you next week…
Seems like you’ve been quite busy– but it’s a happy busy!
So, are you selling the juice through eBay or what? I mean, how am I supposed to get some? 🙂
MInTheGap’s last blog post..Gov. Palin Reminds Us of Reagan
Ya know, I’d ship you some, but am not sure how it would travel!!! Lots of bubble wrap? 😉
Yes, it’s been a happy busy, and we just got back from a weekend with church family at Family Camp, just the refresher I needed after last week! It’s good to be back.
I tend to agree with most of what you said in your post but I
did post something related on my blog a while back.
Here’s just some of what I said in that post…
In that light, whoever plans the engagement party (likely the bride’s family, but it can be the engaged couple or anyone else who wants to plan the party) should plan a few games and activities designed to help everyone get to know everyone else.
Give it a read and if you have any opinions on it of your own,
feel free to give me a shout…
weddings’s last blog post..Pre Wedding Activities
Thanks, Weddings!
It does sound like you are busy! I have never pressed my own apple juice before. Did you make more than you can drink right away? If so how do you plan on storing it so that it does not go bad?
Hi Shannon,
Yes we made several gallons…we drank a bunch fresh, and I canned the rest. I had to flash pasteurize it by heating it up for a certain amount of time, and then canned it. We’ve been doling it out very frugally, to make it last longer! 😉 It’s still more delicious than what you can buy in the store, even after canning it! The stuff in the store must be watered down 75%, no joke!
Wow, that sounds like a ton of apples to make apple juice. I’m surprised you didn’t need sugar to make the juice though !? Sounds like a lot of fun. Also sounds like a lot of work. 😉
~Deb
Hey Stressless Deb. It did take a ton of apples, and my apple/peeler/corer/slicer bit the dust two years ago so we used an apple wedger…one of us kept wedging while the others sliced peels off. And no sugar was necessary, believe me, this was the best juice we’ve ever had. The stuff in the stores has to be 70% watered down. Seriously. It was fun work! 😉 Thanks for commenting!
Mary, your story takes me back to the days of making apple juice and canning fresh vegetables with my mother and grandmother. I didn’t know it then, but those would turn out to be some of my fondest memories of childhood. Thanks for sharing!
I, too, have fond memories of my mom and sisters canning tomatoes, etc, in the hot summer months…canning is a wonderful project to share with friends and loved ones…no wonder our ancestors liked to have working bees! Thanks for taking time to comment here!