Fall came quickly this year. Nights are getting chilly.

My afternoons are spent fixing the roof, but there are all the things that always need to get done. The usual chaos, so to say. I am getting better (and faster) at al of it. Slowly, I am adding more skills, as others become routine.

I really don’t like the canner I chose. My husband jokes we live in a fast food kitchen. I’ll have to find a different solution soon.

I really enjoy canning. I dream about a pantry filled with home-grown, home-canned food. Home-canned food just tastes so much better. These are canned diced tomatoes. And they are so simple.

You just wash your tomatoes, chop them into sizes of your choosing, and squeeze it all down with your hand. Close them up and off into the canner they go. Yes, that’s it.

I’ve been canning a lot of potatoes lately, many of which were thick-skinned enough to need peeling. I am not complaining about the amount of skin chips. Seriously, they are delicious!

Two of my jars didn’t seal. I knew that ring needed replacing… But it’s fine. We’ll use them up quickly, so they can go into the fridge. A few hours later, the potatoes were done, too. And all sealed, yay.

Whenever something becomes routine, I learn something new. Brewing kombucha has become automatic. I’m making a lot, and meeting my needs for non-water drinking. It’s been dialed in.

Currently, I’m learning how to make sourdough bread rolls. My first attempt failed. I mean, they were still good to eat, but far from perfect. So, I tried again two days later. And this time, things went much more smoothly. I hate how much easier it is to bake with light flours compared to whole wheat. I’ll get there. Much better!

Slowly, I am replacing what we buy with what we make.

We no longer buy granola. It takes minutes to make a batch. Now, we get to adapt it exactly to our taste. A bit of syrup instead of a lot of sugar, for example.

I can dry the apples myself. The next batch might even be from fruit I harvested. Next year, when my strawberries, blackberries, and other fruit are growing, I’ll hopefully have some to dehydrate for granola.

But there is a lot of work between now and home-grown fruit. Right now, I don’t even have water yet. One step at a time. Winter is coming quickly. I am excited for spring. It’s time for the last harvests.

So long, and thanks for being here.