Do any of you feel like there’s just never enough time? Between the day job and taking care of the garden, taking care of what comes out of the garden, keeping up laundry and the house, oh and cooking some supper and having dishes to eat on, that leaves about 30 min to sleep.
Okay, maybe it’s not that bad, but sometimes it feels like it.
Last weekend, I took one day with my grandkids. We played, watched moves and then went to my company party.
We had a ton of fun just hanging out and watching movies, brushing hair and just doing “stuff” last Saturday. They always make my weekend, no matter what we’re doing.
That left Sunday as the only time I had left to get stuff done over the weekend.
I started by straining the infused oils that were ready.
These oils had sat and infused at least a month and some of them as much as 3 months.
I think they turned out beautifully. Most of the golden ones are calendula and sweet almond oil, 1 pint is calendula and coconut oil and the green one is lavender and coconut oil.
I’ll make some salves, lotions and maybe some chap stick with these. I’ll probably leave a little bit as it is and use it just as an oil too.
We discovered this year that we really like breaded, fried okra. I grew up with the old boiled okra, and had learned I hated it.
After the boiled stuff, I never had the nerve to try it any other way, until this year.
So this year, we grew some okra for my daughter-in-law and decided we had to try it. Wow, is that better than the boiled stuff.
This weekend we had about 6 gallons of okra that needed to be processed. My plan was to dry some and bread and freeze some for use in the winter.
That way we could just use however much we wanted at a time.
I only have chest freezers so I could only freeze one tray at a time. They need to freeze in a single layer. So that took all day.
While the breaded okra was freezing, I cut and set some up on the dehydrator. I filled 8 of the 9 shelves in my new dehydrator.
Using the time I had tonight to get a couple more things done.
Tonight I made more sweet pickles for my husband’s sandwiches. Boy, did I start something. He loves those things and reminds me regularly when he’s getting low.
From the dehydrator I jarred up a little under a gallon of dried okra.
I now have enough okra to probably last us the winter. But…..it’s still growing. I’ll be giving some of that away this weekend.
This dehydrated okra makes a pretty decent snack. If you salt it a little before you dehydrate it, it’s a nice crunchy snack. My mom would have really like it.
Time or the lack thereof.
Anyway, my point here is, once the garden starts coming in and you have to start putting up the goodies, time runs away from you. It feels like there’s just never enough time.
I try really hard with “to do” list, to make sure I’m not running in circles. I’m even crossing stuff off my list. But it feels like I’m adding as much as I’m crossing off.
I guess that’s just how it goes. Mark off 1, add 2.
Extra days
I’m taking off this coming Friday to catch up on things that I can’t get done on the weekend. I’ve done this several times this year.
It used to be taking vacation time to work, even at home, would have really irked me. But not anymore. These days it makes me smile.
I really enjoy putting it all together, trying to put up more and more of our own food every year. And I really don’t mind just getting stuff done here at home, whatever that might be.
Now if I can find a way to ditch the day job…..
How do you get everything done. Or do you? If you have a secret on how to find more time, I hope you’ll share here. I know there has to be some kind of cool method out there…..maybe.
Let me know what you’re up to in these last days of summer.
I’m really hoping to get back to some kind of trial and/or error next week. Maybe a cracker or maybe even some mustard. I’ve been working on both.
Until next time-
Health, Wealth & Blessings ~ Tracey