Jewels from the garden~ (canning tomatoes)

We have had an overabundance of tomatoes this year from the garden. We've given them away, and eaten them in salads, on burgers, straight from the garden with a little salt and pepper (Mmm...) and we still haven't been able to eat them as fast as they are ripening. So I decided it was time to learn how to can...

R and I learned together (I'd never canned before) and we had a lovely, messy, morning canning tomatoes together. Here is R getting the hang of peeling the tomatoes after they've been blanched.

 

She was very careful with the sharp knife, and between the two of us it didn't take too long to get them all peeled.



 Then we cut the tomatoes into quarters, put them in the canning jars, and added a little salt and lemon juice.

 

Finally... an hour and a half after we started, the cans were in the pot ready to be "processed".



 Here's part of the mess we made. (You can't see the tomato juice dripping down the dishwasher, or the bits of tomato peel all over the floor!) The peppers are out because I made one jar of tomatoes and green chilies with some fresh roasted Hatch chilies one of our big girls brought for M's birthday.

 

After 40 minutes of sitting in the pot of gently boiling water, our tomatoes were done! Aren't they beautiful? I'm guessing in another week or so, we'll be doing this all over again... I still have dozens of green tomatoes on the vine.

 

Thank you everyone for the good thoughts, prayers, and understanding. With or without M's sz, life goes on and sometimes a measure of peace comes from the comforting, productive, everyday tasks of home.