Like a Squirrel

This time of year, when I see the busy squirrels scampering about with their cheeks bulging with acorns to store away in their hollow tree for the winter, I feel a sense of camaraderie with the little critters. Right now, the harvest is ON! Late night canning escapades, baskets of fruits and vegetables everywhere you look, and a pantry that is rapidly filling up. The leaves are finally starting to turn color along our road, and fall from our oak trees so we crunch through them when we walk out to feed the chickens. It was so chilly yesterday evening, we lit the first nice crackling fire in our woodstove. The world feels round and full, like a pumpkin.

We have been eating all the corn we could ever want since August. The latest variety to ripen was the painted corn I planted last. It didn’t grow very tall, and the ears are little, but they are beautiful shades of yellow, crimson, ruby, golden and almost black. It’s a fun addition to a meal.

I pulled down all of our purple pole beans and chopped them up to freeze in a couple of big gallon bags. I plan on adding them to soups throughout the winter. We eat a lot of soup around here.

Our chickens from this past spring are finally starting to lay, and we have a beautiful rainbow of eggs to collect each day. I have been wanting some green/blue Auracana eggs for years now, and finally have two Auracana hens. The blue eggs go really nicely with the deep red Maran eggs. I’m definitely getting more of both breeds next spring.

We harvested our four giant sunflower heads to dry for seeds, and spread them out on the hearth by the woodstove. I also saved the heads off a sampling of the different varieties we had this year so that we can plant them again in our garden.

I don’t even really want to think about tomatoes right now, nor see them ever again, but we harvested two huge baskets full from our garden (with more ripening as I speak), and we stayed up until 1:00 one night making salsa.

We were going to can it, but were so wiped out by midnight that we decided to freeze it all. Somehow it magically fit in the freezer, and we now have seven quarts and seventeen pints of salsa. It actually turned out really delicious, so I don’t mind eating a lot of it this year.

I took all the grapes I gleaned around the University and our neighbor’s yard, and made the grape juice recipe my neighbor told me about. It was so easy to just pack grapes in the jar and pour boiling honey water over them. I just did a boiling water bath for 10 minutes, and ended up with lovely purple jars of grape juice. I figure we’ll eat the grapes before drinking the juice. What a good winter treat to look forward to!

The pantry is filling up fast. The shelves are lined with jars of canned goods, herbs and dried fruits and tomatoes. The freezers are full of berries and all sorts of good things. I’m even thinking we may need another chest freezer for next year. There will be full pantry pictures here, as soon as I bring in some hazelnuts and acorns. Then it will be all ready for the winter. I love to just stand in there and smell all the apple and potato smells mixed with drying herbs and garlic smells. I think I would make a good squirrel!