So many potatoes

Turns out 50 lbs of potatoes is a lot of potatoes.  I've mostly been using them for home canned stew but I've also put a bunch of chopped potatoes in the freeze dryer. Every time I chop potatoes for canning, I over estimate and end up with some that have to be freeze dried.  I'm very bad at estimating for stew apparently. 

I have 35 cans of stew so far and the huge bag of potatoes is almost gone. I may make some baked potatoes tomorrow with some of the few we have left.

We had eaten almost all of the previous stew I canned a few years ago. I think we have 3 bottles left.  My goal is to get 52 jars, one per week for a year, by the time I'm done. I can't believe it but I'll actually have to buy more potatoes to do that. ha!

I get tired off all the chopping to be honest but I borrowed a special chopping contraption from Doneen that made the potatoes SO much easier. Carrots are still a pain and my hands are stained orange now after a weekend of canning. It's a good look.

I suffered my first ever broken bottle while canning my first load. Luckily all of the other jars sealed just fine.  I knew something was up when my garage smelled like delicious stew..sure enough.

I am feeling like it's getting easier and I'm doing better at managing the pressure of the canner. I'm almost feeling like I know what I'm doing!

So many forgotten things

We had a little flood in the basement apartment a month or so ago. Rain came in the door due to a plugged drain at the bottom of the stairs. The Taylor's were out of town at the time so no one realized until things had been wet for several days. Bummer.

We pulled out carpet, baseboards and set up fans. We ended up needing to replace their flooring but while we were at it we decided we might as well paint, replace some old light fixtures and do a little more sprucing up.  

They had to move out for a few days but we managed it. I failed to take after pictures but the Taylor's got a few.

Here's before (living room)-it's actually more of a "during" when we were pulling out carpet and had already painted the ceiling

After:

Bedroom (low lighting but walls are white)

Living Room (from the other direction)

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We purchased the 50 lb bag of potatoes that the local high school sells as a fundraiser. We did it a few years back and I just haven't had the guts to do it again for awhile. It's a lot of work to make use of that many potatoes!  But we did it again this year.  My plans for them include: canning more stew (I have used up almost all of my canned stew), freeze dry some for future use, can some if I can find enough lids, save a few in the cold storage room.  I worked on freeze drying some today and, as expected, it's exhausting. I used about 1/10th of the bag  (If I'm lucky).  Oy.

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It's gotten suddenly cold in the last week and I'm super not ready for winter already. I'm hoping we get another shot at fall. I think it's supposed to snow tomorrow. I'm grateful for the moisture but I'm ok if it just stays up in the mountains at least in October!

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Branden and Amber bought their first house!  We are so excited for them!  We're hoping to go out and help do some fixing up that they want to do. Amber is already painting and making it their own and it's looking so good!  It has a big barn that Branden is excited for also as he can set up a super awesome car repair place in there.

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Back in the day, when I used to blog on the regular, I had my blog as my home page when I opened the internet. I remember one day Frank noticed this and thought it was a little weird. He felt it was a bit self centered to go to my own blog first thing every day. I decided he had a point and I changed it to be something random like google after that.  But now with how things have changed in my life and I find myself not even thinking of blogging or writing my thoughts, I'm thinking I might go back to making my blog my home page. I think I need to remember it exists and maybe I will think of things to say that I want to remember.  

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I probably could have made my home page something good like the Church's website for example...that would have been a good choice.  Instead of just google, which I always immediately click away from.  Food for thought.

I'm doing a scripture study called "Inklings" through instagram (a good use for social media!) and it's really wonderful and I recommend it to anyone!  It's helping me keep spiritual thoughts front and center and helping me to reach for my scriptures daily.  I want to be an elect woman and someone who stays true to God no matter what happens in the world.

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Another crazy thing that happened this week is that I started giving away all of my scrapbooking stuff. Oh man, it's been hard. I'm still very attached to all that stuff. But I don't use it so I need to give it a new life and I need to move on.  I do feel like I'm lacking in the hobby department right now so I need to work on that but I'm (mostly) ready to let this particular thing go.  Wish me luck.