Tomatoes (and a gross picture - be warned!)

They said it couldn't be done. They said that my tomatoes would never ripen on the vine. They didn't expect us to have an unusually warm summer here in Crescent City.

But a morning in the garden today filled this colander with ripe sun sugar tomatoes. Then I topped it off with 5 ripe romas, and 4 ripe heirloom "dark prince" tomatoes. Not to mention a smidgen of beans and peas from my seemingly-resurrected bean and pea plants - having perked up after our recent cold snap.

I canned two cans of tomatoes last week. I found a much quicker "recipe" to can them in the pressure cooker, so I think I'll try to knock out another few cans this morning - a couple roma jars and one dark prince jar. All roads lead to the freezer for the cherry tomatoes. That way Jack can use them for cooking and chili-making and whatever else. The greens are going in my dinner today. :)

I haven't posted in around a month. My apologies. Things got a bit hectic here for awhile. I had a surgery to remove several fibroadenomas from my breasts. I'll include a photo at the bottom of this post - those who don't want to see the little fatties can avoid them, that way. No worries - they're all benign, they were just growing rapidly for no clear reason, so my surgeon and I decided it was time to take them out. This being my first surgery, there was a lot of pre-surgery stress and then there was the feeling pooped out and having no energy that follows while my body heals. Well, things are finally back to normal.

The summer is slowing down at work, derby practices have gone "back to the basics" for the off-season, and I'm reigning the house back into control. And the garden. I realized that I didn't do much weeding at all recently. Not to mention that I need to start prepping for a winter garden - pulling out plants that aren't needed, weeding, and planting winter crops. The fall harvest is coming in. I've got some nice squashes and the little heads of cabbage that come after cutting the main head are getting close to solid again. And then there's those tomatoes...

Anyhow, in honor of the harvest, as well as the upcoming autumnal equinox, I'm hosting an Autumn Equinox Potluck & Party at my house on Monday night. Should be fun. I'm making squash soup and cooking a bird in the crockpot, and invited folks to bring other harvest dishes to share. I made some sourdough bread last night to go with the soup, and I'll probably make the soup tomorrow so that it'll have time to sit and flavor-fy. :)

Well, I've got just two more hours before I have to go to work. I'm giving my last evening program of the season tonight. Hopefully it goes well - hopefully there's actually folks there...

Here comes the gross picture....

Until next time!

They had pretty light covers to look at while you waited in pre-op.

They took out 9 in total; the lower ones are from the left, the upper ones are from the right. The biggest (#9) was from the right. It's the one that started this whole "let's remove them" business.