Aren't they a cute couple? What a couple of goofs!
And of course we sang .... while the candles melted...
And she blew out the candles ... and missed one!
And opened presents!
And later my "nother daughter", Kelly, came by to wish her a Happy Birthday too! Here's Rebekah, Kelly, and Stephanie...looks like trouble to me!
We keep a big pot of boiling water on the stove; the pot needs to be large enough to put 4-5 peaches in at a time, without cooling the water too much. They stay in their boiling water bath for about a minute.
Next they go into a large bowl of ice water to cool quickly.
Once skinned, I cut the peach in half, slices, or chunks; depending on whether the peaches are bruised or blemished. The halves are kept in a holding pattern in a pot of syrup. I make the syrup using 1 part sugar to 2 parts water, then crush & add 1000 mg Vitamin C (prevents browning).
I sterilize the jars by running them through the diswasher. They stay there until right before filling, that way they stay clean and hot.
This is also when I start the fire under the canner. I do most of my canning outside during the summer so that I don't get the house too hot. We use our turkey fryer for all our water bath canning, and for venting the pressure canner. It gets too hot to do the entire pressure canning process, but it is ideal for this type of canning.
I use tongs to fill each jar. The peach halves are laid in the jar pit side down and stacked to within 1 inch of the top of the jar. This is tedious, but it makes for a beautiful finished product.
Once filled, I ladle in enough of the holding syrup to fill the jar to 1/2" from the top. Then we wipe the top of the jar with a damp paper towel and top them with the lids and rings.
Next they go outside and into the canner.
They are kept at a slow, steady boil for 25 minutes.
Once the time is up, we move them to a cooling rack. I got this handy dandy baker's rack at a garage sale and it works great for canning. It also folds up and stores out of the way when I'm not using it. They are left here overnight to cool.
Today is the last step of the process. The jars of peaches are brought into the kitchen, we remove the rings, and check the seals before washing them. Here are some shots of the finished jars. We ended up with 36 finished jars for this batch, not bad for a morning's work!
We planted 3 pounds of seed potatoes, and so far we've dug up 6 pounds. We're really pleased with this variety and I plan to keep them going through the end of the year. Here's what 6 pounds of freshly dug spuds looks like.
The first step in creating our chips was to scrub the potatoes. Since they have such thin skins, there's no need to peel them; besides, keeping the skins on makes them a health food, right?
The slicer I use is very inexpensive and works very well. It cuts the potatoes to just the right thickness.
Don't they look nice? This is one potato sliced. We used 3 potatoes for chips today.
Of course you can't eat chips by themselves and call it lunch. We made some bread, chicken salad, and some collosal sandwiches!
Our dear friends recently had their pasture baled, and we offered to help load the hay into the barn. If you really want a hot, itchy job...become a hay loader! Of course we were doing this 25 bales at a time in a pick up truck. All 163 bales worth! 
Bekah worked like a champ all day stacking the bales on the truck as the men toss them up, and offloading at the barn.
Back to the fields for another load, every bale has to be put up before it rains or before the damp ground ruins the bales.
Bob and Rebekah work together to plan the evening event. Until Rebekah gets tired of me taking pictures... 
And with others, it's obvious...
What a way to end a week of vacation! Bob worked so hard Saturday that he was ready to go back to his job...and have some rest!
