Did Anybody Else See the Partridge?

We have some lovely friends that we met courtesy of our local Ron Paul Meetup Group. They live a couple miles outside of town. Last month, their family vacationed while it just so happened to be raspberry season. We fed their 4 dogs and 12 chickens for 2 weeks, in exchange for berries. A very unfair trade, in my estimation! We did very little work, and in return got 9 jars of jam, and a few bags of berries in the freezer. Had I purchased the same amount at our grocery store, they would have probably been chemical-treated, AND cost me over $30!













This is the first time I've made raspberry jam, and I must say, the family was impressed. Mmmmmmmmmm...













So now with this second attempt at canning (What? you don't remember my first attempt? No one died, and as a matter of fact, I just opened the last jar today!) being relatively successful, I'm on a mission to save the world through the miracle of self-preserved foodstuffs! Ok, not the world, but my family will be eating more healthfully.









See this? This tree in our backyard is absolutely loaded with pears. Last year, we got none...count that...zero, zip, NOT ONE! single pear off this very same tree...Why, you ask? Because our backyard was also loaded with squirrels.













It would appear that the squirrels entertained themselves with cable television over the winter, because we haven't seen many around. Or maybe there's something in our trashcans that causes infertility.






Now if we manage to keep the blasted rodents out of the tree for a few more weeks, we should have plenty of pears to can, make jelly, and share with our berry friends.

(And if we could get rid of the mosquitoes, we'd go outside, pick up that bike, and fashion that lumber into the swing set for which it was intended, but that's another story.)