Pickled Peppers

Here is yesterday's harvest!

Pickled banana peppers:
You will need:

• 2 1/2 cups cider vinegar
• 1 1/4 cups sugar
• 5 half-pint canning jars, lids, rings
• Sweet banana peppers, cleaned and sliced into rings (roughly 2.5 larger banana peppers per jar).
• Tongs and other utensils

Sterilize jars and lids in boiling water for 10 minutes. Place pepper rings in bowl and pour boiling water over them; cover them and set aside for 10 minutes. Drain hot water from peppers. Transfer pepper rings to cool bowl; pour ice water over them and set aside for 10 minutes. Combine vinegar and sugar, boil for 2-3 minutes, stirring a lot. Drain pepper rings and put them in jars. Pour vinegar-sugar mix into each jar, leaving 1/2 inch head space. Place lids on jars and tighten down. Boil jars in water bath for 10 minutes. Remove jars and allow to cool - lids will "POP!" and they're pickled!

If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers, he picked roughly 8 quarts (16 pints) of pickled peppers, I think. This recipe makes around 2.5 pints.

Reading, Walking, Arithmetic

I’m a freak. I like to walk and read (simultaneously). I did this a lot in college, walking to and from class. And I’ve recently been at it again. To me, it’s a great way to combine two activities for which it can be very difficult to make time - leisure reading and exercise. People ask me about it all the time, and they can’t get over the fact that I’m “so coordinated”. I can tell some people want me to stop doing it. They really can’t stand it that I read and walk at the same time, and they don’t like it when I do it. I’ve had some close calls (dogs, parked cars, low-hanging tree limbs), but it’s my thing; get over it. When I hurt myself doing it, I’ll let you know and we’ll both have a laugh. Shoot, it can't be any worse than texting and walking. Or, better yet - texting and driving! I found this picture in another blog on the topic.

I am reading Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire.

Work.

Step into my office.

Roses Are Red....and pink, and orange, and yellow, and purple, and white.

At the end of Bolin Creek Trail, there is a community park and a rose garden! The Gene Strowd Community Rose Garden contains 350+ rose bushes of 130 varieties. You'll find numerous fragrant blooms here, with names such as Peace, Fourth of July, Black Magic, American Beauty, Iceberg, and Sunset, to name just a few. Mom and I stopped by.

Mom and I smelled every single rose in the garden. That's a lot of sniffin'.

It's fun to be pictured among flowers.

Garden Update 1

Last evening's harvest. There was a sweet banana pepper that was about 5 inches long that would've made this picture SO MUCH COOLER, but mom and I had already eaten it in the garden.



















Strawberries! Last time I had some ripening on this bush, some garden varmint stole them from me! I better figure out how to safe guard these sweet babies from theft! (When you only have one strawberry plant, every berry counts!)



















Passionflower vine (A.K.A., "Maypop") is growing! We added this trellis last night, so hopefully it will climb, climb, climb, and then BLOOM!



















This sunflower sprouted from birdseed. It's finally blooming!







Here's Mr. Don Juan. He smells the best.

Big Birthday

My brother turned 30. This is what it looked like:The Cool Whip was bubbling from the heat of those candles! He wouldn't tell us what he'd wished for, but I wouldn't be surprised if it were something along the lines of "Hurry up, this cake is melting!" Actually, I think he said that out loud.