o don’t worry, I’ll tell you.
I’m so awesome that I made my own homemade jelly, and then canned it. You can’t find that kind of awesome in the store!
My house smells like strawberries and sugar. mmmm.
AK-47 made a suggestion that will kick my awesomeness into the stratosphere. I causually mentioned that I am on a canning streak, and I need to figure out what to can tomorrow, since I only used 4 out of the 12 super expensive mason jars I purchased. I have no patience, I also need 1 to 2 hour projects to occupy my time and prevent me from napping during the day, naps ruin my sleep schedule, so canning my own preserves was the perfect mini-project. But I didn’t have any mason jars, neither did AK, and the buses that I catch to wally world stop running at 8pm, and I just had to do this project today, which meant that I had to purchase jars from winn dixie, and which meant that they were super expensive but they were totally worth it. Back to the point, she suggested that I make apple butter. Dude, I love apple butter so much, that if I could, I would marry a vat of it and bear its sticky sweet children. Yeah its that great, and making it by hand will make it that much better. But it all depends on how tired I am tomorrow, since the apples have to simmer for an hour. This would not be any problem if I or AK had a slow cooker, but alas we don’t. So tomorrow after a long day of work, I might have to first purchase a pound of apples, core them, cut them up, and then simmer for an hour. AND THEN I would have to sterilize the jars, fill them, lid them, and then boil for another 10 minutes, and then let sit overnight. Oh did I forget to mention that you have to let the jars sit 12-24 hours before you handle them? Silly me ooops. The canning would go a tad bit faster if I had a dishwasher, since you can pop jars in there for a cycle for sterilization. In addition to apples, I need to purchase some tongs. I can make do without them, but its dangerous and I run the risk of either dropping a scalding hot glass jar on the ground (shattering it into thousands of scalding hot glass pieces) or horribly burning myself. Not a good look either way. Sigh. I will let you all know my final decision.
Here are the jars of homemade strawberry jelly. They have to settle overnight and then I can move them. I apologize for the grainy picture, but I don’t feel like using the digital and uploading and all that.
I am also going to remove gluten from my life. First I am going to do a trial run similar to the Great Baking Soda vs. Suave Experiment, and I will blog my observations. And at the end of 5 days I will make a decision about whether I will excise gluten from my diet or not. In the meantime head over to Gluten Free Girl’s blog and check out her amazingness. Although I have toyed with the idea of going gluten free before, and ultimately chickened out, her blog re-inspired me to do it now. Her blog demonstrates how easy it is to make the transition, it triggered my memory of doing the Atkins diet (I lost a billion pounds almost overnight, it seems, and it would seem like an simple thing to just go back and do it again, but I’m a vegetarian now, so no dice), and it just seems like gf living would make me healthier, just like eschewing meat has made me healthier. So tomorrow will start my sojourn of gf living.
I still have no effing clue how I should wear my hair at my mother’s wedding!!!!! The wedding ceremony takes place on June 7th, 2008, at 4pm. In addition to being without a confirmed hairstyle, I still need shoes, a full line girdle or corset, and I need to get my make up professionally done several days before the ceremony.
Everyone knows that you shouldn’t make any major hair and/or make up changes right before a major event like this, because something horrible might happen. But me being the great procrastinator that I am, did not follow that dictum. So I absolutely hope that things will work themselves out, and that I will not look like a crazy banshee woman and ruin my mom’s big day. In addition to giving her this super sweet 13 piece bar glassware set, I am toying with the idea of giving her 1 or 2 jars of the homemade jelly. Didn’t I tell you that I am awesome? But really, why would I give a diabetic a jar of jelly? That just doesn’t seem right to me? What do you all think?
I love Billie Holliday, and I love magnolias. I never noticed how many magnolias are in Gville, until this summer. The big, floppy, super white blossoms remind me of Lady Day and lynchings (re: “Strange Fruit”). And although the flowers are surrounded in sadness for me, I can’t get enough of them.
I am going to post tomorrow about the fantasitcal memorial day weekend that I totally enjoyed to the max. So you can look forward to that post.
Until tomorrow,
cordially my love,
[initials]
p.s. Selected songs from the “preserve making and canning playlist”
(all songs sung by the Great Late Billie Holliday)
Twenty-Four Hours a Day
No Regrets (this one receives heavy rotation)
Let’s Call a Heart a Heart
Summertime
Easy to Love
He Ain’t Got Rhythm
That’s Life I Guess
Guess Who
I Can’t Pretend
What a Little Moonlight Can Do
The Way I Feel Tonight (another one that receives heavy rotation)
