Apples through freecycle

This week we have been busy with apples! In the past I have known of people that had crab apples but didn't use them and I know that I very much enjoy making apple sauce out of crab apples (as long as they aren't too tiny and sour). This year I decided I would try to do something about that situation. I have participated in Freecycle for a while now and so I decided to try that out. Freecycle (in case you don't know) is a cool organization that has local online groups that you can join and then people post things that they have to give away or things that they would like to get. (In this category you are only supposed to ask for things that other people might just through away or not use - in other words not big expensive items). I have done some giving away before but so far I hadn't managed to reply in time to get anything (which is fine, I didn't really need the stuff anyway). This time I did post a "wanted" item asking if anybody had crab or regular apples on trees that they weren't going to use and I said that we would be careful with the trees when picking. I got several responses so I was very excited!

On Monday we drove around 20 miles and at this place the lady had a tree with regular apples (which when we got there she had them all picked and ready to go for us!) and a crab apple tree with egg sized apples. The crab apples are incredibly yummy to eat just plain and we have really been enjoying them! We picked the apples off of that tree getting about 1 1/2 bushels. It was very fun. A friend from church went with us and so we shared the apples with her. Today we went to another house in town where the lady had offered her trees. She had more of the egg sized red crab apples (2 small trees) and another crab apple tree with golf ball sized apples that were really good! We got about 4 1/2 gallons today.
Now we are busy at work making apples sauce. It is quite a bit of work with crab apples but I take as many shortcuts as I can. First we cut them in quarters (Jonathan asked if he could help) and then I take the cores out.
Then I cook them with a little water until soft.
After they are cooked I use my hand held blender and puree them (skins and all) and then I add any cinnamon or sugar if desired. Then it is ready to can, freeze or eat.

I am really looking forward to having lots of apples sauce and apple pies this winter! Do have any other suggestions for storing apples?

Do you use freecycle? What do you think about it?

From Apples to Applesauce

One of my favorite things about fall is APPLES! While our apple trees aren't producing yet, we have been blessed to have others share with us and so for several years I have made much of our own apple sauce. (Last year I was able to get a bunch of apples through Freecycle, you can read about it here. I didn't have any success with that idea this year but perhaps some of the rest of you might if you try.)

I love to put up food for the winter but being the busy homeschooling mom that I am, I also like to find the most efficient way to put things up. My mom came up with this easy way to make applesauce and so I thought I would share.

1. Wash the apples

2. Cut them into quarters.

3. Core them (and you can cut them smaller now if you have big apples) and throw them into a big cooking pot. Leave the peelings on. In organic apples the skins are actually quite good for you.

4. Add a little water to cover the bottom of the pan at about 1 inch deep.

5. Add sweetener if you wish (to taste) and we like to add cinnamon.

6. Cook them until soft on medium (or lower) heat. (You can also use the crockpot if you don't have very much. Very little water is needed then.)

7. Next I use my hand held blender and blend them all up into "sauce". This gadget works very slick for this. You could also use a regular blender but that would be much more work. Maybe a hand mixer would work but It wouldn't be as fine of a job.

At this point the applesauce is done. You can eat it right now (though if we are going to eat it fresh like that, I actually don't blend it as we enjoy it warm and chunky) or my Mom freezes all of hers but personally I like to can mine.

To can them I use the water bath method and I do it like this:

1. Wash the jars and rings you will be using.

2. boil some water to pour over the canning lids to sterilize them.

3. In a large pot that is big enough that you can have water 1 inch above your jars, fill with enough water that the water will go one inch above your jars (I always have to do a little guessing here) and put it on to boil. (Put a lid on to make it boil faster and conserve energy.)

4. Fill the jars with applesauce (I use a jar funnel to do this) up to 1/2 inch down from the top.

5. Carefully wash off the rim to make sure there is nothing on it. (Also jars with any chips in the rim will not seal.)

6. Lay the canning lid on top and then carefully put the ring over and tighten it down (make it tight with your hands but not super tight.)

7. When the water is boiling put the jars in the pot of water. I have a wire basket that they fit in to go down in the water, this works nicely or you can also use a jar holder to place them in but you do need to make sure that you have some sort of rack inside so that the jars aren't sitting directly on the bottom of the pan. If you don't have anything you can actually put something together yourself out of wood or metal. Be creative!

8. Bring the water back to a boil and then let it boil for 25 minutes.

9. Shut the burner off and carefully (without tipping if possibly) take the jars out of the water and set on a towel. If you have a basket like I do you can take them all out in that or you can take them out one by one with a jar tongs.

10. Leave them alone until cool and then test the middle of each lid to see if it is tight (sealed) or whether the middle still bumps up and down (unsealed). If they didn't seal you need to store them in the fridge and use them soon.

I find canning to be a very fun and useful hobby which helps my family eat healthfully and also helps us to keep our food budget frugal.

What things do you enjoy canning or would like to learn how to can? I would love to hear your stories!

For more frugal ideas visit Frugal Friday at Life as MOM.

Our Local summer

This summer we have had fun working at eating local foods as much as possible. I especially inspired to do that after reading Animal, Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. Local eating probably comes a lot easier to me than to many as I was raised by parents who raise their own meat, milk and eggs and grow large gardens, enjoy berry picking and have their own maturing orchard. That said I still did a lot of buying at the regular grocery store including much of my produce. Though I cook mostly from scratch there was still room in our diet for getting rid of preservatives and other stuff that isn't so great for us. I am not out to change the world or to say that I think everybody should eat only local but I thought I would explain some of the reasons I wanted to try heading that way:

• You get fresher food! No fruit that ripens as it travels to you or sits on the store shelves.
• A lot of times either you are the producer or you can visit with the farmer to make sure that you are getting food that is chemical free.
• You support the local economy.
• If you train your way of thinking you can eat things that are in season and save money.
• Getting food without hormones. This is something I am really working on for my maturing children.
• Less gas is wasted in transportation.

I had planned on being fairly strict in my eating locally this summer. That didn't quite happen (I did still go to the grocery stores every so often though I didn't visit Walmart from the beginning of June to Sept.) but I did make progress. Here are some of the ways we eat locally:

• We have ordered (from a local farmer) 1/4 of a steer that is hormone free and grass fed. We are getting for around $2 a lb. so I think we are getting a good deal.
• We get most of our milk from either my parents (goats milk) or a local dairy (which is hormone free). I have tried some to make my own cheese. I have also made butter and ice cream a few times. We regularly have homemade yogurt. (lately I have been spoiled because my mom has been making it for me!)
• We have a garden and also have been frequenting the local farmers market. We have also been blessed with friends and family sharing produce with us.
• We picked lots of wild berries!
• I have started using more honey which I bought from local beekeepers.
• We buy local grain and grind it ourselves.
• I talked to a friend that loves to hunt and he said he would be glad to share if he gets a lot, we will pay for his tags.
• Today we picked a bunch of apples that I got after posting on Freecycle that I would be interested in any apples that people might let go to waste.

That is some of our methods of eating locally, what do you do?

Autumn is here!!

I have really been enjoying the Autumn season. The other day I was saddened to hear after someone commented favorably on the Fall weather, another replied "But it just means COLD! I don't like the cold weather." I feel bad when people look at the negative aspect of each season instead of appreciating the beauty that God packs into each one! With that said I thought I would share some of the things that say "Autumn" to me.
Above is a picture of my parents road. It doesn't look as beautiful in the picture as it really is. The leaves are gorgeous in a wide variety of colors. We have that around our place too, but not quite as much (in fact I suffer from Maple tree jealousy at this time of year as we don't have any).

I have also been enjoying the marigolds in my garden with have been blooming like crazy. They are a nice orange fall like color.

We also have leaves starting to fall. In our yard it is predominately oak leaves which have a very cool shape.

The flowers are going to seed, ready to send down seeds to make lots more flowers next year! Yea, I love flowers!

Political yard signs are popping up all over. I especially like the ones in this photo. :-)

Lots and lots of apples! I love how they look and we have had a blast picking them put I also very much enjoy the wonderful smell of hot applesauce with lots of cinnamon or apple pie or crisp! Yummy! Here is Jonathan helping to pick from a totally loaded crab apple tree. Another benefit of picking apples (which we found out about through freecycle) has been getting to meet more people.

Pumpkins! They are a very cheerful, "fall" looking vegetable.

Going to Ula's Hayride! Ula (a 90+ year old lady from church) had her 20th hayride party last week. It was attended by 131 people. We had a lot of fun and it is definitely part of Autumn for me. Above are David and Tomisha on the ride and below are Aaron, Jonathan and Harrison.

Grapes! We had fun on Monday picking grapes over at my parents. Jonathan and I also had fun making them into juice (which we are thinking about turning into jelly).

Other things that I enjoy are the Blue, blue skies, feeling cozy wearing a sweater and comfy socks, Hot chocolate and tea, Harvesting for the garden, picking up potatoes and that feeling that we need to get things done! Winter is coming.

What do you enjoy about Autumn?

Learning to save money in my shopping.

Shelly had wondered how I was doing on my goal of spending under budget on groceries so that I could give to charity what I saved. I had planned to post about that monthly and I didn't so this would be a good time to do that!

The amount that we have budgeted for groceries (this is just food, we have a different category for household expenses and another one for entertainment/eating out) is $325 (for our family of 6). For the first 11 months of this year our average is $303.67 per month. Ken wanted to wait until the end of the year and then give away the amount we have saved. Some I am planning on working extra hard this month to spend less.

I didn't go as far under budget as I had hoped but I am pleased that we are under. Also I did decide during this past year that I really wanted to purchase Hormone free meat so we decided to purchase 1/4 of a steer (around 150 lbs of beef) that was local, grass fed and hormone free. We just got that last month so we actually have a bunch of meat (I also am very stocked up on grains, canned and frozen stuff from the garden, butter, sugar, honey and many other staples) for this next year! That means we should be able to spend considerably lower for quite a few months to come.

We have been incredibly blessed with many good things to eat this year and many of them free. My parents are very generous with sharing fresh farm eggs much of the year and Goats milk (which all of us but Ken really enjoy!) for the summer +. During that time I also am able to make some cheese to freeze and I also froze whey to use in pancakes and such this winter. God also blessed our gardens in many ways and we were able to put stuff up from ours and what my parents and friends shared with us. We were also blessed by many apples which I was able to pick through freecycle. Again this year our freezer has a bunch of berries in it and I have plenty of jams made. God is so good!!

This has been a fun year of learning more about shopping and spending my money wisely. I have also remembered to pray for God to give me wisdom as I shop and plan as well. He is so good to help throughout every part of our life!

Another goal that I had set was no buying of clothing or anything to wear for the kids and I. That has gone well. The only time I strayed from that was last January when boys coats went really cheap and so I decided to pick one up for Jonathan that he will start wearing probably this coming Jan. I spent less than $10 on it. The clothing challenge has been a really fun one for me. I admit I have gotten somewhat tired of the clothes I had but I still had plenty to wear. It has made me be more creative and I have tried combining different clothes together than I usually do and have found some "new" outfits that I really like. Challenges can really help make us creative! I do admit that I am looking forward to going shoe shopping come January but that is pretty much all we need.

This month my goal is to see if I can spend less than $100 total. That is for me not Ken so that includes all groceries (my department to spend in), household, gas for the van, gifts (except what he might get for me), postage, etc. It will not include utility bills and such like which Ken takes care of anyway. I plan on reporting each week to let you know how I am doing. So far this first week I spent:

• $18 on dairy for the next 2 weeks. (Hormone free milk from the farm)
• $16.39 on toilet paper (I didn't want to run out!), fresh fruit, walnuts and a great deal on Choc. chips.
• $29.08 to fill the van with gas (What a blessing that gas has gone down!!)
• $6.33 on pictures to send out with Christmas letters.

Total: $69.80 leaving only $30.20 for the rest of the month. Obviously I will have to be careful. It will be interesting to see if I can do this. I will let you know if there are any particular challenges that we have to think outside the box to deal with.

Have you visited my giveaways yet? I am giving away a tote bag, note card set, gift tags and coupons!

How has your year gone as far as financial goals? Do you have any fun plans for next year? Do you have any special challenges with the holidays? I would love to hear what you are thinking about!