Today we went down to Dunlap and got 75 pounds of canning tomatoes and a bushel of green beans.  We got 7 quarts (one load) of the beans canned and the rest of them all cut up and ready to process in the morning.  There is no way we are going to let the deer keep us from having the canned green beans for the kids this winter.  I hope to get one or two more bushel before the season is over.  Tomorrow morning we will put the beans on to process while we are peeling and deseeding the tomatoes and cooking up the spaghetti sauce.  We have 90 quarts on the shelves now and tomorrow and Thursday will get another 30+ quarts done with the tomatoes we got today plus the ones that are ripe in our own garden.  The deer tried eating the tomatoes, they took several bites out of the green ones as well as the red but didn’t like them much I guess as they didn’t eat many.  We will get more tomatoes each week until we have about 200 quarts done and some more cold pack tomatoes and salsa.  We like to have the canned goods for Christmas presents.

It looks like we will have some peaches to can by next week if the raccoons don’t decided to take them.  They did that one year.  This year they are over a month later than other years.  The weather has been cool and wet so I guess that is what has delayed them.  They look great right now.  We thought we had lost all of them to the frost this spring but I guess the ones near the inside of the tree were protected enough to survive and they are about twice the size of any we have had before so I think we will end up with as many cans of peaches as we had last year.   The butternut squash is getting ready and we have had several already.  I picked a couple dozen and there are at least that many still growing and the deer don’t like those.  Last year the ground hog ate the butternut but we caught him in the trap so have not seen any this year so far.  Wish we could have a dog to help keep the wild animals out but where we are gone in the winter to a place we can’t take a dog I guess that is out of the question.   As you see we are keeping busy and enjoying life on the farm again.  I guess we are true farmers – nothing discourages us for long.  Have a great day.