Slowing Down . . . A Little

The heat and humidity have finally given up for the season.  Well, at least the humidity is in a different form.  We've had intermittent rains on and off for several days frequently dropping between 1/2" and 1-1/2" on our area.  But that's okay because we needed the moisture.  Farmer's Almanac says our region should expect a colder and snowier winter than usual so maybe this rain is the start of the more precipitation part of that prediction.

The days now have a different feel to them than they had had all summer.  Almost as if they're moving at a slower pace.  Or maybe it's just me that's moving slower.

We still have the majority of our root crops int he garden.  Putting off harvesting them as long as we can is necessary as we need to wait until our root cellar is cold enough before filling it.  We have a fan that pulls cooler night time air into the cellar to help with the cooling, but for that to be efficient we have to wait until might time temps sink down into the 40s.  And we're not there yet.

I did pull all of the onions from their beds yesterday and lay them out on the ping pong table set up in the garage to start the curing process.  I'm happy to see they're all larger than normal in size.  I'm not fond of peeling and chopping four little onions when one big one will do the trick.

Because of the on and off rain today, I concentrated on catching up on desk work which included some correspondence and bill paying . . . one fun to do, the other not so much.

In between showers I dashed out and picked some green peppers to chop and store in the freezer for use in chili, soups, casseroles, pizzas, etc. this winter.  I don't blanch them before freezing . . . just flash freeze the pieces on cookie sheets, then pop the frozen chunks into a freezer bag.  The pieces stay fairly well separated, and it's easy to take out just the amount I need. 

The pepper plants are still producing gorgeous peppers as you can see by this whopper I harvested.  Unless we decide we want to be eating Stuffed Green Peppers three times a week this winter, I'd best not use any more of them for that purpose.  There are so many still on the plants I may call our local food co-op to see if they can use them.

I know some of you are not happy to see the sun rise later in the morning and set earlier at night, but it feels good to me.  I don't think I ever get enough sleep during high summer time as I seem to be strongly affected by natural light.  I wake in the morning at dawn and can't seem to quit "working" at night until it gets dark.  Now at this time of year, I'm starting to feel I can slow down a bit.  And I am ready, ready, ready!