I am Blessed by bounty

The beans and tomatoes have been keeping me busy these past few weeks.  To add to that, I went and bought a bushel of sweet corn and just finished canning it.  I got 20 pints, yippee!  :)

I now have equal to 9 quarts of canned tomatoes, approximately 30 dried and powdered tomatoes, 26 quarts of canned green beans and 20 pints of canned corn.

I have been looking through the ball canning book at the recipes.  This has made me want to make some of the yummy recipes I see in there so this winter I will be using the recipes that I pick out as a guideline for what I plant next year.

Yes I will plant corn.  Buying corn is the costly way to do it even though they only charge $3 per dozen or $17 per bushel and give you extra in case some are not good.  A 10X 10 plot will give me more than I bought this year so I might plant a 10 x 20 plot of corn next year.  That will give me some to eat fresh, give away and still be able to can more than there was this year.  It will definitely be an open pollinated variety, probably my old favorite, golden bantam, not to be confused with golden cross bantam which is a hybrid.  No hybrids in my garden if I can find an OP alternative.  I was planting golden bantam back in the 70's and 80's.

I am in the process of expanding the garden now by putting down cardboard and mulching it with grass clippings, mowed leaves, and old hay.  This makes the ground super fertile for next year as well as nicely killing the grass and weeds that are growing there.  I need to go to the dollar store and get some more of their boxes.  They break them down flat before they dispose of them anyhow so that is a great convenience for me.  All I have to do is be there on a day when they are stocking from boxes and have a lot of empty ones already on the cart.  They let me sort through them and take what I want.  I choose the ones that have only black lettering on them so there won't be any bad poisonous ink going on my garden.

That's all for today, there are more beans to break and can.  :)