This Stinks

Little Sprout is sick. The sick with the runny nose and stuffy head and wanting to be in someone's lap at all times. The sick where food really doesn't taste good, but you wanna eat anyway. The sick where you just HAVE to make everyone else's lives miserable because you feel cruddy and you wanna share the wealth.

Fun.

To make my day a little more difficult, I went over to the folks' place this morning and did some gardening. I got 3 bags of 'maters, about 20lbs of potatoes, and about 10~15lbs of onions. When I got home, I started making soup out of the tomatoes (the only tomato based thing that really gets eaten in this family), cleaned up the potatoes and cooked them so that I can freeze ready made 'taters for quick meals later, and am now looking at my onions thinking that I really don't want to deal with them. They are waiting to be cleaned up, chopped, and frozen as well. I am hoping that by this time next year I will have some kind of root cellar going so that I don't have to freeze my produce. I just don't know enough about the way the house will handle winter to risk losing my goodies storing them in less than ideal conditions.

Anyway.

I am starting to get really tired, since I worked the overnight last night. Yeah, I know you are all sick of hearing about how tired I am. Just imagine how sick I am of being tired! Hah! I win. My point is that I am in the middle of about 5 things right now, and I can't stop them to take a nap.

Not that Little Sprout would allow it, but you know what I am sayin'.

I am planning to head on over to the folks' place tomorrow morning again so that I can finish up some work in the garden. I am also hoping to check and see if the apples are worth gathering this year. Dad is saying that the hail damage is so bad that they are worthless, but I know that you can use messed up apples for a lot of things. And I really love apple pie and homemade applesauce. I would really like to get some for the coming winter.

Speaking of the coming winter, I am finally starting to feel the pinch that everyone has been talking about. I felt kind of bad when everyone was always talking about the rising cost of gas and food. I really didn't notice it that much at first. I drove very little, and we always buy as much food as possible in bulk for really low prices so that hadn't hit me yet.

Since moving, I have doubled my drive~time to work. Wow. Big difference. And we have been doing some serious grocery shopping in the area as well. My wallet cries whenever I think of it.

Still, we are doing really well. I am really focusing on cooking in big batches and then freezing extras for days when I just don't feel up to cooking. I have been pleasantly surprised at how easy it is! We are eating a lot out of the garden, and I am learning to cook things more and more from scratch. Maybe if I keep this up long enough, I will be able to convince Mr. Barefoot that I can quit work! Heh. Not likely.

Anyway, while I am cooking my head is full of ideas for the yard and plans for the new gardens I am going to be able to have. I am getting more and more excited. I was showing Mr. Barefoot all the cool varieties of garlic out there, and he started pestering me to get my garden beds built. This is a good sign!

Gotta go before I burn my soup......