They don't can themselves!

When I was in grad school I used to pass a sign everyday on my way to class that was for a tomato company that needed drivers. It said "the tomatoes don't deliver themselves."

Fast forward to the garden I have with my neighbor. We could put a sign out in the middle of all of our millions of tomatoes that says "they don't can themselves." And maybe that would remind us to think a bit smaller next year and not plant quite so many tomato plants, especially if they are like ours and grow so enormous that they take over the garden completely.

Well, like I said, they don't can themselves and it was my turn to pick this "round" of garden tomatoes.

Thank goodness for sisters and especially sisters with canning skills.

Yesterday Anne packed up her kids and her workout clothes and canning supplies and seasonings and parked herself in my kitchen all day. It could be that she is just really nice, or that she sensed the rising note of desperation in my voice as I tried to carry on a phone conversation over the noise of Ada's cries, or maybe she just wanted to score some of my sweet tomatoes.

Or maybe she is just one great sister.

Whatever the reason she helped me peel and core and chop and simmer and can and freeze all day. And she even watched Cambel and Ada for me so I could go to the grocery store alone. And she cleaned up my kitchen and my living room. And her husband brought over dinner in the evening.

Yeah, she deserved the tomatoes.

Canning and freezing enough tomatoes to temporarily put Ragu out of business and then scraping up all of the tomato splatters off the floor today is not necessarily fun.

But I will take it all for a day with my sister, laughing and talking and generally ignoring our children so that we can feed them homemade spaghetti sauce for the next decade.