Salsa

Since we picked all those vegetables at the farm this weekend I need to do something with them so that they won't spoil. With mostly tomatoes and peppers, I thought salsa would be the perfect thing to make. The problem is I have never made salsa before. I contacted my pepper expert sister, Angie, and she gave me a basic run down on what to do. After a long three hour day at work I came home all set to make the salsa. Who knew it could be so simple? I'm not sure if I got the taste down exactly the way I want it yet, but it smells pretty good. I will know more once everything has a chance to mingle and cool. This batch made an entire blender full. I will freeze two of these containers and we can scarf one down tonight. Thanks Ang.

Frogs

Amazing things happen every day if you can just find them. Last night my husband found one. A tiny little frog or toad, no bigger than a quarter, was directly in his path on the way up to our front door. So I went out and caught it. We brought it in the house and the kids got to look at it and beg to keep it. So we learned that wild animals like to be wild and it would be much happier outside than in a cage in our house. Our little friend stayed inside for about 30 minutes before I decided it was time to say goodbye.

 

Going to the Orchard (but the farm was better)

Arizona is a very diverse state. We are best known for our saguaros and deserts, but we also have mountains and forests and grasslands and even wetlands. We decided to take the family out to commune with nature. It is almost "Fall" after all. It is also apple picking season (if there were any apples to be picked). Our original plan was to head up to Date Creek Ranch North West of the Valley. Luckily my husband decided to check things out on their web page before we left. Seems that Arizona suffered some pretty bad freezes back in April that devastated this year's apple crop. So we decided to head south past Tucson to Apple Annie's Orchard and Farm in Wilcox, AZ. Their apples were also hit by the freeze, but there were still apples to pick.  We came home with 15 lbs of various apples. What does one do with 15 pounds of apples? Make apple sauce. It was my first try and I would have to say it was very easy.

But even better than the apples was the farm!! They had rows upon rows of vegetables (which I pretend to like for my children's sake) for the picking. So we all tromped out into the fields and picked yummy veggies. We came home with eggplant, various peppers, squash, zucchini, tomatoes and a cucumber for Cas. We even got enough for the neighbors. :)

A fun day was had by all.