The Good 'ol Summertime

Hello, y'all.
Hope everyone is having a nice, enjoyable Summer time.

We have sure been trying to make the best of our Summer time, between work schedules and the heat. Mostly just work schedules. The heat is typical, and a good part of what makes Summer activities so enjoyable (to me).

A lot of people disagree with me about the heat.
Everyday two or three of my FB friends are on there complaining, and wishing Summer away.
You just have to feel sorry for them. They're missing out on a lot of fun times and memories.

I was having a pretty rough time last year, and ended up not opening the pool last Summer, and it was kind of a mess when we got the cover off this year.
     Took me and Kev a bit of work (and $$) but we finally got her cleaned and going.

This is the 12th year we've had the pool, and we finally got a deck and steps built for it this Summer.
      Still need to add a railing, but just the steps and deck are a huge improvement over the wobbly ladder contraption we had previously.

I'm extra proud of the deck/steps because the project only cost about $60.00.
    We had taken apart an old deck from an old house and had the joists, deck boards, and cement footer things in our salvage pile, and Cousin Joe gave us the step stringers from his salvage pile. We have a stockpile of screws and bolts and such.  All we had to buy were (2) 4x4's for the legs, and a gallon of DeckOver paint.
     In an odd instance of the kind of Luck I never have, there happened to be a gallon of DeckOver paint in the Clearance shelf marked $9.00!! (Regularly about $35 a gallon!)
It wasn't the color I would have chosen, but for nine bucks, I wasn't going to be picky!
     It's a lighter brown color, like light milk chocolate. With the thickness/consistency of it, the paint job was like frosting a chocolate sheet cake, lol.

Most don't have a backyard pool, but are making the most of their Summer time visiting State Parks, going kayaking/rafting/tubing, the Beach, water parks, water falls, etc.
     Actually, we've been doing more of  those things than we have been using our own pool. Our cousins and the neighbors get more use out of our pool than we do!

My Dad used to have a couple of peach trees in his fruit orchard, but when he planted them, he didn't know much about the types of peaches and their blooming season and such, so his kept blooming too early for north Georgia and getting frost-bit and not making any peaches, or tiny useless ones at best, so, he got rid of those trees. So, no Dad's Orchard peaches for us.

So one fine, sunny, hot June day, we headed off to Dickey Farms , about 2 hours south, for some peach ice cream - and peaches, of course.
       A box to eat/share, and a box for canning.

I just halved or sliced the peaches and canned them in a light syrup.
     I figure if I ever want to make any jam, or pie filling, I can open a jar or however many it needs and make it from there. This was the simplest, quickest way to get 'er done. 

I've been doing different sorts of canning/preserving this Spring/Summer, not my usual kind of stuff.
      I discovered a FB group called Rebel Canners and O. Mah. Goodness! What a trove of information and awesomeness!

♫ You can can this ♪ You can can that ♫ You can can these ♪ You can can those ♫

(Tune of "Weapon of Choice" - Fatboy Slim)

I'll try to do another post with more details about that later, but a few things I've canned this Summer are: Chocolate-Cherry Jam,

Strawberries in syrup, mostly for Strawberry Shortcake, although good for ice cream/banana split topping, too.

Cherry Pie filling, Cherries in syrup, and....Sweet Tea concentrate.

My sweet tea concentrate isn't Canned, just jarred. I had Canned some, but we went through it so fast it wasn't worth the effort. I've just been jarring and refrigerating them, but if necessary I could put a lid on them and Can them up real quick.

I also made a batch of Orange Marmalade (not to my tastes) but my Aunt, who I made it for, said it was yummy.

I learned to Can chicken, and dehydrate ground beef.

One of my kitchen helpers, Sir O. Sherbert

 We went a couple of times up to my parent's to work on my Dad's work van...Looking to be a pretty good apple crop this year.

I need to update my Family Travel blog, but so far this Summer we've visited a couple of State and Local Parks and several water falls.

Trahlyta Falls at Vogel State Park

Fishing at Vogel State Park

at Anna Ruby Falls

Beautiful Anna Ruby Falls

Anna Ruby Falls is in a National Forest, next to a State Park called Unicoi State Park.

We had planned to spend the rest of the afternoon at Unicoi having a picnic and doing some canoe/kayaking, and a little beach time, but unfortunately that didn't work out.
     We did have our picnic, which was nice enough. We know not to have really high expectations of tables that live outside, under trees, day a, year 'round. That's why I bring a table cover.

Otherwise, for no apparent reason, the boat rental was closed. There was a torn open bag of old trash piled outside the trashcan at the pavilion near the beach, and the beach itself didn't look that great.
The difference between the cleanliness and orderliness between Unicoi and Vogel State Park was obvious, and a shame.

Summer isn't over yet!

We have plans to go Tubing on the 'Hooch  next week, and a Beach camping vacation later next month (after most of the kids have gone back to school, and the crowds are fewer!).