Lately . . .

The end of last week turned extremely busy, and I'm just now catching up. A friend passed away a little while ago, and I serve on the Hospitality Team at our church. We put together a nice luncheon to accompany the memorial service on Saturday.

In addition, my daughters and I have been harvesting the apple trees and the one super huge plum tree. The apples just get picked and stored, but the plums have to be processed in some way (making jam, chutney, splitting/pitting for prunes and freezing). My fingernails are badly stained, but oh well, that's just part of the job.

Also, a big front is pushing in today, and have been picking and storing tomatoes, as I can. The first major storm front also usually brings late blight to the tomatoes, so if we want to use them, I've got to get them harvested.

I had hoped to get in a couple of side excursions this week, but we may be very busy with harvesting before the weather turns very cool and very wet, and getting last things done for fall quarter.

Still, lunches need planning. As our fridge and freezers are packed to over-flowing, meals are based first on fridge contents, and second on bits and pieces from the freezer. (You know, all those half-full containers of this and that can really take up freezer space!)

This week's lunch menu includes:

• ham and egg fried rice (using squash, garlic and greens from the garden)
• Harvard beets
• beet green quiche
• vegetarian chili
• plum pie
• apple pie

Two pies this week, as we couldn't decide which we wanted more! One daughter made a large batch of pie pastry for me on Sunday, so the pie-making is easy for the week.

I hope that you're having a great week! And enjoying the change of seasons!

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