Hot, Pot and Cherries

So, this week I've been canning cherries. (Remember, Deb?) Monday we canned pitted cherries in pure blended and strained cherry juice -- boy was that a mess! The cherries splash all over when the pit comes out. I cleaned for two hours after the last load was done! Tuesday we did whole cherries, and the juice with the steam juicer. Matthias had so much fun he wanted to make cherry juice next. Wednesday we got started too late and Frank needed the car, so we went swimming instead of canning -- it was so hot, we were totally sweaty again by the time we got home! Thursday, yesterday, we did the juice Matthias wanted. It was really hot outside -- up to about 35 C, I think, and inside we had the steamer running until almost 5 pm. It got up to 88 F inside the house. So I was really glad when it was all over and I could settle down in the tent outside -- we've had it set up in the yard for about a week now. When it was cooler out, it was hard to sleep because it got too cold -- I had to sleep with a hoodie on! Last night, it was wonderfully cool, especially with the whole house so hot still! The only drawback was the pot smoke drifting over us from the new neighbours -- argh! I found out recently that if I inhale pot thickly enough my airways close and I choke on it (someone was smoking right outside the library door, and I walked out unawares and took a deep breath of it, and coughed uncontrollably for five minutes). So I may have to talk to the neighbours -- we've smelled it a couple other times at night, but it didn't bother us until I wanted to sleep out in the tent!!
So if you come visit, be sure to have some canned cherries or cherry juice! We did 21 jars of pitted cherries, 14 jars of whole cherries, 12 jars of juice, one cookie tray of frozen cherries and we have a fridge full to eat fresh. Wow!