A BOATLOAD,

of Cherries, exploded on our trees. I don’t know what happened but suddenly, my trees were bending over due to the weight of this crop…IT WAS HUGE!

Cherries,Cherries,Cherries EVERYWHERE.

In our ward, our Bishop has encouraged us to ‘put up’ our excess food that grows. I decided to follow his council, and learn how to preserve cherries, seeing how I had 2 trees full of them.

For about a week straight, I did my best to ‘put up’ our cherries.

We ate alot of them, but still had PLENTY more, I pitted them, then dried them like raisins or craisans,

I pitted them, then put them in the freezer to snack on at a later date,

With the help of my husband, I pitted them, and made cherry freezer jam (there is a reason, no one sells cherry preserves. They aren’t the tastiest of things, but my boys didn’t mind when I served it to them, so I guess it was worth it)

And then with BUCKET LOADS of cherries already picked, and still in my house,

(and telling all of our neighbors to come and get them) I decided it was time for me to learn how to can them (and learn how to can in general, I have watched my mother in law do it a couple of times, and I my grandmother when I was much younger, but it has been years since I have seen it, and I have never done it by myself!)

So I learned. I watched videos, and read articles from reliable sources, and with the help of the internet, I ‘put up’ over a dozen jars of cherry pie filling.

After all of that hard work, it was a good feeling to look and see the beautiful things that have been preserved, and I am looking forward to later in the summer and fall, when I can ‘put up’ some more food from our garden.

But I must admit, I am grateful to be done pitting cherries, you see, I am kind of stupid, and didn’t realize there was such a thing as a multi-pitter of cherries,well to be honest, I didn’t even really know there was such a thing as a single pitter for cherries, and used my olive pitter and pitted them one by one. Next year, I am totally investing in a nicer one.

Maybe then the process of ‘putting up’ the cherries won’t be such an overwhelming task!