Apricots, Anyone?

Yup, this pretty much sums up my life these days!

Last weekend I had such a great opportunity to go pick apricots with my friend Katie and her two sisters. We could pick as many as we wanted and they were all FREE! I enjoy picking fruit, I actually find it relaxing, even if it's hot or it's cold or whatever. I just like it. So I picked and picked and picked (and sampled) apricots. They are Mia's favorite fruit, or they were at some point. She changes her mind a lot :) But that's one of the reasons I wanted to get so many was so she could enjoy them all year. She was adorable and messy and throughly enjoyed herself at the orchard. She wanted to eat as many as she could access (key phrase here :/ ). Well, she couldn't reach the ones on the tree- mainly the ones on the ground. That were moldy. And brown squishy liquid. And totally gross. Sigh. That was a real challenge but then we saw there was a play set so Katie's sisters took her and Katie's daughter (same age, it's awesome!) over and that was a life saver. Keeping her out of allllllllll those apricots littering the floor beneath the trees while trying to pick was simply impossible. Thank heavens for help!

I don't have a scale so I'll never know the exact weight of how much I picked but let's just say it was A.LOT. Bags and bags full. 

It was a warm day on Saturday and when I got home I realized...oh man, some of this fruit is looking extremely ripe. As in liquid. Even some that were on the top were turning to fruit juice before my eyes. I had to jump on the business of processing this fruit, like, pronto. I've never canned by myself, and only once last summer with Mom, and it was getting late but I thought what the heck this can't be that hard! So I ran to walmart, picked up some jars, and headed home to quickly put Mia to bed and get to work! I called my partner-in-crime Kathy and bless her heart she stayed up with me until almost 1 am her time to walk me through making the jam. She didn't know how either but just as an awesome trusty side kick does, she watched lots of youtube videos, critiqued Martha Stewart (apparently if you save the pits, and remove the outer shell of the pit, and take the inside, and crush it, it adds a "nutty flavor" to the jam. Uh, sure, I'll save that for next time LOL!), and read recipe after recipe so I could hear it all on my headset as I washed and pitted apricots. 

I should note that when I got home, and saw how many I had picked...I was overwhelmed. I think some panicking may have happened. I mean, I'm telling you, it was a lot. I had no idea what to do with it! Well in the end over the course of Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday I made 3 batches of jam, fruit leather, 2 batches of dehydrated fruit, I froze some whole and also froze some puree to make more fruit leather in the future (thank heavens because I overcooked the first batch. By two hours. Oops). 

I may not have done everything perfectly...I mean, the leather is, well, leathery ahem well yeah more like apricot chips, the jam never did congeal right, even by the third batch, and I never did know when to turn off that dehydrator. But boy did I have fun. And as I processed the very last apricot...I was kind of sad! I wanted to call Katie and say, let's go back and get some more! Haha she got even more than I did so I'm sure she would've called me crazy and hung up haha but that's how I felt! 

I am now ready to start on blueberries so wish me luck!