The one where Geo jumps back into her life with a smile

Hiya. It's been a while hasn't it? Sorry about that.
Life has been full and fun and good and I've just been busy :)

Burning Man was beyond fabulous and now that I'm back home we are spending a few weeks trying to get the playa dust out of everything we took there. I've been doing some fall canning and starting back to work part time. It's been just over 1 week back and it's so nice to be back. I admit it would be nice to stay off, but everyone has been so nice to me, especially when I've been back that it is a joy to be back here...even tho there is so much to do. Ah well...bit by bit it will come. We had a real holiday...the first one in almost a year where we just...well...had a holiday. Nothing to do with me or work or being sick...just fun. It was awesome.

Burning man was like going on a camp holiday to another planet. That's a salt flat desert. With naked people. And free drinks. And art everywhere. And nice hot weather. And flaming octopi. And...And...yeah. Pretty hard to describe it to be honest. I can't even describe how much fun we had. The drive down there and back was a great time too. I love travelling by car in the US...everyone is so friendly (and you can buy cider at the gas station - I'll never get used to that...). J and I just got to spend time together and relax and he had probably the best birthday of his life out there in the desert. J's parent's lent us their vehicle to drive down so we didn't have to worry about vehicle problems and we really enjoyed their posh tripmobile (Ford Flex's are awesome...they hold so much STUFF...and they're kinda pimpin too...). When we got back we said goodbye to our old well-loved, but rust-bucket, protege and traded it in for a nice 2012 low milage Mazda 3. It has heated seats, no rust AND, more importantly, it has a working suspension and the hatch even holds itself up without a piece of 2X4! (Ooh! Ah! Such luxury!)) I loved our 2002 yellow car but it was falling apart and needed about 4K of work done to it...so we took that and put it towards this newer one. It's so nice to have a reliable car again. We even got a decent trade in on the screaming yellow madness, so we were able to send her off without regret. Our new car isn't yellow (it's white) but that's OK. It is reliable and will keep us going for many years to come :)

This weekend was make stuff weekend. I have a friend with an apple tree and crabapple tree in her back yard who is desperate to get rid of apples so she and I and another friend spent saturday making LOTS of pies to freeze and on sunday I gave in to my need to preserve things in the fall and spent all day canning up some peaches in light syrup, crabapple jelly, pickled dill carrots, hot pepper jelly and roasted garlic jelly. Some will be for christmas presents I think.  I still have two 5 gallon pails of crabapples to do something with. I believe a batch of wine will use up one of them...and I'm hoping my mum-in-law will take the other one. I actually have a blister from processing the bucket of apples I did yesterday to get my 15 cups of juice for jelly. I made lots of jelly! My mum used to make it and we've all eaten up the last of her preserves, so it'll be nice having some to give to my family. And eat. Nom. I have never made the garlic or pepper jelly before but I love pepper jelly so I'm hoping they'll both be tasty gifts and neat foodie things to try with roast chicken or pork. I still have a giant mint plant that I need to turn into something tasty in the next few days too...but hey.
For now, it's off for a walk in the sun and then a trip home to set up our camping gear in the back yard and hose it down and pack it up for another winter before a nice BBQ with some fresh brussel sprouts for supper. I hope you are all enjoying the fall and have been having a wonderful last few weeks. I sure have been :)