Thank you Lord!

We have so much to be thankful for!  How about you?

Our daughter Marilyn and grand daughters were in a car accident recently, but God protected them all.  They are fine. Then God provided enough money from their insurance to replace their car with a van... which they thought they would be looking at getting sometime soon, so it turned out well.

Our garden continues to produce, and Jim and I are busy picking and canning and trying to keep up.  We put up bread and butter pickles today. 

Aren't they pretty?  We looked all over for a recipe that we wanted and ended up making our own.  

Bread and Butter Pickles

16 cups of sliced medium (1/4 inch) pickling cucumbers.

2 red onions, thinly sliced.

1/2 cup kosher salt.

4 cups chopped ice.

5 cups cider vinegar.

5 cups sugar.

3/4 tsp. turmeric.

1/2 tsp. celery seeds.

1 Tab. mustard seeds.

1/2 tsp. crushed red pepper (no seeds).

3/4 tsp. ground cinnamon.

3/4 tsp. ground all spice.

3/4 tsp. ground cloves.

Combine cucumbers, salt and onions and chopped ice in a large bowl.  Mix them up well. Cover with a plate and put a weight on it (we used a gallon of vinegar).   Let stand for 3 hours.

Drain completely after 3 hours.

In a big pot, combine vinegar, sugar, turmeric, celery seed and mustard seed, pepper, cinnamon, all spice, and cloves. Put on a burner on a medium heat, adding drained cucumbers, and onions.

Heat mixture, do not allow it to boil, but make sure it is good and hot.  Have your canning jars hot in the dishwasher, or you can put them in the oven for a few minutes so they are hot.  Also have your rings and lids boiling in water. Take the pot off the burner.

Transfer hot mixture to jars and seal.  As long as you have hot jars, mixture and lids, your jars should seal and be fine without doing a hot water bath.  Ours did, and this is how we do our dill pickles as well with hot brine.

If you prefer to do a hot water bath, leave them in for 10 minutes.

Made another pair of booties the last couple of days.  A co-worker La Shana is really close to having her little girl, so I got busy and made these.

These little felt booties are so much fun to make.  I got the pattern here on Pinterest.  However, I have made them smaller for newborn to 3 month size.  I made the ties by braiding three colors of 3 strands each embroidery thread.  Also added a fabric bottom to it.  As I make these booties I have discovered more things that I will change and do...next time...   Have more ideas for new ones down the road.

Wild fires are still going in the western states.  Our thoughts and prayers are with California, Oregon, Nevada, Washington and Idaho.  Many homes have been lost.  We have had smoke filtering into the valley from these fires the last few days, to where  you can hardly see the mountains today.  Thankfully Pa Jim has been doing alot better health wise, but smoke makes it hard to breath sometimes.  He seems to be doing ok though.. Thank you Jesus!

We are so thankful for all our  blessings... praying you have many to count as well!

Hugs, Ma and Pa