Canning & Donating

Today was a whirlwind; hence me blogging at 12am.  Lately D1 has been in the "I want to sleep in mommy's bed" kick.  Every night we get her into her bed and somehow I wake up with an extra body in my bed.  Oh well.  Hubby says we should enjoy it and remember that she will be 16 before we know it and not want to be in the same room as us.  HA!

I let hubby sleep in and did breakfast duty.  I had spent the entire day yesterday cleaning so a few things needed to be done.  That last load of laundry had to be folded, the dishes from the dishwasher had to be put away and there on my counter sat 2 large zucchini.  It has just been TOO hot to bake.  They were intended for my FAMOUS Zucchini Nut Bread.  Today it was rainy and cold.  Perfect baking weather. Once hubby got up I got to work.  I cranked out 4 loaves of bread in a little over an hour.  Im a machine when it comes to this bread.  I shredded the rest of the zucchini for later batches.  I had to try it before I served it to anyone else.  It was AWESOME.  I delivered one loaf to a foodie friend that hasn't ever tried zucchini bread, yes, really!  Another loaf was to go to my BIL as I was heading in their direction to donate blood later in the afternoon.

I got D2 to nap and got ready to head to my appointment. I dropped off a loaf of bread and headed to the community center.  It seemed like there was one conundrum after another while trying to donate today.  I gave them my donor card from 3 years ago.  I have been "off" having babies so I haven't donated in 3 years.  I used to be the every 6 weeker!  Anyways, my info didn't come up correctly.  Then it turns out that my card was generated in Columbus Ohio and is not valid here.  Ummm... ok.  Then I get through the process where they stick your finger to check your iron count.  I needed to be 12.5 to donate. It was 12.4.  Now, I am a medical professional and know for a fact that I have NEVER been low.  They retested and miraculously I was 13.1; ummm. ok.  Then I get back to the recliner and get comfy.  She scanned all the barcodes on the bags and we were all set until the tech noticed that I had a "rash" on my arms.  I had gotten some sort of heat rash while shopping last week and I still had a touch of it.  I was now denied.  I understand the reasoning but I had now been there an hour with 2 finger sticks.  I was a bit irritated.  I rescheduled for next week.  Grrrr.

I then went to the in laws to pick tomatoes.  They now have a HUGE quantity of tomatoes that are ripe and the market is only on Saturday.  I decided to help out and process some into sauce.  We picked 4 crates of tomatoes and 1 crate of basil.  I brought everything home and started the canning process.  The thing that sucks about canning is the return.  From everything we picked I got 2.75 quarts of sauce.  I also processed the basil into pesto cubes.  It really makes you understand why a quart of spaghetti sauce is expensive.  TRUST ME.