September Prep Journal

[CapeCMom]

Welcome September-one of my favorite months in the North East. Nights are cool, days are warm-no humidity.
With the long weekend coming up, I plan to Pull our most of my squash plants. A majority have powdery Mildew so bad that the leaves are almost pure white. I will then plant the rest of my cool season crops. A question though-will the spores that are around the area from the powdery mildew affect my lettuce and spinach? Lee, I need you! Also plan to start my Fall Housecleaning, which includes my front porch-it needs a good scrubbing. The spiders have made a mess of it-DH regularly uses the leaf blower to blow the leaves, spider webs and such off of it, it still needs a good scrubbing. I like a weak solution of simple green and a scrub brush-then I hose it down.

Ramen noodles were only 1.98 per case at Wally World, so I picked up several for the pantry.
Found several boxes of the plastic screw top lids for Ball Jars. I was happy about that because I have a problem with pantry moths and I pack all of my dry goods in 1/2 Gallon Ball jars. I can now put the lids and rings to better use.

[NCLee]

Not sure how I can help.... ????

Never had powdery mildew affect turnip greens, which is what we grow instead of spinach. Around here mildew is a headache for squash, cucumbers, gourds, etc. But with the weather we're having this year, ???

If you're talking about cleaning the porch, I'll help, if you swing by and lend a hand here with washing the siding on the back of the house. (no power washing). It's in the shade most of the year, so it's about time to knock down the moss. :)

Lee

[CapeCMom]

Thanks for the offer Lee, lol-no really I was worried about the powdery mildew getting onto my other plants-but like you said it has not affected my turnips or beans so may be spinach and lettuce will be immune too? I just didn't want to plant stuff in the same area and then have it be infected. At what point should I pull my beans out? They aren't producing much now but the plants are gorgeous-they do have some new flowers on them-I should probably pull them huh.

[NCLee]

If the plants look good and you still have time before first frost, you may get another light crop of beans. Can't remember if you need bees or not for pollination. So that may be a factor, this late in the season.

Anything more about mildew in your zone, and I'd be speculating. Here, I don't believe it would be a problem, as the humidity is starting to drop, and generally this time of year we're a little dryer, unless a hurricane dumps a lot of water. Rain this year ???? as strange as this summer has been.

Lee

[NCLee]

Friday, we made a run to Sam's Club. Learned not to make this run on weekends, if we can avoid it. Even on Friday, the place was crowded. Noticed a lot of steaks and beer in the carts as folks were getting ready for the long weekend. Anyway, made a couple of other stops on the way there.

Picked up the following.
6 bx of canning lids & 2 bx of SureGel
1 bx ea Ball regular & wide mouth plastic mason jar storage caps
6 bx Arm & Hammer Washing Soda - YEAH, been looking for that for 2 years.
1 bx (8 cans) Lesueur peas (my absolute favorite canned pea)
1 pk (3 jars) pasta sauce
1 pk (2 jars) Welch concord grape jelly
1 pk (2 family size bx) Luzianne tea
1 Folgers Instant Coffee (16 oz)
1 cs (30 pk) tuna Lunch to Go
2 Idahoan Mashed Potatoes 3.5 lb/ea
4 bx Boca Burgers
1 bx (72 tablets) Alka-Seltzer Plus Cold Formular
1 pk Gladware Family Size (3 -13 cup) storage containers
4 pk Ziplock BPA Free (2 ea - 9 1/2 c) rectangular storage containers
1 large bag of carrots to be dehydrated in the next couple of days

This morning, I'm canning a turkey, already prepped, just need to defat the broth. Two more turkeys are in the ice chest and will be prepped this afternoon for canning tomorrow.

Planning to can the rest of the venison that's in the freezer later this week. Also have some 5 lb bags mixed frozen vegetables that'll go to the dehydrator.

While I've got the freezer space, will be stashing some cornmeal in there for 72 hours to kill any pests that may be hiding in the bags.

The Ziploc containers will be filled with water and will go in the freezer to make block ice. This size block of ice will fit well in our large ice chest that we use if we have to empty the refrigerator and freezer. Will also go in our 5 gal water cooler. And, it's another source of drinking water, if we need it.

Another project in the next few days is to transfer 25 lbs of sugar to 1/2 gal jars. Those Ball plastic lids are just about perfect for this type of storage. I've been using them for years. They have a flexible lining material that forms a good seal for this type of storage.

How are your September preps going? What have you done or are planning to do this month?

Lee

[CapeCMom]

Lee, you only bought one coffee?, lol. I know how you are!
Looks like you got a good haul, and have been really busy canning. That's great! I'm just doing Fall Housecleaning this weekend. It's so cool that I am finally in the mood to do it.

[firegirl969]

Today I bought a nice little am/fm portable radio with alarm clock that operates on two AA batteries. We live out from any radio stations by about 40 miles, but it picks up great. I only paid $5. I also stocked up on more rice, OTC meds, spare spark plugs for things around here, an eyeglass repair kit, antibiotic ointment, and powered milk.

[NCLee]

Nice find on that radio! Congrats.

Added 6 more boxes of canning lids to my stash yesterday.

Lee

[firegirl969]

I had a doctor's appointment today, so I rode around in Wal-mart's motorized wheelchair and got some sure-jel and 50 lbs of sugar. The sugar went up $2.22 a 25 lb bag since last month. I also got 24 cans each of vienna sausage and mushrooms and 12 jars each of pizza sauce and taco sauce, as we didn't raise enough tomatoes this year to make these sauces. I also got 14 bags of pasta in the hispanic foods section for 29 cents each and some powdered milk.

ETA: I also got 8 cans of pink salmon with expiration dates of 06/14.

[Apple]

I like to stock up on band-aids and frequently find Nexcare brand are half-price in the grocery store. I even found some little butterfly band-aids were half price recently. Bought every box on the shelf!

I keep a large, sectioned box from the hardware dept. filled with all the first aid supplies, bandages of all sizes, tapes (both waterproof and paper tape for sensitive skin), gauze, antibiotic ointment, etc.

[NCLee]

Apple, you probably already know this, but just in case.....

Be sure to keep an eye on the expiration dates of those meds. And latex gloves tend to break down over time. For both, I wouldn't stock up more than what you reasonably expect to use before they're too old to be safe to use.

Same to a lesser degree with some brands of bandaids. They tend to lose their ability to stick after a while. Once every 6 months or so, review your supplies for anything that needs restocking. Nothing much worse, IMHO, to think you have something on hand, in an emergency, only to find that you can't use it for some reason.

If you already know this, please ignore this post.

Lee

[firegirl969]

Yesterday, I scored 7 more 5-gallon buckets from the bakery, 4 of them had lids. I also picked up some more powdered milk, bakery mix (similar to bisquick, but in large bags for bakeries for $2 a bag), 10 envelopes of taco seasoning for B1G1F, 24 envelopes of yellow rice mix for B1G1F, and 10 envelopes of brown gravy mix. Today I went to the thrift store 1/2 price day sale and got 2 more quart jars and 5 pint jars, a dressy church sweater, a dressy coat with hood, and a pair of sweat pants, all for $9. One of my seniors also brought me 6 quart jars and 1 wide-mouth pint jar this week and a gallon pickle jar, which I am storing some of the bakery mix in.

[Apple]

Thanks for the good reminder Lee.