More from the orchard...
This first picture is Grand Prize plums...yummy!

The rest of the pictures are scanned in photos...the orchard I worked at was small. The owner went in business with a friend not far from the orchard. There we raised these beautiful blackberries, as well as strawberries, raspberries, watermelons, cantaloupe, pumpkins, decorative gourds, and we raised tomatoes one year. Oh, I forgot we had blueberries bushes that started baring fruit.

We planted these peach trees the first year I worked there year round. I don't remember how long it took to get this crop of peaches and nectarines...not very long at all. Out of probably 8 years it was the only crop that survived our harsh winters. Both my boss and the other guy had health issues; these trees along with five(eta: I don't know why I wrote five--it was more like 10 or 12 ) long, long rows of peach trees that his daughter-in-law and I bud-grafted were bulldozed out. The strawberry rows were plowed out...a sad but happy time for me in so many ways. The strawberries all had drip irrigation, and were planted on small ridges covered through the plastic film that has become popular here in the past years. The drip tube was buried in the ridge under the plastic film layer. One of my many jobs was to get the irrigation going once spring rolled around. The ground was almost pure sand so irrigation was a must. That was the chore that I was not going to miss. The first patch had 50 rows of strawberries that were 400 feet long, then we added to them each year. The rows added were 800 feet long though. I do miss working on the irrigation at all...the only way I survived it was to look at it as one giant puzzle!

I had to walk the row to the end and feel the end of the irrigation line to see if water was reaching the end. As many times as not, it wasn't. So then I would walk back and every so often dig down to find the plastic drip tube. When I found where the water was, then I had to figure out where the leak was--sometimes it was easy to find cause there would be a big, noticeable wet spot. But lots of times there were numerous places where mice had chewed, or maybe a deer had bounded through and the hoof sunk deep enough to cut the line. No, repairing irrigation lines is not my favorite job.

Sampling the fruit was never a chore--one of these peaches would not be a bad thing right now! Since I worked there, fruit bought in stores just never tastes quite as good. And apples are never as good as when you reach and pick one and eat it!

At the orchard....
I know this is not exactly a fruit scene, but I do love this picture....when it is enlarged I just feel fall when I look at it.

The apples below are Arkansas Black--notice the little critter on the one. These spiders sort of jump--and they love Fuji apples! You might see one or two here and there in the orchard, but there are always more on the Fujis than all the rest of the orchard combined. Anyway, Arkansas Blacks are a gormet cooking apple, the taste will vary with how much rain we have had, and they are the hardest apple I have ever seen. I know I have NOT seen half the varieties, but believe me this is a solid apple. The people that tried them at the orchard seemed to either love them or hate them--no in between.
Now this picture below would probably be in the top ten favorites that I have ever taken...don't know if it that the picture is that good or if it is because I LOVE these apples--they are Blushing Golden. They are such a full rounded flavor...and so juicy. It was after the harvest one fall, and I was cleaning out under the trees--using a weedeater, etc. I was back in the farthest corner from the house and getting so hungry, but didn't want to stop before I finished. I found one of these apples, ate it, and have loved them ever since.These apples are EarliBlaze--an early cooking apple. We used to could count on starting picking them around August 20th. The past few years what few they have left is usually picked right around August 1...these are not necessarily a favorite apple of mine. I just like the picture.

Frustration...

I am now qualified to give a good example of frustration. As anyone who has been reading this for a while knows, I have a couple baby quilts I need to make. I have been having a hard time getting motivated to do any of it though. But over the past week or so I have started...and while both tops should have been done in a couple days, I have been dragging my feet and had a couple other problems thrown in.

I decided the other day that the time is NOW to get them done. So yesterday and the day before I devoted a big part of my day to them. What happened the first day was all my fault...I made six blocks, and went down that night to do some preparation work for yesterday only to discover I had sewn the wrong red fabric in two blocks--even with my road map I messed up. That was frustrating enough--I spent a while ripping out the wrong fabric and I did sew in the correct fabric.

Last night I was working on the last four blocks, on the last round of strips, and when I pressed one open, I noticed that the previous color I had pressed was scorched! Looked bad! How did that happen? I had not left the iron setting on it at all, I had merely gave the strips a quick press to press them open. I had no idea if it could be washed out...thought I would give a little rub with a damp cloth. The fabric TORE!

The fabric was used in four blocks, two strips to each block. I ripped it out of every one of the blocks, and am contemplating ripping out this other fabric. I am just so disgusted. It is fabric from Joann's and while I thought it was cheap, I thought it was a step above some of the really cheap fabric. But I would hate to make the tops and them fall apart once the quilt is finished. But the other color is on the edge of the quilt and I don't know if there would be that much stress on it or not. What do you think?