Easter has come early (or late, whichever way you look at it)

The kids went out to feed the chickens some peaches. I was inside, still peeling, pitting, slicing, and storing peaches. In mid-slice, I heard a massive scream from the kids outside, and literally heard them galloping to the house. They tore the screen door off the hinges, and all yelled at different times, "There's an egg! There's an egg!" I heard it five different ways. As did the entire neighborhood. And yes, there it was, in the corner of the coop, a tiny little brown egg. I'm so proud of my girls!! And now over the next few days and weeks, we'll be getting 14 more little tiny eggs. The kids can't wait for the "real" eggs to start. They are envisioning scrambled and fried eggs every morning for breakfast. They're dreaming, but that's what they think. I don't make a big, hot breakfast every morning, and fresh eggs isn't changing that. But, Jeffie Jean is going to get to fix breakfast one morning a week this school year, so that will be one more hot breakfast for them all, and maybe it will be eggs.

And back to those peaches. A dear man from our church brought me a huge box of peaches Wednesday morning. Yep, not quite a week after Georgia Beth's birth. It has taken me three days to get them all processed. I knew I wouldn't have the stamina to can them, so I was just going to freeze them. Now here is where it gets interesting. I called Mom to find out how Grandma froze her peaches. I always call Mom to find out how Grandma did something. Because if Grandma had a way of doing something, that's just the way it should always be done. Always. Never deviate. Never improvise. Follow her directions to the tee. Yeah. Until this time. WHAT?! Did I just say that?! I didn't do it just like Grandma. How could I? She actually peeled each and every peach. Do you know how hard that is? And how long that takes? Now, I helped one year with the peaches. My job was to slice the peaches. She peeled them. And I promise, I couldn't keep up with her. She could peel a peach faster than I could slice them. My Mom mentioned that she like to peel them. Didn't blanch them because she thought that cooked them too much. Really, I think she took pride in her peach peeling abilities. I tried. I ended up with half the size of the peach when I finished, and it took me like five minutes just to get the skin off. So, I broke, and did it different. I blanched them. And then, I didn't dry freeze them either. Grandma just sprinkled hers with fresh fruit, and put them in zip top bags and froze them. And I chose to make a syrup for them, and freeze them that way. Man am I being a rebel! Mom said that the peaches texture changed, and I remember Grandma always fussing about freezer burn. (But then again, she worried about that with anything that spent even a day in the freezer) So after some research, I found that "wet freezing" significantly reduced freezer burn. So that's what I've done. As you can see, I've felt the need to confess. To whom, I have no idea, but I'm glad my secret is out. And I now have 13 quarts of sliced peaches in my freezer. And a massive batch of peach crisp. And the chickens even got a treat too. And I'm so glad I don't have to look at peaches anymore. Did I mention I can't stand peaches?

Too bad I can't find the cord to the camera. I'd love to share pictures of the egg, chickens, and peaches with you! And the clean kitchen too. Oh yeah, I even cleaned up after myself!