Sweet Onion Relish & Mason Jar soap dispenser

   A friend of mine broke into the first jar of this relish that she made and canned. She was raving about it and ended up eating the whole jar. Donʻt freak out, it was only a half-pint. So I was anxious to make some too. What I had available was some Walla Walla sweet onions, spicy brown mustard, some fresh thyme and dried tarragon to make this with. I canned 8 jars today (the recipe makes 9 half-pints easily but I used two European jars and they are slightly larger than half-pints). It needs to set three weeks. Hope I can last that long before dipping into a jar! (See Recipe page )
   I did make a Mustard Pickle relish which is spicy and something I could eat a whole jar of. And then there were the pickles I made: my fav-bread and butter, kosher dill and some Polish dills...
Relishes and pickles must be set aside. The apple tree in the back yard is dropping its fruit. Itʻs time to make apple pie filling and apple jam. So out comes the apple corer, peeler and slicer, an old-fashioned gadget that actually works, but only with smaller apples. My recipe is an old one, one Iʻve used for years, the difference is I now use Clear Jel instead of the corn starch it calls for. And in the previous relish recipes that asked for flour, used the CJ. Safer canning-something about heat penetration.
   Got hubby busy on a project. In our kitchen is a coat closet. Lots of junk in it. Thereʻs a hidden corner in this closet and Iʻd like two shelves to hold the canned goods and my canning tools. They are presently relegated to the garage where I find hazards in the way of getting at them. The closet nevers overheats, never gets really cold. Always very cool and dark. Perfect storage for canned goods and....it puts them actually in the kitchen. Yeah!!
   I am proud of a little project Iʻve pulled off. Iʻve turned some mason jars into soap holders for my bathroom, the main bath and the kitchen. In my bathroom, I have an ancient Atlas jar with a tint of green, the main bath has the new blue "vintage" Ball jar, the kitchen, some plain old Ball jars but their lids are red!

Hereʻs a plain Jane one. With an awl, tin snips and an old soap pump from a bottle I had in the house, is how I made the first one. People have used a drill but buying drill bits at ten bucks apiece for the difference sizes of soap dispensers just didnʻt make sense to me.  I love collecting the ancient mason jars, wonʻt use them to can with, but I can repurpose them into objects Iʻll enjoy having around. Next project--mason jar lamp.