Tomato time.

My family grows tomatoes. Since I can remember, every summer growing up consisted of planting, picking, and sometimes selling the things. Since moving away from home, I've realized how lucky I was to just have free produce all summer long, especially vine ripened, super fresh tomatoes. This year and last year even though I'm no longer living with a field of tomatoes in my backyard, like my parents do, I've been lucky enough to get a few full buckets from them to can.Now, using the phrase "lucky enough" is easy to say in the fall and winter, when tomatoes are the perfect thing for making stews and soups, but at the moment it takes some intentional wording to think like that. When it's hot outside, the last thing I want to do is crank up a few burners to boil water and skin tomatoes late into the night. (and then the next day or so as well) But in the end, it always does seem worth it.