Summer Holidays Come to an End and Bread and Butter Cucumbers

 We have a lot of cucumbers, which isn't as difficult as the zucchini glut as we love to eat cucumbers as is, on sandwiches and in salads.  I also decided to pickle some into "bread and butter" cucumbers which are great on sandwiches, and burgers.  I just slice up 3 or 4 cucumbers and layer them in a dish, sprinkling salt over each layer.  Cover and put in the fridge overnight.  Then drain them and rinse them well and leave to drain some more.

Put 1 1/2 cups white vinegar, 3/4 cup of sugar and a cup of water into a saucepan.  Add 2 tsp of mustard seeds or pickling spice.  Put on the heat and stir until the sugar dissolves, then simmer uncovered for about five minutes.  Add cucumber slices, bring to the boil then remove from heat and pack into sterilised jars.  I just run jars through the dishwasher to sterilise them.  They will keep in the fridge for a while, if they last that long.  I made a batch last week and today I am making a second lot.

I have had to put word verification on the comment process here, I know nobody likes it but I am getting ridiculous anonymous spam comments, several a day.

Emily has decided to go back to school and try to do years 11 and 12 again.  I am cautiously optimistic but feel she has grown up a lot in the past few years and now she is on the medication she is much better and ready to prepare for her future again.  Josh has decided to repeat year 11, which I am not opposed to, as he didn't do as well as he could have last year, and a lot of that was probably due to me being unwell and not giving him the stability and support he needed.  I really don't believe he would have been mature enough for university next year either.  Josh's friend Peter, who he's known since primary school is also repeating.  He got a job late last year and had decided to leave school but hated the job.  He had missed a lot of assignments due to working and figured he'd make the choice to repeat before the school made it for him.  We are going to the school tomorrow to see what they think of all this.  This Em's second attempt to start year 11, I just hope it works out for her this time.

I have volunteered to work at the soup kitchen this year, it's a wonderful service provided at one of the churches here, everyone is welcome, not just the poor and the lonely and I will be proud to be a part of it.

These are the pickles I made today, I used white wine vinegar this time and pickling spice (last batch I used mustard seeds).  They smelled more like the commercially made ones due to the dill seeds in the spice mix.  And we cut them a bit thicker this time as well.