September is here.

I can't believe September is here and summer as we knew it in Sonoma is over. We're only able to come up again on weekends. I'll miss our long stays in the heat and sun.

There is a lot of canning happening this month. Sometimes in Sonoma and sometimes back in San Francisco. It's easier in Sonoma with the fantastic new range but the cold fog in the city sure makes it easier to stand over a hot stove for hours.

Grape jelly happened last week in Sonoma. We had about 12 pounds of grapes that ripened all at once. Tasty as is, I knew we couldn't consume that much in a week!

We also have plenty of cherry tomatoes to harvest. I've taken to freezing them. They look great in quart jars in the freezer.

And now the larger tomatoes are ripening. The gophers ate all but one of my canning tomatoes so I hastily bought more to replace them without thinking what varieties I was buying.

Let's hope our stomachs can handle tomatoes with every meal for the next few weeks. And of course the apples are ready too. It came so fast this year, I didn't believe my daughter when she told me they were ripe. We'll see how these pears do. There are a lot on the pear tree but not sure when they'll be ripe enough to eat. Last year we had one pear when we moved in.

And of course, the harvest is accumulating on the kitchen counter, including a second flush of green beans.

Tomorrow I will plant more seeds for the fall and winter crops, including parsnips. We'll see how those do as I hear they have a hard time germinating. I think I'm looking more forward to the winter crops this year.