I've always liked the sour cooking apples. Sometimes I find red varieties too floury or bland...especially when they're out of season and have been stored in a cold room for too long.

When I was growing up we had a huge apple tree in our yard that bore those little green cooking apples, about 3" big. No good for fresh eating but made wonderful pies and sauce.

We have some in our yard now, don't know what kind they are; last year was the first year they produced and it was dry so we didn't get too much. Pears too. Only the peaches and cherries did well this past summer. I made peach preserves but the cherries are still in bags in my freezer awaiting some kind of processing. I think I'll take care of them sometime this week, maybe make a pie or two for Thanksgiving and can the rest.

I didn't get to do much canning this year. Garden didn't do very well.

We did get a lot of onions though. I never realized how worthwhile it actually is to grow onions from sets, but I'm definitely doing it again next year. I planted 100 little onion sets and got enough to keep us supplied till next spring if they don't spoil, and so far they've kept very well. The trick is to lay them out on newspaper and dry them for about a month before you store them.

Oops I am rambling again. ;)

So, the city gives out 100 free trees to residents. They go based on who submits thier requests first. Anyway, they do a drive-by tree planting. You wake up one day (no advance notice) find Miss Dig has come by and painted lines on all your underground lines. Wake up the next day to find a ginormous hole in your yard. Wake up the next day to find a tree planted in your yard. Kinda odd when dealing with it. Anyway, the first year I wasn't home for all of it, left one day, came home the next to a random tree put in my yard. The bastards put a crabapple tree in my yard. The following year, yup, they did it again! Ohhhh....I do not like trees which leave waste on my yard. Leaves are one thing, but I hate them rotting on the ground. Needless to say I am not applying for another tree this year.

Fixed that for you.

My brothers and I used to do that with the tomatoes that turned bad on the vine... tell you what, nothing funnier than a half-rotted tomato exploding all over your lil brother. And nothing SCARIER than your mother finding out about it!

On a related note. We had an immediate neighbor at one time who was a dentist and was obsessive about his yard. We just to take all of our pumkin seeds and randomly plant them in various spots in his garden every year. I don't think he ever figured it out.