ReluctantFarmChick.com

 How can I possibly convey the corn process when a picture is worth a thousand words?  I know my readers are NOT going to want to READ a thousand words - and actually there would probably be 8 pictures, so that would be 8000 words.  Go get a cup of tea.  I’ll wait here. . . .

No card reader yet.  Next thing I did was scrounge for a USB cable with a camera thingy on the other end.  Now I’m obsessing about that because surely my camera came with that (3 moves ago).

Prince Farming had this original idea that we’d get up EARLY to pick the corn.  Like up and breakfast around 5:30am so we could get out there as soon as it was light.  Luckily it rained (or maybe we were just really tired).  So we didn’t get up that early.  We were out picking corn at 8:30am.  We had the "garden lot" (not one of the two fields).  We prefer the garden lot, because it seems there aren’t as many vines.  I think there is a conspiracy of vines that try to keep corn ears on the corn plants.  Vines grow up in the corn field and climb the corn winding round and around to get to the sun.  In the process, they "sew" the corn tightly against the stalk.  (no picture)

I only had to pick 2 buckets of corn.  We put 25 ears of corn in each bucket so we can keep track of how many we pick.  After I pick 2 buckets, Prince Farming also had at least that many and our son had part of one.  (Our daughter got off lucky this year - she’s at the lake with the girl cousins and Mema & Pop-pop - she’s SO happy).  When that much corn is picked (4 buckets), I sit on the back of the truck (no picture) and start shucking.  That means I peel the green stuff and string off the corn, and put it into coolers while Prince Farming continues picking.  He picked 10 more buckets of corn.  For you math whizzes that makes it approximately 350 ears of corn.  Give or take a few.  I think shucking might be the grossest part of the process.  Although picking is nasty too - you have to walk between the rows and there are sticky things and wet things and sharp leaf edges.  I don’t like that part, but I only have to do a very little of that, and Prince Farming lets me pick the widest and easiest row.  Shucking is the unskilled part of the job.  And the grossest.  There are worms of varying colors and sizes (no picture) that start eating at the top of the ear.  The way to deal with this dilemma is to take another corn husk anduse it break off the top offending part of the corn (so you don’t have to touch the yucky mealy part).  Then everything is fine.  This year there were also bugs - I call them June bugs, but that can’t be right because it’s actually August.  But they’re that pretty blue color and that disgusting big size.

After all the corn is picked (but before it’s all shucked) we move back home.  That way we can get the rest of the process going.  See, the whole point is to get the corn from the field to the freezer in the shortest amount of time.  We came home so Prince Farming could get the rest of the cleaning stage set up.  I continued shucking while he rigged the wheelbarrow tipped at the edge of the garage with a garden hose hung just right so it would be a "faucet" under which to clean the corn.  I have only done this part of the process once, so it’s not very clear.  But at this station there are vegetable brushes and paring knives.  They clean the corn and cut away the worm/bug junk and any other bad spots (there aren’t very many bad spots).

While they are cleaning outside, I come inside and start water boiling in big pots.  And I cover the entire kitchen in black trash bags and towels. (no picture)  Corn has a lot of sugar in it, and it gets to be VERY sticky.  Everywhere.  At this stage, our son is still outside shucking or cleaning.  I’m in the kitchen alone.  I get to choose my own radio station or CD (I couldn’t find Dido, so I did Nora Jones).

When the water is boiling, I can start taking corn.  I boil around two dozen ears at a time.  3 minutes from when it starts boiling. After 3 minutes of boiling and I stop the cooking process by putting the corn into cold water.  First one sink of cold water then a second sink of cold water.  I change the water often.  From there it drains then gets cut.  The cutting is done by jaming a corn cob onto a nail that is pierced through a 6 x 6 x 2" block of wood (no picture).  Then there is this circular blade thingy 
that you slide over the corn cob.  It cuts the corn off and it lands up in the cookie sheet under the wooden block (no picture).  My son came in to do cutting.  I had to clean the cobs after him because it’s only fun to slide the cutter down ONCE.  After that it’s just work.  But there’s too much good stuff on there to leave it with one cut.

After being cut, the corn is scooped (4 cups) into a quart bag.  The bag is rinsed (very sticky) and flattened (no air in the bag) and placed blissfully in the freezer.  DONE.  

Except we did this over and over and OVER for HOURS.  We were ready for lunch (all corn processed) by 2:30pm.  And guess what we ate?  CORN.  And baked potatoes.  And garden tomatoes and cucumbers.  Yummy farm food.  Sore backs.  Messy kitchen.  Huge sense of satisfaction and relief to have it done for another year.  I think we ended up with around 50 bags of corn.  

The corn is Silver Queen corn.  It’s the sweetest corn you’ll ever eat (well, the Silver KING corn last year was pretty amazing too).  It’s a white corn.  And delicious.  And a family tradition.  As much as we all dread "corn day" we wouldn’t have it any other way.  That’s also the other side of reluctance.

 Attending Stampin’Up! convention is always a great time for me.  I love to see people I haven’t seen in a while, and reconnect with ones (in person) that I generally speak to (or interact with in some way) during the year.  I also love to see the new stamps and accessories.  They lend themselves to a huge "blank slate" of Imagine what I can do with that!  Actually, who am I kidding.  It actually lends itself to Wow - I can’t wait to see what people come up with using that so I can copy them.  But anyway - it is fresh.  And fun.  And I always leave wishing I could stamp more.  And because stamping was a bit of a business for me, there’s always that possibility of putting the whole machine in gear and letting it work for me.  I’ve managed to studiously avoid that for several years now - and it’s proving hard to get back into it.  At convention 2007 I decided I was going to spend more time stamping.  Just for fun.  And when I got to convention 2008, I realized that stamping just hadn’t happened (other than 1 set of wedding invitations, 1 set of anniversary announcements, 1 set of baby announcements, and 2 sets of cards for gifts).  It’s not okay for a stamper to be able to make a list like that.  a) there’s very little creativity in that (lots of repetitive stamping) and b) when you can remember everything you’ve stamped, you haven’t stamped enough.  Not to mention the square footage in our house dedicated to stamping is completely being wasted under a pile of boxes.

With my new blog thing, Amy decided I could have a stamping page.  So simple.  It’s a no-brainer.  You blog.  You stamp.  You put the two together.  So here I am, letting you know, that in the very near future, I will, I might, I would like to, I have decided to, I think I’ll add a page to the blog dedicated to the enjoyment of stamping - mine and yours.  This will require an overhaul of some space.  But I’ll start small.  And my commitment is to fly-lady my stamp room.  Whatever it takes.

In the mean time, my farmchik life continues.  This week is corn week.  You’ll LOVE that post.  Thursday has been slated "corn day" for our family.  Last year I missed corn day because of stamp convention.  This year they kindly waited for my return by NOT picking the corn from the field.  Prince Farming’s dad said we could have the garden corn - it was planted later than the field, so it will be ready later.  Drat.