Ever have one of those days in which everything seems to be going along fine, then all of a sudden it all comes to a grinding halt. That was Saturday. I put up 5 pints of tomatoe sauce, 3 pints of pickled peppers, and 5 pints of pumpkin. The tomatoes and peppers I could process in a water bath, but the pumpkin I had to process using a pressure canner.
I got out my grandmother's pressure canner and read all the directions, the proceeded with a bit of trepidation. It went along just fine all the way to the end. I turned off the heat and allowed the pressure to normalize before removing the lid and pulling out the jars. The problem came when I was still hearing the same sound of steam letting off only there was no steam. The sounds was coming from under the kitchen floor. Michael, my partner, raced outside and looked into the vent under the house and sure enough, water was spraying everywhere!!!
Sunday was spent trying to repair a water leak under the house in a minuscule crawl space without setting the house on fire. It took three tries before he got the solder to completely seal the fittings. After we turned the water back on, another leak started right up. This time it was a different size pipe. Back to the hardware store....
Monday evening the second leak was repaired. Both leaks were in the hot water lines, so turning off the hot water meant we could take a bit of time to make sure we had all the pieces before cutting open the pipe, but it also meant no showers or dishes until the leaks were fixed. During this time we learned that the water lines need to be grounded in order to prevent electrolysis from making holes in your pipes. Who knew!
The good news is that we have hot water again and could take those most needed showers. I have only just finally caught up on all those dishes made from a frenzied Saturday of canning. We had homemade tomatoe soup and grilled cheese sandwiches for dinner, we had earned them.
