I distracted myself from mowing this morning by walking across the street to check on the status of the mustang grapes. Ripe, perfect right now, and lots of them. I filled a bucket and got a gallon of juice from it. I alerted my new next door neighbor (took him 3 years to move in, but they're finally there) because he is the one who I first saw picking these grapes years ago. He lived a few miles from here but used to drive over to visit his sister who lives six doors up. I asked him back then what he was doing, and then looked into using the juice and started making jelly.

So today I invited him over to see how a steam juicer works, because he has been making the juice the old-fashioned way of heating all of the grapes and then straining and straining and straining to get to a relatively clear juice. I learned about the juicer prior to starting to make jelly, and it's one of the things that has kept me making jelly - it's so much faster and easier. I showed him how the juice is siphoned from the collection pan with nothing needing straining, and offered to let him borrow it when he decides to next make jelly. We will never ever discuss politics, but I can win them over with the offer of fresh garden tomatoes and borrowing the steam juicer.