Tuna

Royal and I haven't taken a real vacation since our honeymoon.  Real vacation meaning somewhere we lay around and sleep in and maybe drink too much occasionally and not have real life to deal with and where we get kind of bored by the end of it and are ready to come back to real life.  Now that we live in Kansas, our vacations consist of coming back to Washington since we hardly ever see our family, and now that we have kids, our vacations are pretty much work.  Usually, this year included, I come out to Washington early with the kids to spend more time "on vacation", but really it's just I do my usual "job" of taking care of the kids but in a different location.  The first part of our vacation was spent up at Kaylee's house.  It is so fun to be with my sister, doing our days together, instead of on the phone talking about our days.  But, it is work.  The cooking, and feeding, and cleaning, and kids everywhere kind of work.  It's really fun, and a tad more chaotic than my everyday life, but still it's work and by the end of the day when Kaylee and I would finally get the kids to sleep and the house was quiet and we'd finally get a chance to do something with each other, we were too freaking tired and we'd end up falling asleep on the couch, or going grocery shopping kid-free because we were, yet again, out of food.

Now, I have left the Wagner compound and have hauled all our stuff down to the Lovingfoss lair in Kelso, for the second half of our "vacation" and to await Royal's arrival.  It's a different kind of work down here.  I don't so much have to worry about the food aspect of it.  Royal's parents house is always full of food, and his mom loves to cook, so there's always left overs to reheat, or she'll be at the stove making something.  So that parts not so hard.  The kids are a bit older now, so I don't have to be on top of them all the time making sure they are staying out of things.  The work down here comes in a whole different area - if it's not a house project - ripping our carpets, painting houses - then it mostly has to do with storing up for the winter.  And I came on this vacation expecting this kind of work.  Knowing I was coming during the time I'd normally be canning in Kansas, I hauled all my empty jars out to Washington knowing that I could get all my canning needs filled here in Kelso. 

I arrived on Thursday, and the work began soon after.  Norma got a call from a fisherman on Saturday that the tuna had come in.  So, Wayne took the truck down to Ilwaco and picked up 750 pounds of tuna.  400 for Norma and myself, and the rest for other people in town.  Norma and I spent a good 10 hours in the kitchen on Saturday.  She fileted the fish, I stood at the sink and cleaned the fish, and then we stuffed it into jars and started pressure cooking it.  Norma got up at 6 this morning to keep working and we finally finished with everything today around 6.  Holy aching back and feet and holy stinking hands and clothes.  I've taken 2 showers and still can't seem to get the fish smell off my fingers!

Here is Jayden bringing another fish into the kitchen for Norma to filet. 

 He was really excited to watch, and really wanted Norma to cut one of the fish's heads off so he could carry it around.  Pretty sure he's got a bunch of Royal running through his veins.

We had coolers and coolers stuffed with fish.  We forgot to actually count the fish, but have figured out it was probably around 25-30 fish.

Before processing

And after!

From 400 pounds of fish, we got 226 jars, mostly pints - we had to use some others when we started running low.  This is by far the best tuna I've ever had, and my kids love it.  So here's to hoping my half of the fish will last at least a year...  :)  Or I guess I know what I'll be doing on my next "vacation"