Today was such a beautiful day. The sun was shining bright, it was fairly warm, the redbuds, dogwoods, lilacs, violets, dandelions are blooming. And, the hummingbirds have arrived.
The grandkids were out of school today since it is Monday and they have gone to a four day school week.
A funny thing happened. Emmett came in while we were making the jelly and asked if he could dig up a purple flower and put it in a pot. I said yes, and told him how to fill the pot halfway full of dirt first, then dig up the flower and put it in the pot, then water it. So he goes out for a while, then comes in with the pot with the flower in it. A purple violet, like I had assumed he wanted? NO...a purple tulip! HAHAHAHAHA! I thought it was hilarious!
Julie and the kids came down this morning and her and I made wild violet jelly. It turned out so pretty, a light pinky lavender color for the white Confederate violets, which are these...
And a slightly darker purple pink from these purple violets...
It tasted good, but it has a slight lemon taste to me, owing to the fact the recipe calls for 1/4 cup of lemon juice for citrus to help with the jelling of the jelly! I don't know if the taste of lemon is really that noticiable or if I just knew the lemon juice was in there, so I tasted it....anyway, it's still good.
If it all doesn't jell up, we have some pretty, tasty violet syrup.
Next I am going to make some dandelion jelly.
P.S.- the jelly DID jell up, all except the last batch that I decided to put in only 2 Tablespoons of lemon juice instead of the 1/4 cup it called for...it is syrup still. HAHA! It will be good on pancakes, waffles or french toast!
The darker colored jelly is from the purple violets, it took me a good half hour to pick enough violets to make 2 cups which is what the recipe called for. Then I picked the white Confederate violets and it only took me about 5 minutes to pick enough of them to make 2 batches of the lighter pink jelly. Needless to say, I have way more of the Confederate violets in my yard than the purple. Most people might consider them weeds but I LOVE them!