They say that many hands make light work.

Perhaps.  But let’s face it. Hard work is still hard work.

What many hands do is make the hard work take less time. And, if they are the right hands (and some left), they throw in love and laughter, knowledge and experience, ideas and inspiration, time to talk and touch base and a lot of listening.

And so it was yesterday as I gathered with some good friends to spend the day making dilly beans, mustard beans and honey-dilled carrots.

First, the obligatory feet shot. Pretty toes to pretty toes, ready to support a long day ahead.

The cat, sensing a hard day’s work ahead, retreats to the shade of the honeysuckle to nap. Cats are smart.

I don’t know that much about pickling and canning and jam-making. Home-making skills, I guess you’d call them. As a single woman living alone, there is not much impetus to spend a lot of time making large batches of preserves. After all, a girl can only eat or give away so many jars of pickles, or jam, or whatever. And to get enough variety, we’re talking several different batches!  So, my experience level is low. But, I can chop veggies, tip and tail beans and I peel a mean carrot.

I’m also fairly teachable. So, I get to help with some of the trickier jobs – filling the jars, sealing the lids. Uh, taking artsy photos.

The honey-dilled carrots are definitely my fav of today’s work. Dilly beans are great, especially for Caesars! The mustard beans? Meh, not a favourite. But, good for gift-giving and I strategically bartered some of my mustard beans for more dilly beans. Did I mention the Caesars?

All in all, a good day’s work. You can see the results of our hard labour. Some say this is the reward. For me, the time spent with friends is the real reward. You can’t fit that in a jar. Although, we do sometimes get a bit pickled.

Sadly, I think we wore out the cat. Hopefully he recovers by chocolate-making time in December.