Frugal Fall Decor Ideas

Looking for a few quick fall decor ideas. Try adding a chenille throw as a tablecloth and adding popcorn to a vase with a pillar candle. Quick, simple and frugal.

You could also use a plaid blanket as tablecloth in pretty fall colors and leaves gathered up from your yard in a vase with a candle. These are things that most of us have in home already. Don't have a fireplace, can't afford a gas one or you don't won't the mess of a wood burning one, then pick up one of these DVD's and pop it in enjoy. No chopping wood or cleaning up ash or soot.

Easy Freezing Tomatoes

Every year my sweet father-in-law plants a large garden and brings us fresh veggies. This year he had quite a bit of tomatoes and brought us two five gallon buckets full. I was a little overwhelmed with so many since I'm the only one that eats them. My husband will only eat them in salsa or cooked into a sauce. Well, there is only so much salsa and marinara sauce you can make or eat at one time. I had to figure out a way to save these fabulous tomatoes for later use. I took some to my neighbor and she told me to freeze them and here's how. It's really simple and took less than 30-40 minutes tops. First wash all dirt off of tomatoes and set aside.

Then bring a large stock pot of water to boil. After water starts to boil using a spider or a large slotted spoon, drop 3-4 tomatoes into boiling eater.

This is called blanching. You'll know when they're ready to remove from pot when the skin starts to split. Promptly remove with the spider or slotted spoon. I just placed mine on an old kitchen towel to cool. In the meantime I added my next batch of tomatoes to the boiling pot. At this point you'll want to open a gallon size freezer bag and I used my cutting board and a couple of paper towels to start out with but quickly swapped over to another bowl to place the skins on.

After the tomatoes have cooled to where you can safely handle them, just peel the skin off and lay the tomatoes on the cutting board to cool further. You may have to use a pairing knife to pierce the skin on some to get the peeling started. Be careful because they are still very hot at this point.

You can probably remove the other batch from the pot at this time and place them on the towel to cool. While those are cooling, place your peeled tomatoes into a gallon size freezer bag, wiping any excess liquid or juice off and removing as much air as possible from the bag and seal shut and place in freezer. There you are. You have a bag of whole fresh peeled tomatoes ready for your next soup, stew, chili or pasta sauce. Enjoy!