Hot.

Today Angie and I turned this:

into this:

We made 48 jars of hot pepper jelly.

It sounds like kind of a crazy scheme, but it was definitely the best executed and most successful of all of our crazy schemes.

There were a few minor mishaps.

Mishap 1: Batch 1 was thrown away; we skipped 10 minutes of boiling. That was fixed by writing the recipe in giant letters and hanging it on the fridge.

Mishap 2: There was some yelling during batch 2. I picked a critical moment to visit the ladies room, and batch 2 almost boiled over leaving a sticky mess every where. Angie's quick thinking helped us avert a major crisis, though.

Mishap 3: The hot pepper facial also caused some watering eyes, coughing, and extremely clear sinuses. Turns out the peppers need to boil for awhile. The mixture lets off nothing but hot pepper steam and needs to be stirred constantly. It is great for both the sinuses and the skin. I predict it is the next big spa treatment.

Mishap 4: (not pictured) There were two minor burn injuries both of which were quickly fixed by Hot Wheels tattoo style band-aids. Turns out hot pepper jelly is hot in more than one way.

Mishaps aside, I'm really proud of us. We finished everything in about four hours (including clean-up) and had a great time.

I'm even willing to try canning other things.