Quote Originally Posted by 2cuteboys View Post
Try to grow vegetables that you can can or pickle, to get you a little further into the year. I did pickles, beets and pickled carrots last year and my kids loved them - the carrots worked much better than the pickles, and aside from the boiling, they were easier. I didn't buy the actual canning supplies either - just boiled in a big ol pot and used silicon oven gloves to move them. You can get cans second hand and buy the lids/middle part separately. I found some on sale at save-on last year too.

I'm also going to try to can tomatoes this year, as they grow quickly and (usually) you can get a lot. We use a lot of canned tomatoes as well, so it's something that would be budget friendly for us. If you use a lot of tomatoes, costco has a box of Kirkland organic diced tomatoes - eight big cans (I want to say 28 oz? Not sure though) for under $10. They sell some natural rice blends that are pricey compared to plain white rice, but the same brand/type at the grocery stores is much more expensive. My dad is so skeptical of costco for things not actually being cheaper, and it's true, but sometimes things actually are, particularly I've found for the natural or organic stuff.

Also google "ewg dirty dozen" and "clean 15" for produce. The clean 15 is a list of fruits and veggies that don't tend to take on pesticide residues and such, so it's safer (and cheaper!) to purchase those non-organic.
Thank you so much....I do buy the tomatoes from costco and they save a lot of money. I grew an insane amount of tomatoes last year, to many really, and I have everything to jar them but chickened out after reading up on how easy it is to cock it up and have them contaminated with bacteria. My friends mum has already said that this year she will teach us both how to do it so I look forward to that.