I've been meaning to post this for the last month, but it slipped my mind due to being sick back in April.
Anyhow, the experience of collecting sap from our own maple trees was far too neat to not post. It is something we will always remember and something we will be doing again next year.
It started when I noticed sap dripping from the trees one day while going for a bike ride. It didn't take a lot of prompting, for the boys to go out and start drilling holes, putting in spouts and hanging pails. Each day they went out, (sometimes several times a day cause it really was that much fun!) to collect the sap. They gathered about 12 gallons!
We should have started collecting sap about 2 weeks earlier and we would have easily collected double that amount. Hopefully we'll start earlier next year.
The making of maple syrup takes forever. Lots of slowly cooking off all the water. The sap is about 98% water! We cooked the sap outside because it would have increased the humidity in the house too much.
After hours of cooking and using way too much propane, this was the end result! It is so incredibly yummy and sweet!
Although this was certainly not a money safer, it was well worth the effort! The boys loved the serenity of being out in the trees gathering sap first thing in the morning. It's so incredibly peaceful! The experience itself made the effort well worth it!
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