Have the exact same problem. During strawberry harvest it always rains like mad. It destroys the flavor of some varieties worse than others. Of the 4 varieties I've tried, Shuskan seems hold it's flavor the best in heavy rains. Maybe you could plant some good early, midseason, and late varieties. Chances are some of them would miss the heaviest rains. Rain only seems to destroy the flavor if it occurs within the last week/week and a half before harvest. If planting several varieties, my advice would be not to let them intermingle. Keep them in separate rows or separate patches. Makes for easier harvesting when they are not intermingled. Plus it's easier to identify the different berries, so when you discover a favorite, you don't have to guess the variety.

I love the container store stuff, but have used Tupperware Midgets for years! They work fine, even if they end up sideways in your lunch bag--but once you take the top off your salad dressing, there is a mess as the dressing kinda spreads so you have to wipe up the inside of the lid quickly. The dressing gets into the little inverted ridge on the snapping top, and it's not the neatest thing in the world to wipe up something kinda oily. From what I've read about Lock and Lock, they're great too--QVC has them, and maybe Walmart or Target??? Here is a link that might be useful: Info about lock and lock

Caboodle, I feel your pain. That dressing sounds awful. I am in search of a good recipe for the cornbread. I found this one and would like opinions. I have a cornbread recipe I like made with yogurt but it is more cake-like than perhaps it should be for stuffing. Southern Buttermilk Cornbread http://andreasrecipes.com/ I grew up on my mother's and grandmother's Southern cornbread, and I'm devoted to it. Southern cornbread has no sugar and is cooked in a cast iron skillet, which renders a lovely crunchy crust. You can eat it by itself with butter or apple butter, or you can eat it with beans or chili and spoon either on top of a slice. This is another recipe that I've played around with. Many cornbread recipes call for 1 cup cornmeal and 1 cup all-purpose flour. However, all that extra flour seems to detract from the corn flavor in my opinion. So I split the difference and I like the results. Equipment mixing bowl 9 or 10-inch cast iron skillet Ingredients 1-1/2 cup cornmeal 1/2 cup unbleached all-purpose flour 1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt 1 egg, beaten 1-1/4 cups buttermilk 4 tablespoons vegetable oil (or bacon drippings if you happen to have any) Preparation 1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. 2. Stir together cornmeal, flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in mixing bowl. Add the beaten eggs and the buttermilk, stirring just until all the dry ingredients are wet. Do not overmix. 3. Add vegetable oil to the cast iron skillet and place in the hot oven for 3 to 4 minutes. You want the skillet hot, but you don't want the oil to start smoking. 4. Remove hot pan from oven. Make sure that the pan is thoroughly coated with the oil, bottom and sides, then pour the excess oil into the batter and stir. Pour batter into the hot pan. 5. Bake for 25 minutes or until lightly browned.

This is a funny story about Stove Top, I'm wondering if the people that say they don't like the stove top dressing would say the same thing if they didn't know it was actually Stove Top. One year my sister was telling me about going to her friend's house and eating the dressing...she said it was absolutely delicious and asked her friend what it was and she told her "oh it's just Stove Top". I don't have to worry about making dressing because my husband won't eat it unless it's stove top...HA! But since it's really not very high up on his list, I most likely won't make any. It's just the two of us for TG dinner!