Jam

So the other evening Diane and I picked raspberries. They are soooo yummy! I have been debating on what to do with them so I decided to try my hand at making jam. I have made blackberry jelly with my grandmother before but it has been so long that I forgot exactly how to do everything. So, as this was my first attempt alone I decided to just make 2 pints of jam.

Oh! You want to know the difference between jelly and jam? Well so did I many years ago. Here's what my grandmother taught me:
Jelly: is made with the juice of the fruit
Jam: includes crushed fruit or pulp of the fruit. Jam is usually less firm than jelly.
There ya go. Mystery solved! (You know I had to teach you something today)

So anyway, I made jam. It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be. The way I made it was equal cups of sugar to fruit. My understanding of raspberries is that they contain their own pectin so I did not add any extra store bought stuff. Perhaps I'm wrong or you have a better recipe. If you do please share! I would love to cut down the sugar a bit.

The major problem that I ran into is that we don't have a caner. Instead I used a large stock pot. So to sterilize the jars I laid them sideways, covered them with water then boiled them for 10 minutes. During that time I made the jam. 4 cups of raspberries to 4 cups of sugar. In a pot I mushed them together using a potato masher. Once everything was well mashed I brought the mixture to a boil, stirred and allowed it to reach 104'C as the recipe I was using called for. After this I transferred the jam to the sterilized jar, put a lid and rim on and barely tightened them. Finally I moved the jars back to the stock pot (I placed a steamer net in the bottom to keep the jars from touching the bottom of the pot) and boiled for 10 minutes. I did have to lay the jars sideways in order to have water cover the top. I'm sure this is a big no-no for many reasons. Anyway, after the 10 minutes was up I pulled them out and now they are cooling on the counter.

So far the only thing I notice that is wrong is the head space, I was way off. My understanding is that it should be a quarter of an inch or so. Correct? Both jars will be pretty much eaten right away so I'm not overly worried this time. So, how terrible did I mess up? I should probably invest in a caner or a bigger stock pot since I plan to make more because we are going to be picking more soon. Anyone have any suggestions? Thanks!