Wash all of your jars and allow to air dry.

Fill a large pot half full with hot water.  Bring to a boil on the stovetop over medium-high heat.

Place cold water and ice cubes if you have some available, in a large bowl.

Mix up 4 cups of sugar and 2 gallons of water in another pot on the stove and start heating it over medium heat. This will be the syrup to pour over your peaches. If you want to make them sugar free, you can use 2 cans of apple juice concentrate and 2 gallons of water, or you can use just plain hot water too.

Once the water on the stove is at a boil, turn down to a simmer and gently drop peaches into the water.  Leave them in the water to “blanch” for about 2-3 minutes or until the peeling is just starting to come off (see video below).

Using a slotted spoon, remove the peaches and place them immediately into the ice cold water to stop the cooking.  You don’t want them to be mushy, just cooked long enough so the peels will come off easily.

Continue blanching the peaches until you run out of room in your cold water bowl.  You can keep you hot water at a slow simmer until you have room to blanch more peaches.

Let peaches cool in the cold water for a few minutes, and peel them by just slipping the peelings off with your hand.  I rarely have to use a knife.

Cut the peeled peaches in half using a pairing knife.  Remove the pits and place two pits in the bottom of each quart jar, or one pit if you're using pint jars (this will help preserve flavor and freshness).

Put the peach halves into the jars, and cover with the hot syrup.  You can also slice peaches into smaller pieces if desired.

Wipe rim of the jar with a damp cloth to make sure there is no sticky juice on them.  

Place lids and rings on the top of the jars and hand tighten.

Place jars in a boiling water-canner and process for 20 minutes. 

For more about the water bath canning process, see video below.

Remove hot jars from canner using jar lifter and allow to cool at room temperature for a few hours and seal.  If you're doing more than one canner load of peaches, it is best to add a little cold water to the canner before you put another round of cold jars into the boiling hot water.  This will help prevent any jars from breaking.  You don't want to lose any of those precious peaches after all that hard work.

Remove rings, wash outside of jars if they are sticky, and then store on your pantry shelves.