Catching Up!

Apparently I have a whole month's worth of events to catch up on. I have been crazy busy with the new fall schedule, combined with some carry over of summer harvest at our garden. So, here is the beginning of catching up for you to enjoy!

Apple Picking - Sept. 6th

We decided to go apple picking the first weekend in Sept. This has become a fall favorite family fascination. (OK, silly me the alliteration fan just had to use another F word (Oops, could be taken the wrong way!) The girls love riding on the wagons behind the John Deere tractors (Poppa sure has "brain washed" them well!) and then the real fun begins, picking the apples.

We know that properly picking the apples is important to the health of the tree and its ability to produce more apples next year. To properly pick an apple you turn the bottom up to the sky and gently twist and pull.

We picked a bushel of apples - with the intention of making some apple pie. A bushel sounds like an enormous amount of apples, but here we are a month later and there are no apples left. AND, we did not make any pies. True, I did make one batch of apple crisp and a small pan of "apple pie innards" for dessert (that was my quick version of apple pie I threw together after dinner one night. I was just SO busy that I did not have time to put a while pie together and to bake it.)

After picking we went to the playground area and played. And I do mean WE played, not just the girls. There is a great play area, with old tractors to climb on, a zip-line, dirt and sand galore (what fun!!) a straw maze, large tricycles to ride, tubes and logs to climb over and thru, a giant wooden train, and so much more, unique, stuff. It was a fun afternoon!

Putting on a Play - Sept. 16th

So, one evening, after dinner, I looked at the girls coming down the steps and laughed! Lauren had changed into a pair of overall shorts and tied a red handkerchief over her head; she was dressed up as Kiara (From Lion King 2) who was dressed up for Halloween. ...interesting....

Annika was in her Kovu (From Lion King 2) costume from last year. I havent seen her in this costume since last winter, and it was a shock to see and remember how proud of the lion mane I made!

We went outside, summoned by the girls, and they put a rather loud and crazy play/dance for us. It was quite a fun spontaneous 15 minutes. I love this free spirit, creative, uninhibited part of childhood, and I will miss it when it fades away.