The orchard

It's October and while big, orange pumpkins are on my mind, let me tell you my one bone with the pumpkin patch. It's big and commercial and crowded and it has very little to actually do with pumpkins.

I'd rather be at the apple orchard; in the crisp Fall air strolling down a tall grass lane between a row of Jonagolds to my left and Blushing Golden's on my right.

 
We went to this adorable little orchard a few weeks ago with my mom. It was a sunny, warm day with just enough crispness in the air to make it feel like Fall.

After a quick stop in the barn for apple cider donuts, we grabbed a wagon and headed towards the rows of trees bearing apples of all colors and names. We stumbled upon these first, and I almost quickly disregarded them as just regular old Golden Delicious. Thanks to my mom, we stopped and tasted them. They were nothing of the sort.

Behold, the Blushing Golden.
Sweet, tart and crisp. My perfect apple!

We filled our bags with lots of those and ate our way through several others.

I remember as a child the very best thing about going to the apple orchard was twisting an apple off the branch and eating right then and there.


I loved standing back and watching my boys love doing it too.

{Me in my farmer clothes :) It's always good to have a picture for posterity, just to prove I was there.}


There was a giant tower of hay bales. Henry and William loved climbing it and jumping from the top. My mom and I sat on a bench and smiled at just how different little boys and girls are. We didn't think climbing those bales even once sounded like much fun, but they were so happy to climb up again and again.

 
And look, there were pumpkins too!



The best of both worlds.

{Oma and the boys in the orchard.}

{Photo credit to Henry for the picture of my mom and I and William for the picture on the right!}