Nostalgia wins

 I have very fond memories of going to a local pick your own farm with my dad for many, many years growing up.  So, when Chris and I realized our weekends are packed this fall and there wasn't going to be a time to take the girls this week we decided we'd throw legalism to the wayside (who wants that anyway?) and skip church to go :-)  We got there when it opened and had a great time.  We got pumpkins, apples, took a hayride, Ella mastered the Hay Maze, and the hot apple fritters were amazing. There's defintitely something to be said for enjoying God and family in the sanctuary He created once in a while rather than in a more formal one :-)

Preparing to rock the Hay Maze

It cracks me up that Chris was FEET taller than the maze!

Chillin at the Barn

My Peeps!

Not so sure about Hay

Another fall farm!

Fall fun continues :-) We found a new fall farm destination and I think it's my new favorite-so much for the kids to do and so cheap (actually free this time-thanks Shaun and Nana!)

There was an obstacles course and hay maze


A Noah's Ark shaped Playground the kids loved


Trikes


A Hayride :-)

A 9-acre corn maze

Ella was OBSESSED with this 2 story tall slide. She went down probably 50 times!


My lovely friends Jen and Amy

Love this pic Jen took of Ella in the corn kernel pit. Such a fun farm trip!

Pumpkin Fall Fest

We had a fun time last Saturday at a local pick your own/fall festival farm. Here are a bunch of pics!

Not many recent pics of Amy and me-my great friend and sister-in-law :-)

Hannah, Lexi, and Christopher-Ella's best buddies :-) There was a traumatic/dramatic event just before this where Ella got her head shoved out of the way so another kid could fit in the whole and Ella burst into tears and came running to me. So sad but she recovered quickly :-)

My Brother-in-law, his Mother-in-law and my nephew.

We brought Ella's friend Lexi with us to the farm and they had a great time.

My sister came too and had a great time with the swarms of children who kept saying "hold me! hold me!"

Hannah getting her face painted-this girl LOVES pink more than any 3 year old I know. That's saying a lot.

Love this one!

Sayer born=Produce for us :-)

A week and a half ago our good friends had their third baby (Sayer Malachi-he's SO precious!) and because of this event, Chris was able to fill in for them at the CSA they're a part of. I knew this would be right up Chris' alley and I was right. He's always excited to do something physical with such a sedentary job. And we got buckets of produce as a prize! We'll cover for you any time Shaun :-)

Chris got caught in an INSANE wind/rainstorm while at the farm so he was happy to be home and dry :-)


We got peaches, apples, peppers, eggplant, lettuce, and all kinds of squash! Plus fresh eggs and bread. Good deal for 4 hrs of work (that I didn't even do!). Definitely considering joining a CSA for next year :-)

Apple and Pumpkin Picking!

Ella was quite industrious about picking apples-even though her friends were there and I thought she'd just play. This is her coming out from under a tree where she'd picked some saying "I got some good ones Mom!!"

All of the kids got a turn getting hoisted up by super-tall uncle Chris (aka daddy)



I love this one of Stacy, Christopher, and Ella. We had a great time (even though we lost Ella's hearing aid while we were there-oh well, it's bound to happen sometimes-that's why God provides insurance!)

Great New Petting Zoo!!

Ella had her first field trip for preschool last week! I feel like such a school-mom going on a field trip! When did this happen? Anyway, the exciting part was that it was about 3 minutes from my house but I had no idea this place was there and it was awesome! We're definitely going back.


This turkey was pretty but slightly scary to be so close to

I got to hold a 10 day old piglet!!

Ella and her friend Savannah on a hayride

A Brahma Steer-I had never heard of this beast before! It weighs 3800 lbs and was ENORMOUS when it stood up. It was kind of like a huge bull with a camel's hump. Crazy!

Ella and I both milked the cows-one of which was 8 months pregnant with a 130 lb calf! (the staff was very helpful, hence my knowledge of all of these fun facts!)

Ella tried to pet this calf but it was obsessed with licking the little boy on the right and chased him around!

Petting a donkey and yes, there was a zebra! How cool is that! The Zebra really looked painted, like it wasn't even real. Great job on those God-they're SO cool looking.

Ella insisted that "goats like hay, and this goat needs his lunch"

My happy little cow-girl :-)

Strawberries!

Picking strawberries is becoming an annual event and I love it! Hopefully our jelly-making will be more successful this year-last year it never set :-( Here are the pics!

Running through the strawberry fields last June

Same thing this year but she's much faster!

We met a bunch of friends there-here's Amy and some of the kids picking away (very few moments were this seriously focused on actually picking strawberries)

Hannah's basket was full of stems instead of strawberries-she ate everything she picked! She's hilarious. Jen suggested that they should weigh the kids before and after picking so we can pay for the difference!

After picking we picnicked and played by the barns. For some reason Ella took a liking to this rock and "held it like a tiny baby" (her words) for quite a while. She only put it down for us to play "ring around the rosey" but then insisted we sing "ring around the rock" which made us all laugh :-)

Enjoying the beautiful sunflowers.

Jam making time! Ella washed 'em, I cut 'em, Ella squished 'em.

Her shirt got wet in the process and she was adamant that I needed to take it off for her. Then she helped add the sugar.

She's learning the art of controlled stirring so everything stays in the bowl-she did very well.

The finished product! After about step 4 Ella lost interest in the process and kept asking when we could put jelly on the strawberries-she didn't quite grasp that we were making the jelly-but we had fun until then! I'll report back about if it actually turns into jelly :-)