Ta Da!

Wow. Heather and Sharon (Hmmm, I thought it was Sharon but now I can't find the post......) both bestowed this on me. Thanks ladies!

I shall pass it on to Laura at LifeDreamed who is cuddling her new little baby now!

EC at This is How We Do It, who's knack for eighties song references constantly has me falling out of my chair laughing. Her photography is awesome too!

Sarah at SaraSignature- also amazing photography!

Needleroozer- an inspiration in art and kindness. May Art For Food be a huge success!

There are MANY more amazing bloggers out there. Cheers and blessings to you all!

Apple in My Eye

Last week a co-worker of Dearest's invited us to pick apples at her farm.

Ooooooh. Apples. I love apples. Really. A lot. (((((drool)))))

I finally had an excuse to buy a fruit picker arm.


The drive there was lovely.

Once we were there an older guy was working on a tractor. He helped me at first as I got set up and got the hang of it. He thinks the apple tree is the variety Wealthy. Neat. Also, they are absolutely delicious.

They are organic by neglect. Appearantly no one even picks them. I don't understand. How can you not eat the glorious fruits if they are growing in your own back yard.

While I was picking, Lil'Bug got a hold of my camera. I have never let her touch it, somehow she not only got the hang of it but has excellent eye for composition. I'll do a separate post with her pictures.

I got the hand of the tool, but before that happened I was beaned in the head a couple times by falling fruit. No, I did not invent calculus later that day. I did however eat a lot of apples!

I brought home a bucket load. Wealthy are not good for storing so I will be making pies, pie filling, and apple butter.

Easy as Pie

My first from scratch, apples I picked, dough rolled by hand pie.

Good flavour. Things to note: I love hot right out of the oven pie BUT this pie needed to rest for 1 hour for the juices to distribute. 1 hour does not mean 39 minutes.

Pie dough wasn't rolled thin enough or else I should use more apples, about double what I used.

Local mamas: if you'd like to try a piece, we're home all day Friday! I'll be baking more pies. Lots more pies. Call me and come over!

Monday, Monday

Blah. I have the sniffles complete with sinus headache and scratchy throat.

I love Mondays lately. Despite my frustrating weekend, Monday leaves me with a clean house because Sunday morning we clean it as a family to prepare for Dearest to have band practice. Clean house is good. Usually I am also caught up with laundry because that's what Lil'Bug and I do while Dearest is playing music downstairs, but Blueberry was fussy last night and I still have about 5 clean loads to fold and put away.

Mondays are also free train rides for members at the zoo, wading pool park day, and a good day to go to the Historical museum (it used to be closed on Mondays so everyone thinks it still is).

With all of that available we will likely only go to the library today, clean out the car again, and try to buy an apple picking tool to prepare for our orchard trips. Very busy day.

Oh, and I'm going to attempt to make shortcake today.

Whew.