It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Fall. I love it. My favorite time of year is from now until the new year. The weather is just perfect, there are so many holidays to anticipate, so many goodies to bake and share, delicious winter recipes to warm you up, and so many fun traditions to continue or begin.
Today was a glorious day. I started it off with a bike ride with friends in the morning. The air was crisp and cool, and I knew it was going to be a perfect day to spend at the apple orchard once Sam came home from school. So, after lunch we loaded up in the van to head to Flat Rock, NC for our annual trip to Sky Top orchard. It was so beautiful; there was a cool breeze, but the sun was shining in the blue sky making us perfectly warm. Nathanael napped the entire drive up, which was a blessing not to be overlooked. He certainly knows how to push Sam's buttons in the van, which he made sure to do for most of the ride home. As soon as we arrived, we made sure to measure the boys and get our apple donuts!! YUM!
Then we headed off to pick some apples. This is actually the first year that we picked our own apples. Yeah, I know, it's kind of sad. In the past years we just bought prepicked ones, but really we come for the beautiful day spent with the boys and, of course, the donuts. But this time we came earlier in the season and so the trees had a plentiful supply of apples to be picked.


We found several varieties ready to pick and filled up our basket with goldens, fugis, ida reds, and cortlands. And of course, each variety needed to be sampled so that they could be rated "satisfactory" by the apple connoisseur.


And finally, no trip to the orchard is complete without a hayless hay ride. And luckily nothing else happened after that because my camera refused to focus. Here's hoping it was just a low battery....grrr.
Oh how grateful I am for the beauty which surrounds us and that Paul is not so chained to his job that he is able to make these outings with us.