Alive

I feel alive in fall. I don't realize how much summer affects me til it's gone. I guess I feel stifled by the heat and just plain lazy. With fall here, I have more energy--more zip. I wish I had more zip in my legs but my foot is still injured. I haven't run since the PDR and it's a damn shame with this beautiful weather. It has me pretty down. I wake up and it feels fine. I sit here at 6:15 and it's throbbing like nobody's business. So I wait. And I miss running at a place like this. This is one of the lakehouse roads that is absolutely stunning at this time of year.

This weekend we headed to where fall truly resides right now--lakehouse. We marveled at the leaves as we went up the turnpike and watched as the temperature dropped, dropped, and dropped some more. It was seriously chilly when we arrived and there is nothing better than having a beer while watching a fire get going.

On Saturday we headed out for some apple picking. We found a place last year we really liked so we headed back. The apples were bursting from the trees and the kids were nuts trying to scoop them all up. There were also raspberries for the picking and here we experienced a net loss. I put raspberries in the carton and mysteriously they disappeared. . . .

I can't wait to go back soon. We took a nature walk and the kids collected all sorts of cool leaves that we later turned into crafts. Everyone was remarkably happy and even treated us to an 8am sleep in--unheard of people!

Here are some pics:


Can you imagine a more beautiful place to pick apples?
Can't you hear the CRUNCH?

He's thrilled--thrilled I tell you--to pick apples
OK Grace--so where are the raspberries????
And then I saw why. . .
So there were farm animals at the orchard. You KNOW how much I love farm animals. Doesn't this donkey just scream, "Please take me home!"

Please? Pretty please? And I was tempted. . . .

So here's the runaway goat. He's supposed to be in his pen but each year he escapes. But this time he decided to hop a ride on our tractor for our ride around the farm. Oh how I shouted with glee!
Here's our driver trying to get him off. He didn't think it was funny. I thought it was HILARIOUS.
And here's nature's stained glass. Everywhere you looked this weekend.