Whew!

I am ready for bed! We had a fun but tiring day!First we headed out to go apple picking! Here is Miss Fern during her picking peak, she tired out soon!
Riley was amazed at this large apple, he looks a bit like Johnny Appleseed hu!
How sweet is this!
Hey look I really was there too!
YUMMMMM!
Hey where is Jake!!??
We ended up with all 4 of the bags FULL with apples, now to make apple sauce, apple butter to can, and a couple apple pies to enjoy! :)
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After the picking we ran over to the Meridian mall to pick up a couple things and then we saw a sign to Hubbard Park and Castle Craig. Well we had always wondered what that castle turret was we could see from the freeway, so off we went on another adventure (I told you we were tired)!

Here is the placard, I looked it up online and unfortunately it is not the highest point, but almost! :)
Here is Riley standing near the castle, awesome view isn't it!
Here we are at the base of the castle (yea it is just a turret I was expecting a little more when they called it a castle).
And Fern on her way up, there is a metal stair case going up, lucky for me it was only 4 flights of stairs, my knees don't handle stairs too well!

Here is Dan and I, we could in fact see the Long Island Sound and Long Island! Also New Haven, Hartford, and beyond!
And my babes, they were not too keen on the top. Probably because Dan's fear of heights kicked in and Riley feeds off any nervousness we show, and then the other two react to that! :)
Hi Mama!
Back down safe and sound! :)
We then decided to sit and have our apple and animal cracker snack, Fern thought this was a good spot. :)

But we settled out on the cliff, we had a great view!
Here is the view of the castle back down the hill in Hubbard Park.

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Then we were on our way home, until....

We saw a sign for "Lock 12 Historical Park and Museum", well the museum was not open but we read this!
And then the boys tried to fall into the canal, Fern was snoozing in the stroller, Dan was on his phone and me? I was snapping pictures as usual! :)
Here are the locks from the other side, plus we found a WONDERFUL area to walk! It is paved, goes right by the locks and along the canal, plus it is FLAT!! That is hard to find in Connecticut and a blessing to my knees! It is only 10 min drive from our house and now that we know the jogger stroller can fit in the Honda (after we take off all the wheels) I am in luck! We will be going again soon!

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There will be more nature pictures from our day on the nature blog!

But maybe not tonight I am tired!

WHEW!

This Weekend's Happenings!

I scored at Goodwill, the yellow pot and glass jars (I have a thing for enamelware, and yellow)! Then At the Harvest Moon Festival down on the town green along with all the booths and fried food the library was having a book sale! I spent $6.75 on 13 books!! I got:

The complete works of Oscar Wilde,

Meet Molly,

* The Voyage of the "Dawn Treader",

The Cherry Orchard,

Helen Keller,

* The Last Battle,

Treasure Island,

* Prince Caspian,

Moby Dick,

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland/ Through the Looking Glass,

* The Magician's Nephew,

* The Silver Chair, &

Off to the Moon with the Bernstein Bears!

Whew!

(* are part of the Narnia series)

This is New England and it has COOLED off!!! So I made some fleece pants for my boys! Here is Jake modeling his!

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Back in July when I said we made veggie dumpling soup, I got a couple inquires about the recipe. Well it was just not quite up to being shared but I have tweaked further, made it again, so here is the long of it! :)

Back in high school my best friend Melissa and I went to the Beehive House in Salt Lake City and we both bought this cook book, do you still have it Mel?

I have always been a shoe in for pioneer anything but I do especially like pioneer recipes ( I think I have 3 or 4 similar books like this), and so of course I love to cook all of these lovely dishes. This is the original recipe I jumped off from!

And here is tonight's dinner! :)

If you want the Word Doc. I would be happy to email it to you let me know!! :) I'm sending yours right now Gina!! :) I will update with further tweaks to the recipe!

Smile!

Just thought you all could use a cute smile today! :)

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Also a new little thing on my sidebar, over there on your right underneath the "Blogs I Read" list. It is called "Friends and Family Who Stalk Me!" (But in a good way!) My niece Margret is the only lonely soul on there right now, so go on over and put yourself on there! :) Then I can stalk you too! :)

Love ya all!

Fall is Coming!

Look what greeted me when I went out last night to pull the clothes off the line! The moon in the clear sky (clear sky's are what helps signal the leaves to change colors).
Look it is my moon, it is shaped like a "D"!
Spiders in the eves!
What a great Halloween-ish spider! For more shots of our spiders check out the nature blog!
I know, bad picture! But you try telling bats to slow down! Yep the black blur about an inch in from the tree is a bat!
Here is another shot, the blur just in from the tree it is! There were 3 of them batting around!
Moon, and spiders, and bats, OH MY!
Fall is really coming!

GORP and Us! :)

Good Old Rasins and Peanuts!

1/2 C. raw almonds

1/2 C. dark raisins

1/2 C. salted peanuts

1/2 C. golden raisins

1/2 C. pepitas

1/2 C. dried cranberries

1/2 C. walnuts

1/2 C. chapped dried apricots

1/4 C. hulled sunflower seeds

1/4 C. chocolate chips

Mix all together and store in an air tight container.

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Well all we weathered ol' Hanna, we got massive amounts of rain... massive! But we seemed to avoid most of the strong winds, we had plenty of sticks, acorns, green leaves, and such all over the yard, but no large branches or trees. Thankfully! It also stared to move faster and so we got rid of it faster so that we had a beautifully sunny, dry, with a cool breeze Sunday. :) So hopefully that was the hurricane the Old Farmers Almanack predicted and we will now have to wait until Nor'easter season for another good sized storm! :) Thanks for all the prayers and thoughts, they worked! Love you all!

Panties & Hannah!

Yep that's right two post in one day! Crazy!!!Well yesterday we all went (Fern's request) to Target to find her some Cinderella under ware! She has graduated from the training undies!! In order to get Cinderella we had to get all the princesses, so here is Fern putting on her "Belle" panties (because they were purple)! :)

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As I am sure you all know Hannah is on her way up our way, we are expecting her anytime between this evening and tomorrow mid morning depending on her speed. We are already on flood watch and high wind warning. But it is lovely outside today with a nice gentle breeze. I know that will change! So I went out to see what needed to get put away, and what to salvage from the garden.

I am sure I will lose my sunflowers now that they are finally all blooming so pretty! I am thinking about cutting them so I can enjoy them inside, but it is hard to cut them knowing that will be the end. Oh I just am not sure what I'll do about them!!
Our Whinny the pooh tree is unfortunately mostly dead, I am sure that if the winds are as high as they are predicting we will loose a couple of the dead branches. They are large branches, I am hoping they do not take down any good trees or smoosh the tree house!
I love the canopy we have!
I striped what I could off the plants in the garden, I left the green tomatoes hoping they will not get blown off but if they do I can pick them up and make fried green tomatoes. I took my red pepper off (the 5th from my garden, there is still another 5 or so growing), and beans! I also found near the potatoes and sunflowers that little half of a bird egg, it is so small! I have no clue where it came from but I think the kids will enjoy seeing it!

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So we will continue to "batten down the hatches" in anticipation of Hannah, and update as we enjoy the show! :)

Cake, Berries, and Lots of Fun!

Just a catch up of the last couple weeks!We had fun celebrating Dan's birthday! He got to answer the phone to Happy Birthday's all day, went to Home Depot, had German food for dinner, and chocolate cake with kisses! What a fun day we had!
Our friend Kerrie and her son Christopher invited us out to a berry farm the day after and we got to pick blueberries!!! YUMMMM!
Here we are after picking for over 2 hours, Dan has Jake and Fern in the wagon with the berry buckets, Riley is caring Christopher on his back and Kerrie and I are leisurely walking behind! :)
They were running, we were not!
Here is our bag, I paid just over $11.00 for this bag. When we stoped at Big Y for some more freezer bags we checked the price and did some calculations. If we had bought this same amount at Big Y it would have cost us over $100.00!!!! I have the calculations written down, but I have lost my "brain" (notebook) so when I find them I'll share the info!
Our library has "museum passes" that you can check out for two day's at a time, so we borrowed one for a children's museum in Bristol and headed out! Here are the kids in the play structure!
Fern and Dan hosting Sport's Center, I think Dan was enjoying this more! :) You could buy the video tape of their broadcast for $6.00, but we were enjoying the "free-ness" of the day! :)
Riley was so excited to play with this, they had something like this on Aurthur one time. He was here for quite a while!
The testing begins! :)

Yesterday's Adventure!

Yes I have been neglecting my blog, Dan's been home and I have been reading. But instead of catching up I am skipping to yesterday and then will go back later this week. Can you believe it is September??? So these pictures are from last month! :)

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So yesterday I threw all caution to the wind and drove to New York by myself with the kids, in my honda. Yea, I know I am crazy! I have lived here almost 2 years and have avoided driving in New York and I can tell you it will take quite the miracle and a GPS for me to venture there again!

What was so important that I would do this? My good friend Michael got married to Dina! Michael and I have been friends since forever as our moms have been best friends since forever. We grew up together and tortured Mary together, it was great! :) After our drive, only 2 hours if you don't count the flat tire on the expressway, and getting lost; we arrived at the Swan Club on Long Island and found some seats! Look at those beautiful kids!!
It is a good thing I have been blessed with only one girl or I could not be as crazy as I am! Before the night before the wedding this was my shirt, but I decided Fern needed a new dress and so I used THIS tutorial and turned my shirt into her dress!
Here is the back (what use to be the front of my shirt)!

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Now the good stuff, that made the "adventure" worth it!

Here is Michael escorting his mom "Auntie Norma" down the isle! (My kids have lots of aunts, but only one auntie!)

And here is Dina and her Dad, she was already crying!
Riley snapped this photo of Norma and I during the "cocktail hour" before the reception!
And here we are with Michael and Dina, we got to meet Dina two years ago just before we left Calif. We instantly loved her and the kids instantly loved her all over again. Fern thought she was a princess! She did look beautiful!
When we did get to the reception part I got a couple good shots of the first dance!
And another!

We stayed for a while and enjoyed dinner and dancing (I got to dance with both Riley and Norma)! And then we started our adventure back home, this time dealing with getting lost again (why do they not believe in street signs back here!!!) and not being able to go over 50 mph because the donut tire would get squirrly! So I climbed into bed around 12:30am and am still in my pj's as I write this!

Please remember the very nice man who pulled over and changed my tire for me on the Cross Island Expressway in your prayers, he was truly a blessing to this mama wearing a long pale pink silk dress! :)

Happy September! Happy Labor Day!