Orchard Time!

Leah and Mags didn't have school on Friday, so we made our yearly pilgrimage to the apple orchard!  I'm happy to report that it went much better than last year!

I was telling the girls how we'd been going to the orchard every year since Gracie was a tiny baby!  I found this proof picture in Leah's "about me" page from the scrapbook her teacher put together in PreK.

Be still my heart!  Could they be any more adorable?  Gracie was maybe 4 weeks old.  

We listened to some Adventures in Odyssey on the drive there which made it zoom by!  

Even though the drive was good, we were super excited to get there!  The girls enjoyed doing "Cheers!" with their apple cider :)

Poor Gracie got some sort of bite by her right eye which made it a little swollen, but she was a champ and had an awesome time anyway!

We sampled some different apples, even though we knew we were getting honeycrisps.  

Mommy Confession:  I buy honeycrisps and the cheaper galas.  I give the girls galas in their lunch because they don't have quite the level of appreciation of honeycrisps as I do, and I want to hoard savor the honeycrisps for as long as possible!

We made it to the apple cider donuts, and they were perfection.  So fresh and warm...delicately crispy on the outside and lightly tender on the inside.  I literally almost got choked up, because they were so delicious!  I seriously need a life.

We enjoyed the beautiful view

and did a little browsing.

After we checked out, the girls had the time of their lives riding the tire horses,

posing by the measuring stick,

and enjoying the view (yes, I asked them to put their arms around each other...super adorable).

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We stopped and got cheese curds on the way home.  Apparently nothing says, "Delicious cheese!" like an enormous mouse!

We met Aaron for a late lunch at Culver's

and had such a good time!

After quiet rest, I even took the girls to the library! 

Now that they're older, it's less scary taking them to the library by myself.  Leah can even look for books by herself!

The girls check library books out very differently.  Gracie literally walks down a row of books and randomly grabs some.  Maggie asks to find an author or character she's interested in and picks from there.  Leah treats choosing a library book like a major.life.decision.  

Anyway, for supper we had a quintessential orchard-y meal of apples, apple cider donuts, popcorn (I bought the kernels at the orchard), and cheese curds.  

It was autumn heaven on a plate!

We realized, too, that Gracie had inadvertently chosen the perfect shirt for the day!

"Today is my favorite day!"

And it really was <3