Raspberry Fields Forever

I couldn't resist the title. We had such a great morning last week up in Oak Glen. The kids and I met my girlfriend Laila and her son Ethan for some fun and apple picking. We have started our A-A-Apple unit in MFW and it just happened to coincide perfectly with apple season. We met at the petting zoo, but of course we didn't call first to see what time they opened and we were an hour early. I told Laila about an orchard that made homemade fresh apple cider donuts... and we were off. Snowline is the name of the orchard. They have a cider mill, which was also closed (I guess there are benefits to going up during the busy weekends). We decided to start the day off by picking raspberries. The kids each filled their own basket while watching out for the "bumbly bees". They did a great job of avoiding the prickles and found lots of berries. When we had finished picking we went back to the barn for the donuts... yum. I had been thinking of those warm cinnamon donuts since we had gone up there last year.

Snowline didn't have apple picking that day, so after our donuts, we drove off down to Riley's Farm. There we were told by a lovely woman, in full colonial dress, that we could take a hay ride up to the apple orchard to go picking. So we waited for the tractor and got on board for the short ride up the hill. The days pick were Gala apples and we hunted for the trees with red ribbons tied on (that is how they mark the trees with ripe apples). We were also reminded by the man on the hay ride to twist the apples until they fall off the branch. If you just pull an apple off its branch, another apple will not grow in that spot again. The kids did a great job again of filling up our bag with beautiful apples. They could even reach the apples this year all on their own.





We had a wonderful morning in the fresh air with great friends. We came home with a bounty of apples and raspberries, which we have just finished off today. I guess we had better make plans to up again before the apples are all gone until next year. I'm not sure I can wait another whole year before having any more of those donuts either : ).