Fall is Here! (Sort Of?)

Last weekend, Brigid managed to guilt Steve into taking the whole family apple picking on Sunday by telling him that she was sad he had spent all day Saturday watching football. And that would have been decent manipulation on her part...except for the part where it wasn't true. In fact, we spent a significant chunk of that Saturday all together on a boat, before taking her to lunch at Waffle House, which has somehow become her first choice anytime we ask her where she wants to eat. Then she got to play with her friends in the neighborhood for a short period of time, and only THEN did we make her watch the Notre Dame game for a little bit before she had to go to bed.

All of which to say...her powers of manipulation are formidable, and I am frightened for my future.

Anyway. Apple picking.

The funny thing about apple picking is that even though it's the season for the good apples, the apple farm won't let you pick the good apples yourself, choosing to (I guess?) release their own professional pickers on the good trees, so they can sell them to you for maybe a little bit more money in the apple farm general store. So, while we did the following things on Sunday:

* Bought apple fritters. (I ate almost an entire fritter by myself when we first got there, and when Steve asked for a bite later, I laughed at him. It's like he doesn't even know me after all of this time.) (He had to go buy his own. I do not leave apple fritter behind.)

* Bought cider donuts.

* Bought apple bread. (Which, uh, I also ate by myself. But it was over the course of several days. So...it doesn't count?)

* Bought kettle corn. (There IS still some of that left. I'm not completely out of control.)

* Raced a pig. (We went to watch the pig races, and Brigid was handed a card that marked her as one of the pig race participants. She was assigned Hamgelina Jolie as her racing pig, and there was a gold trophy at stake for the winner. Unfortunately, Hamgelina lost out to Lyndsay Loham, so Brigid had to settle for a ribbon. I told her I liked the ribbon better, and she agreed, but I was lying. I really wanted that pig trophy.) (The other pig race participants were Brad Pig and Britney Spareribs. Har, har har.)

* Went down a big slide. (Just Brigid)

* Jumped on a big trampoline. (Again...Brigid)

* Admired a moonshine still. (This was what Caitlin and I were doing while Brigid was on the trampoline. I wasn't taking any chances with C trying to climb up there with her.)

* MILKED A FREAKING COW! (I am still a little shocked Brigid did this. You could not have paid me to get close to that cow. Also, she said the udder felt like poop. I didn't ask her to elaborate.)

Oh. And...we bought some apples. We wanted the good apples, they brought a freshly picked (I don't know...maybe?) batch in while we were in the general store, so we just decided to take those home with us. We did not pick a single apple on our apple picking trip.

Of course, we then went home and put up some Halloween decorations, because once you start doing fall things, you can't stop doing them, I guess. Even when it's still 88 degrees out and not fall-like, at all.

(Don't judge us. Our next-door neighbors have had ghosts on their front lawn for 2 weeks now, and neighbors across the street from us have a skeleton on their front porch, too. IT'S NOT JUST US.)