HAPPY WEEKEND

Hope everyone has a nice weekend. I have so many posts to write that go back several months but just haven't been motivated to write them. In the meantime Mark and I are heading up to Oak Glenn Apple Ranches and Farm's today to get some apples.  We like their Rome Beauty apples and hope to find some today! 

BECAUSE YOU WANT TO KNOW EVERYTHING ABOUT ME

Okay that title is not really true but it's all I had! 

Mark arrived home safely from the UK on Thursday. We treated it like a Friday and ordered pizza. He didn't go into work on Friday so I've been so confused on what day it is. (no I'm not eating pizza, haven't had any in 8 weeks but plan on cheating with our favorite Aurelio's in Las Vegas this week)

On Friday we headed to Glen Oaks, CA to our favorite apple orchard to get Rome Beauty apples. Well they didn't have any. We were so bummed about it. We ended up getting a Seymour Winesap apple which we had never heard of before. It is delicious, crisp and tart like we like our apples. 

We picked up a carmel apple for Amber, some apple cider to try out a Apple Cider Sangria recipe I found on Pinterest and a small pumpkin. I also got a delicious homemade pecan log roll which will be a special treat one day when I really need it! 

Note to self: Buy a pumpkin at Trader Joe's next year, they have them for $5.99 and we paid almost $12.00 for the same size. I was off taking a few pictures when Mark checked out so I didn't know how high priced they were........

About a month ago my friend Amy told me about the gift in the kids meals at McDonald's. Of course I didn't know about them because I don't have any little ones around and also it would be rare for me to go there to eat. 

So I went around to several stores trying to find what they had left. I was able to find 4 out of the six and the other two #1 Dorothy and #2 Scarecrow were purchased from Amazon. Obviously they were not the $1.50 price from McDonald's but I couldn't have an incomplete set.....right? That's my story and I'm sticking to it!

SUNDAYS IN MY CITY

 Hosted by Unknown Mami

 

 

We ran out to Oak Glen CA  yesterday to pick up some apples. We didn't do the whole Oak Glen experience like we did last year with our children but it was still nice to go. We have a favorite ranch that we always stop at so that is what we did.

 

 We went to pick up our favorite Rome Beauty apples.

 Didn't get the Granny Smith's

but they are my next favorite apple.

 

We did pick up a pumpkin. 

 

 Even found a little color change in some leaves!

 

Have A Great Sunday!

 

OH WHAT A BUSY DAY I HAD

Besides reading blogs and doing several loads of laundry (which should be done during the week but our daughter really knows how to stretch out her laundry!) I did all of this too! I think this is how my friend Alexis lives every day of her life.

I finally tried my apple slicer from Pampered Chef and it is amazing! Actually I didn't even get to use it because my husband, daughter and son-in-law were having so much fun doing it. Fine by me.

I made Apple Harvest Cake that I saw on Sew On... And So Forth and saw it here too! I guess everyone is making it so now it's your turn. (cute little tidbit, my husband set up the apple coring shot) I made Kristin's apple sauce. It is super easy and very good. Look, I even made the apple dumplings from The Pioneer Woman again because it was a request from the kids and since we were slicing apples I thought why not. By the way that cake is delicious.

Then I went on to make Black Bean Lasagna from Southern Living which turned out great and was delicious. I did change things up a bit to use what I had at home. I forgot to take a picture of the garlic bread that my daughter makes which is very good.

Now here is something really cute to share with you. We are sitting down at dinner eating the lasagna and there was a leaf on the table. So my daughter begins to tell me that a leaf fell off the other day when she was crocheting at the table. She kept it on the table in the hopes that I could glue it back on. {{give me a minute, I am laughing again}} I looked at her and started laughing telling her it's a REAL plant!!! Needless to say we giggled about that one for a long time.

Here is my new toy!
I think I may need a class on this one.

Forgot to show you this giant giraffe the kids got me at the Fair.

Also, if you read my Random Dozen each week there was a question this week about a word you have trouble saying. I couldn't think of one at the time but I have it now. Potpourri! It took me years to say this, I always said pot -a-pourri.

There is also a new post up at Debby's Tree.

THREE OF MY FAVORITE PEOPLE + MEET ME ON MONDAY

For those of you who are here for MEET ME ON MONDAY it is towards the bottom of the page.Here are three of my favorite people that you can also meet. Happy Monday to all and thank you ALL for the wonderful Birthday wishes yesterday, I really appreciated them. xoxo

I obviously have other favorites in the world of blogging but today I want you to meet these three. I am going to introduce you to Alexis, Amy and Kristin. Amy and Alexis are also friends but I always say I am their favorite when it comes down to it. We are surely three of a kind, equal in our friendships. Today I am going to focus on Kristin because she had a post last Saturday that was written for me only she didn't actually know that. So here I go in alphabetical order because I won't have to claim a favorite. (love each of you equally for different reasons)

Alexis is from Running away? I'll Help you pack! Mom 2 my crazy 2 is her link name. No her children are not crazy but they are two active little boys. I think she would agree with me when I say her life is crazy. Busy crazy all the time! This woman accomplishes more in her week then I could ever have done in a month in my younger days. Speaking of that I could easily be the mother to all of these ladies. I must have youth in my heart because I get them and love them. Head on over and visit with Alexis and live vicariously through her busy life with her husband and her boys Caden & Cole. She cooks and bakes like no one else I know.

Then we have Amy from Keeping up with the Schultz Family. Amy's life is not as busy and I enjoy reading about her daily life with her cutie pie Alyce. Just look at the sweet picture she posted for me last Tuesday, she knows how much I love giraffes. We have very similar likes when it comes to TV. We have a close relationship which involves not just reading each others blog posts but we also email each other almost everyday. Lookie here, this is the proof of the friendships we have with each other. Amy's favorite is ME and Alexis' favorite is ME. I can say this because as you know I am the Queen! We are three peas in a pod.

I will often sit and daydream about the three of us meeting one day. I have even said to my husband "what would you think if I bought the three of us tickets to meet somewhere" and of course he thinks I'm crazy. I'm thinking that maybe the three of us need to go to Jacksonville, FL and spend some time with Kristin!

Kristin is from The Goat and I love reading her blog. She just has the best posts with links to the best places to visit like this one which was one of her Friday Fragments. I also enjoy her photos. She takes pictures that I fall in love with each time she posts them. Her eye sees what I see but I am not able to get it in a photo like she does. Here is one of her POTD posts and she does them often. She also has an Etsy shop! I know I have given you several links to visit but I assure you that you will fall in love with Kristin too!

So last Saturday I was reading blogs and trying to get caught up because we were going to go to the apple orchards for apples. Duh! So I was reading her latest post and I was so thrilled when I read it. She was talking about one of her favorite top 10 items. Its an Anchor Hocking Microwave dish and I have owned one forever! I love it too and then she found some at an estate sale that she went to. Then on top of that she talks about the applesauce that she makes in it in the microwave. I was just searching for easy recipes for making applesauce and there it was. Like I said she wrote that post for me but didn't even know it!

We share a love of dishtowels and I just love the way she has hers displayed in her kitchen. She also shares a passion with my daughter for collecting smashed pennies. Something else that she collects are fortunes that you get in fortune cookies. So when I was in Mammoth Lakes this summer I got her a smashed penny and mailed her a little surprise package with the smashed penny, a dish cloth and some fortunes.

Kristen was also kind enough to let me post this picture on my For Your Tears blog. Here is her link to the picture which she called Painted Angel.

I know it is a long post, something I don't like to do but there was just a lot to say about these three friends of mine. I hope you had some time to go to the links, if not I hope you can find time to come back and check them all out.

****************************************

1. What is the best dish you can make?
I make a great Black Bean Chili and also a pretty good lasagna.

2. How often do you change your sheets?
Every other week.

3. What is the longest car trip you have ever taken?
Chicago to California

4. What is your favorite fruit?
Blackberries

5. Would you rather have breakfast for dinner or dinner for breakfast?
Breakfast for dinner except for those days when I have cold pizza for breakfast!

APPLE PICKIN' TIME

Well not really, the Queen doesn't pick her own apples but I am sure you already knew that! But it certainly was apple buying time. So last Saturday we headed out on our adventure. Over the years we have found that we like the Rome Beauty apple from Los Rios Rancho at Oak Glen so that was our first destination. Lots and lots of apples to buy and as you can see there were a lot of jams, jellies and butters.

( click to make the pictures larger )

So we passed a place that we don't normally stop at and on their sign it said Honey Crisp Apples! Ding,ding,ding,ding,ding went the alarm in my head but I was afraid to say anything. Make this trip as short and sweet as possible to keep dh happy was running through my mind, along with keeping our daughter and son-in-law happy too!

See last year on Carmen's blog Mom to the Screaming Masses she mentioned Honey Crisp apples but I could never find them in the store. She recently had a post that said they are available again (above link) and I really wanted to find some.

So at lunch he asked me if there was anything else I wanted to do before we headed home since it was my day! (said sarcastically often on this trip) I said well I would really like it if we could stop and get those Honey Crisp apples at that other orchard. (that's were the raspberry vines were which are getting past pickin' time) Of course I got to listen to a comment about the fact that the other two bags of Rome Beauty apples were not enough! we needed more? No we didn't need more but I still wanted them. So them I got :)

The little green rooster and coaster followed us home too along with a few carmel apples! There was also a very beautiful Redwood tree there too!

So I have a lot of apples and I better get crackin' at some pies and some applesauce..........and in case you were wondering, I agree with Carmen, the Honey Crisp apple is very good.

New post over at Debby's Tree!

P.S. It was well over 100 degrees last Saturday.