Not Picking Apples.

Weekends are great. I love weekends. Matt loves weekends. Our friends love weekends. And weekends in the Fall? Great! And weekends with friends, in the Fall?! Even better!
I know, we live in So Cal. you're thinking, "Fall?! This chick is clueless!"
All I have to say to that is: we had Santa Ana Winds here the other day, and that makes it "Officially" Fall to me, ok!! (just ignore the 92 degree weather part).

I have a friend that is from the Mid West and is missing her Fall weather immensely right about now. So we decided we could do some "Fall Activities". You know the type, pumpkin patch, apple picking, cider making, hay rides, corn mazes... All that good stuff. Especially apple picking, how fun does that sound?! We also thought it would be a great idea to wear boots and scarves and cozy clothes since the web site said it's usually 15 degrees cooler there than where we live.

Pumpkin Spiiiice!

So we left Orange County, on a mission to Oak Glen, which is about an hour (or much more) away from us. First we had to meet up with our friends. Then we had to grab some lunch at Chickfale`, at which we decided we might as well sit inside and eat, then hit the road...And then half way there of course, we had to stop at the drive through Starbucks off the freeway to get our yummy Pumpkin Spice Late`s.

We arrived at the Oak Glen area around 3:45pm. It was 81 degrees. We ditched the cozy-cold-weather-wear. Found the pumpkin patch and some very over-priced pumpkins were chosen. Since it was so hot and dusty, we didn't feel like getting lost in the corn maze and thought we'd go pick apples real quick instead. (I say real quick because apparently, the Apple Picking Trees go to bed at 4:30pm. At this point, it was 4:05). Here is where we learned it is twice as expensive to pick your own apples in 80 degree weather than to buy them at your local store. "$15 bucks for the smallest bag?! Forget it!" So we continued down the road to the little country store where they sell the same amount of apples, pre-picked, for $7 dollars.

a beautiful Apple tree, full of tiny left over apples.

Go figure, they were out of the apples we wanted. However! This little store had walls full of beautiful little jars with fresh jams, sauces, pickled vegetables, BBQ sauces, pancake mixes, waffle mixes, pumpkin and apple butters, etc...

Heaven!

This little Country Store was amazing and we spent a good hour walking around looking at things we really wanted to buy, smelling amazing BBQ smoke from the restaurant next door.
We caved. Pulled Pork and Tri Tip sandwiches dripping with BBQ sauce? Yes please!


In the case of looking like slightly retarded idiots,
we have straw in our mouths in the pic on the left. I swear.

a close look at some married couples' wild weekend. haa

You can imagine the yumminess of the meaty meal. But it was getting dark by the time we finished eating so we hit the road, determined to get home quick and start carving our pumpkins.

Now is the part in the story I'd like to introduce you to something called, the Completely-evil-91-freeway.

About 2 hours and 20mph speed limits later, we arrived back at our starting point. Tired, upset, ready to relax. We were happy for the fun day outdoors, yet, really perturbed by the freeway. Pumpkin carving will have to wait just one more day.

 

So to sum it all up, we had a great Fall(?) day, full of... not picking apples.