Apples, Apples and more Apples!

We had a fun fall weekend - with lots of Apples!!

Portland Nursery was holding it's annual Apple Tasting Festival. So between dance class and rehearsal for La Boutique (the holiday ballet) we grabbed Tessa and headed across town. It was a gorgeous, 65 degree, perfect, fall day. The tree colors are magnificant right now and the sun was shining. We had lots of fun taste testing dozens of different types of apples - who knew there were so many varieties. We also tasted fresh pressed apple cider, apple strudel with ice cream, apples with brie cheese and bread, and caramel apples! We each picked a couple of our favorite apples and bought some to bring home - I think there is an apple pie in our future. One of our favorites was Ambrosia. We concluded our fun fall day when dad treated us to dinner at Helvetia Tavern - out in the beautiful fall countryside! The fall decorations are all up at home too so it really feels like fall inside too.

Cali had a fun weekend - Friday night she and a group of friends went ice blocking. Never heard of ice blocking? Well - you purchase big blocks of ice from the grocery store, cover them with a towel (not your mother's good towels please!) and then sit on them and slide down a hill. (Caution: you will get dirty!) Cali is wondering why her back and legs are sore today!? Cali gave a great talk in Sacrament meeting today on missionary work. She thanked the Bishopric because she is turning 18 next month and this was only the 2nd talk she had given in Sacrament meeting - guess they need a better tracking system!

Our Stake is offering a 10 week Geneology series taught by this awesome teacher so my mom, a friend and I are taking it. This last week was all about the internet and what all is available. The teacher asked if anyone had a blog and I was the only one who raised their hand! Yeah! She recommends using a blog as a means to share geneology information with your family.

We all went to Young Women in Excellence on Wednesday- Cali was one of the speakers (two talks in one week for her) and she spoke on the importance of getting your Personal Progress done early. The parents spoke about the projects their daughters had done - Tessa's was participating in an intensive ballet course this summer (dancing 9 hours a day, 6 days a week) and Cali's was her Faceless Doll project for her Honor's Project. They had made posters to display what they had done. We were in charge of the green dessert - there was a dessert for each of the value colors - we did brownies with mint, green frosting. Easy! The Mia Maids were in charge of the evening and the theme was to "Garnish thy thoughts...." so we had a cooking theme and made each of the girls aprons with their name stamped on the front in the value colors. We had taken cute pictures of the girls wearing a tie dyed chef's hat (the value colors of course) and holding a rolling pin. We used those pictures to decorate the walls of the room.

Tonight after church we had 3 other families from the ward over for a birthday celebration for friend Marsha Jensen. I provided the main dish and side dish and everyone except the birthday girl brought something. Jeannena out did herself with 3 desserts and John made us some of his famous bread - it was baked in a huge flower pot! We all had PLENTY to eat and Jane brought two yummy appetizers and a "make your own" salad bar. We are thankful for such good friends. Good food and good friends - it doesn't get much better!