Celebrating Mommy's birthday

In the midst of everything that has happened in Boston this week, I was blessed by 3 days of celebrating with my family. We experienced joy, while so many others were in sorrow. It is hard to reconcile that sometimes.

The girls had so much fun planning the birthday surprises with daddy, although it was tough for them to keep secrets. They asked me over and over again in the days leading up to my birthday if they could tell me. I told them I didn't want to know, much to their disappointment.

On Wednesday, Daryl took the day off and we spent the morning with the girls on their bikes.  We went to Bradley Palmer State Park where they have a road closed to motorized traffic. It was perfect for little girls learning to ride their bikes.

The girls are ready to go!

Lizzle decide picking up sticks was much more fun!

Hannah is riding! (As long as she doesn't scare herself and head into the woods!)

Gracie proudly wearing her "Poppi" helmet.

 On Thursday, while I was at work, Daryl and the girls prepared a lovely birthday supper of steak tips (from the grill), rainbow fruit salad, and couscous. YUMMY

The table is set and ready for mommy!

The beautiful birthday flowers with the "mommy balloon." (Hannah says: "We had to have yellow hair because we didn't have brown streamers.")

My raised bed, garden cake ~ complete with oreo dirt, wafer sides, gummy worms and sprouts.

Mommy and her girls

To complete my days of celebration, Daryl got a our friends to watch the girls and took me out to dinner. It was lovely!

Apple Picking with the Family

Today we went apple picking in Amesbury at Cider Hill Farms. It was a beautiful day after the rainy week we have had. The air was crisp, just like a fall day should be. The sky with blue with fluffy white clouds.

The orchard was planted on a fairly steep hill, but once you got to the top (riding a cool wagon moving by daddy power) the view was amazing. Probably in one more week the surrounding trees will be in full color.

The day wouldn't be complete with out apple cider donuts. As much as we love them at Russell Orchards, these were AMAZING. I think that had something to do with the cinnamon and sugar covering them and the fact they were almost 1/2 the price.

Going...

going...

gone!

Very fun day with the family! It was topped off with fresh apple pie... with 2 crusts (as Hannah requested) and vanilla ice cream! YUMMY!

A Taste of Fall

Despite needing to pack for next week's big move, the girls and I decided to have kind of a "normal" day and enjoy fall with a trip to Russell Orchards. We got our "classic" pumpkin pictures, fed the animals, ate apple cider donuts and picked up some pumpkins to decorate at home. It was great just to be out for a while and continue to ignore the task at hand... I suppose I'm continuing to ignore it now!

Enjoy the pics of the day!

Elizabeth at almost 8 months old!

"Little House on the Prairie" Grace... she wanted to wear this hat:-)!

I'm not even sure what to write for this caption!

Painting their little pumpkins

Digging out the seeds and membranes (Gracie didn't like this job, until we brought out the spoons)

We baked the pumpkin seeds and had them for supper with our Friday night pizza. They were a big hit with all of us!

Daddy carving the pumpkin.

We need to get a candle for in the pumpkin and when we do, I'll be sure to post the finished product!

For the last 4 years, I've gotten pictures of my "pumpkin snatcher." To see those pictures, look here. And here is the four year old pumpkin snatcher.

Belated Father's Day Adventure

Today we were hoping to be spending the day with Grandma Olson and Aunt Loree. Unfortunately, their car had other plans :-(... and so they had to cancel their trip to Massachusetts and head home instead. We hope they have a safe trip home.

Daryl decided to take the day off anyway (yeah!) and wanted to go on our adventure that was postponed due to the rainy weather on Father's Day. His Father's Day request was that we would take a picnic and go to a local frisbee golf park. Today we went and I actually beat him by 2 strokes! (He may have inverted some of our scores AND he was playing the "pro" distance... excuses...maybe) It was a fairly nice course for two thirds of it. The rest was poking up out of thigh high grass. When I got back in the car, my legs were covered in hives. A small price to pay for victory.

Enjoy some of the pictures from our adventure.Hannah's final throw (in honor of Uncle Jon)
Victory!
Team Olson