Picking Apples

It's fall, and that means apples and pumpkins. There are lots of farms in the area where you can take a hay ride and pick a pumpkin. The one we picked, Homestead Farm in Maryland, has some pretty large apple orchards, which yeild apples from September through the end of October, and several pumpkin patches. They also have a few sheep, some goats, pigs and a super cute young steer.

Anastasia was very excited about going to the farm. She was even more excited when she spied the barns and chicken coops. So, before heading to the apple orchard, we made a trip around the animal enclosures.



Then it was time to head over to the trees for some fruit. The farm has 12 varieties of apple, but only three are still on the trees now: Cameo, Pink Lady, and Braeburn. First up was Cameo, and we all fell in love with it, sweet, crisp, and very large.



Anastasia really liked pulling the apples off the trees, and helping daddy pull the wheel barrow. We walked around the orchard picking the apples that were ripe, trying all the varieties that were still on trees, and overall enjoying the cool morning. Stasia also enjoyed riding in the wheel barrow.





Once we had two large baskets of apples, we headed to the pumpkin patch. There were several different varieties of pumpkin and squash growing in the one field, so we had lots to choose from. Big and small, blue, orange and green, even some that looked like giant tomatoes. Back up by the farm house, Anastasia wondered why there were so many pumpkins that weren't in the field.



Anastasia was very intent on taking the hayride, so when our wheel barrow was full, we headed back up to the farm to climb onto the tractor. This was Myney's favorite part of the trip.





When we got back from the ride, it was time to load up the car and head home. Predictably, Annie fell asleep within 5 minutes of leaving the farm.