Apples!

 

Yesterday morning started off strained complete with one particularly grumpy child.  And, as I often do when we have a special outing planned, I started questioning why I ever thought the outing was a good idea in the first place. As the morning and the grumpiness progressed, I was inching ever closer toward making the decision to cancel our apple-picking trip. I think the only thing preventing me was the knowledge of just how much worse the grumpiness would get if I called it off. 

As we were getting ready Little Ish declared that he needed to wear his pirate costume to go apple picking; the outside temperature and the nature of apple picking made wearing such a costume impractical.  After a bit of convincing, he had resigned himself to just wearing a pirate hat and not the entire costume.  Of course, since Little Ish got to wear a hat, Lily insisted that she too be allowed to wear one.  She unsurprisingly chose the hat I made her last winter.  Several verbal tug-of-wars and 2 hats later, we were finally out the door.

When we arrived at the orchard, I popped Atticus in the Boba and all 5 of us made our way down to the u-pick area.  When we finally got in amongst the trees, Liliana looked up and declared, “Apple picking is so beautiful!” And really, it was.  All the frustration of the morning melted away as Ish and Lily had fun finding apples that were just right for picking.  Unlike last year, we did not have to constantly remind them not to pick up the apples lying under the trees. About halfway through our trip, Lily looked up at me and in her sweet little way asked if next time we could go banana picking.  Atticus enjoyed all the time outside, and was content for most of the trip.

As we journeyed back to the front of the apple orchard, Little Ish reminded me that he wanted to “pretend to be an apple”.  This consisted of taking a couple of pictures with the orchard’s face cut-out sign.  He and Lily thought it was great fun, and it made it so they didn’t have to wait in line while Ish paid for the apples. 

After paying for the apples, we staked out a lovely area with a huge tree to sit under as we enjoyed a midmorning apple snack.  Lily got a huge kick out of getting to eat a fixed apple—that is Lily-speak for an unsliced apple. Atticus spent his time taking bites of apple from anyone who would let him, and eventually commandeering the remains of Lily’s apple for himself.  Little Ish seemed to be basking in the whole experience.  Watching the children enjoy themselves made me really thankful that we had persevered through the morning grumpiness.  Hopefully we will make it back to the orchards one more time before apple picking season is over.