happy fall

I love fall in Connecticut. It's one of the most beautiful times of year.  The trees are already beautiful shades of orange and red and the mornings start out cool and crisp.  With fall comes my love for baking and I've been busy in the kitchen making apple crisp, pumpkin bread, pumpkin scones, gingersnaps to name a few!  Here are a few snapshots from our weekend that I posted on Instagram.


On Friday I went apple picking with my little guy.  He loved it!  There is a huge pick your own farm and market less than mile from our house.  We go as often as we can. 

 

I tried a recipe for pumpkin scones that I had found on Pinterest.http://www.pinterest.com/pin/235735361718784648/  They weren't as sweet as I would have liked. 

We had a digger parked in front of our house all weekend (we are putting in new leeching fields) and all three children enjoyed climbing on it.  I loved the contrast of my daughter, dressed in a leotard and tutu, "driving" an enormous construction vehicle.  That's my girl!

 

 

And, now that it is cold out, I find myself making cups of tea throughout the day.  My little guy snuck a sip of my green tea and seemed to like it!

 

 

Hope you all had a lovely weekend as well and that wherever you live, you are enjoying the start of  Autumn too.

that's a wrap

Last weekend was our local country fair.  Some friends let us park at their aunt's house which was SO helpful.  To thank her aunt and uncle we brought a bottle of wine that I wrapped in a bandanna and tied a "moo-chas gracias" tag to the top with some raffia.

We also brought a bunch of snacks..... apple tart, baked brie and some of these tiny caramel apples.  Yum!  They would look adorable with white lollipop sticks and paper flags attached to the top too.  I may do that for Halloween!  Here's what we brought last year!

that's a wrap

 

 

 

This time the gift is for me!  I have been eyeing this pumpkin wreath from Williams Sonoma since last year.  But, at $99.95 I just couldn't justify it. 

 

 

(via)

So imagine my delight when I saw this wreath at the Christmas Tree shop for $16.99!  I added some brown satin ribbon (that I picked up at Micheal's craft store) and hung it on our back door.  Not exactly the same, but close enough for me.

 

 

 

We had a wonderful prelude to the end of summer with a long weekend at the Cape.  Now I am ready for fall.  I have been drinking pumpkin coffees, listening to James Taylor's
"October Road" album and cooking and baking a lot! 

i ♥ pumpkins

We had a wonderful weekend.  On Sunday we went to a place called Jones Farm.  It was a beautiful fall morning.  We picked pumpkins, went on a hayride and then headed over to check out the vineyard. 

I also made some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. (I rarely buys store bought cookies. Homemade just taste so much better.) I put them in our red cookie tin that I bought on one of our trips to Ireland.  The recipe is easy and the cookies are delicious.  You can find the recipe here.  Hope you had a wonderful weekend too.

october

Can you believe that tomorrow is the first day of October?  I don't know where September went.  Anyway, I thought I would pull out my Halloween decorations and here is what I did yesterday.  I put some candy corn garland in the kitchen, a "boo" sign in the bathroom, a teddy bear all dressed up  in his costume and some red mums on the mantle in the living room. (Here are some more decorations in my dining room from last year). Now if only the weather would cooperate and start acting like fall.  Hope you all have a lovely weekend.

hot dog

Every September there is a big country fair in the next town over from ours.  We brought the children on Friday and they had a blast.  On Saturday night we were invited to an adult party at a friend's house.  They happen to live right across the street from the fair. They had white twinkle light's hanging in the trees, pumpkins and hay bales decorating the yard, and a bar set up outside.  We sat on their front lawn and listened to the band playing at the fair and didn't have to deal with the crowds.  It was a great evening!  I decided to bring dessert and thought it would be fun to go with a "fair food" theme.  I made some cupcakes and topped them with some mini hot dogs.  Hope you weekend was as fun and as sweet as ours!

welcome fall

It's officially fall! That means that it is time for our local county fair where we enjoy taking rides on the Ferris wheel and playing with baby goats.

(photo courtesy of Barnes & noble)

The fair inspired us to start reading our very first chapter book. My daughter is enjoying listening to it as much as I am enjoying reading to her.

(photo courtesy of family fun)

We also made some of these mini caramel apples as a treat for my daughters pre-school. The directions can be found here. I wanted to make them with caramel instead of the suggested chips. Since regular caramel won't stick to the apples I used sheets of caramel (you can find them near the apples at most grocery stores). I cut them into circles using a cookie cutter before folding them around the apples. They came out cute and the kids loved them!

What are you doing to celebrate this glorious season?