Of soggy dance performances & brisk apple fetching, a fall weekend with the Catholic Librarian family...

Hi all *beams* and hope that you are surviving this fall Monday along with me. Today is the craziest day of the week for me, so I'm doing what I can to perk things up. For instance, da da DA!

Isn't it adorable? It's my new Scentsy fragrance warmer for my office. I have a cube of Coconut Pumpkin Pie wax melting in there and my office smells like a bakery. HOW did I not know about such possibilities before?! I love it. In terms of fragrances, my favorites are "foody" smells. It if smells good enough to tempt one to actually consume wax or soap, then that's the one I want. I noted with amusement that Scentsy advertises their wax as "food grade, and thus safe for pets and children." Something tells me these little cubes get nibbled on from time to time.

So, I'm happily sniffing the air in my office and preparing for class right now. Monday is my teaching day. So far so good, but I'm always relieved when that's past for another week. When I teach, I have to be "ON!" kwim? Just like when I perform dance. Or hang out with people that I genuinely like at conferences. ;-) Social interaction can be taxing for introverts. I absolutely love it when in a fun situation, but it uses up my power supply faster, that's for sure.

OK, so the weekend. On Saturday my troupe was scheduled to dance at an outdoor artisan's market. There were projections for rain, but I thought that the timing was going to work out, and that we would dodge it. We had rehearsed the group numbers, and I had a loose plan for my solo music both with or without veil, depending upon wind velocity. Saturday morning found me with makeup on and perky, ready to don my Saidi dress and head out the door, when...

...we received notification that the market had been cancelled due to storm conditions down by the water.

Booooooooooooo!

Major bummer. I was really looking forward to it. I love performing with my troupe. I do get very nervous still about dancing solo (working on that, but it's a glacial process :)) but with my troupe? Safety in numbers. And we always have so much fun together. So that was a drag.

When Anne went down for a nap, I put on a new performance playlist I've been working on (and it still needs work, I discovered...) and swirled around the kitchen for a bit, bringing out both Veil and Sword. They were both thrilled to be included. That was a fun workout for the day.

Oh, I should mention that although we put Anne down for a nap, she didn't actually SLEEP. Thus, when we later went to the vigil Mass, she was in such a foul mood that she refused to sit in the pew. Instead, she chose to stand, unmoving, and stare at us menacingly, looking like something out of Village of the Damned.

Mike, in whispered tones: "Is she always like this during Mass?"

Me: "No, it's usually the opposite problem."

*long suffering sigh*

On Sunday, we made our annual apple picking pilgrimage. We've found a really cute farm about 30 minutes away that we love. There is a hay maze and animals for the kids to pet:

Anne: "Mommy, look at this little turkey, she is my friend!"

Henry: "Um, I read the sign about Thanksgiving. I think the turkeys..."

Me: "...are very, very hungry, look at how they're going to town on delicious-looking pile of fruit and vegetables! Anne, did you see the goats?!"

Also lots of pumpkins for sale, of course, and tons of apple trees. In season this past weekend were Macintosh, Gala, Macoun and Cortland. We picked quite a lot of them, and have cobbler and pie plans for later in the week.

And so a good time was had by all. Unfortunately, the wine tasting guy wasn't there, which would have enhanced the fun had by Tiffany and Mike ;-) but everything went very well. We got some photos:

This pretty much sums up the story of Henry's life, right here...

...and headed contentedly home with our apples. :)

How was YOUR weekend, dear reader? Don't forget, the St. Therese novena starts tomorrow!

Apple picking with the Catholic Librarian

I had a busy weekend, and your Catholic Librarian is still reaping the exhaustion benefits from it. But it was a nice weekend, and it involved apple picking, one of my favorite autumn excursions.

My in-laws were in town for the weekend, and you know what this means: lots of tornadoing around the house, making it clean by the sheer force of my fretting. My mother-in-law is a very tidy housekeeper, and thus I am extra paranoid when they come to say. You know, because there is nothing worse than your mother-in-law wondering, "does she ever clean this bathroom?!" Nothing worse, I tell you.

They arrived Friday, and all went well. Saturday we geared up for apple picking. We made the drive out to a farm that is about an hour from where we live, and that is one beautiful drive this time of year. In October it's even better; that's the time of peak foliage in this region.

We arrive, and get ourselves organized. Hank wants to play in the playground and hay maze they have set up, and we buy tokens to ride the tractor back into the orchard. While we wait for the first ride of the morning to depart, Mike and I wander over to the petting zoo. I'm not always a fan of petting zoos. I love animals, I just don't always want them to touch me. And it can be weird if they're all loose in the same space with you, because I personally find it jarring to feel someone at my elbow and turn to find that it's a goat.

We head over, and I can discern quickly that you need to observe the animals only from across a fence and pet them through it. This is good. Except for the fact that a rooster appears to have escaped, and he's pecking his way toward us with an alarming amount of enthusiasm. I back up a bit, but this just spurs him to peck his way forward even more rapidly. I can see the headlines now:

WOMAN ATTACKED BY ROGUE ROOSTER AND PECKED INTO UNCONSCIOUSNESS; expected to make full recovery, but swears off fowl for the rest of her days.

As I gave him a weak smile and asked him to "please not peck me" I realized that he wasn't approaching us with malice, but with an agenda. He was making little "bawking" noises and pecking his head in the direction of the cracked corn feeder. He actually came right over and tried to herd our steps in the chosen direction. Mike walked toward the feeder, and the rooster nearly stumbled over his own feet in excitement. He waited below, pecking away, for some corn to fall down as Mike inserted a quarter.

Pretty soon, the goats and pigs got a load of the fact that some action was going down, and they all crowded at the edge of the fence for their share. This kept them happily entertained, as opposed to last year, when all the female goats appeared to be pregnant, or in the process of becoming pregnant. The males were chasing them around the yard and having their way all too often, even with some who were already visibly pregnant! The female goats weren't taking too kindly to this aggressive display of affection. This year, everyone was in a happy mood.

Soon, we headed to the orchard. In season this time of year are Gala, Macintosh, Cortland, and Empire apples. We all picked a bunch to make applesauce. I ate 2 Empires (what this region is well known for) right off the tree. SO good. Unfortunately, the applesauce yield wasn't very high. We collected over 2 pecks worth of apples, diced them until our fingers hurt, and boiled down 2 enormous pots of apples, only to end up with this pathetic-looking Tupperware bowl of applesauce. Clearly, we did something wrong. I guess doing research on the types of apples best for making applesauce would have been a helpful preamble. But really, it's more about the experience. We had a great time. And my little pumpkin was very happy playing and picking apples. Life is good.