{"id":2886,"date":"2009-09-20T11:30:37","date_gmt":"2009-09-20T16:30:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/?p=2886"},"modified":"2009-09-20T11:44:37","modified_gmt":"2009-09-20T16:44:37","slug":"apple-picking-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/2009\/09\/20\/apple-picking-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"Apple picking 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span class=\"drop_cap\">A<\/span>pple picking is one of my favourite fall traditions.  We&#8217;d never been before 2005, but now I can&#8217;t imagine going a year without a trip to the orchard.  This year, we headed back to our first favourite, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.kilmarnockorchard.ca\/\">Kilmarnock Orchard<\/a>.  It&#8217;s the better part of an hour&#8217;s drive from Ottawa, but the drive is beautiful on a bright blue autumn morning, and if you make a stop at nearby Merrickville on your way home, it&#8217;s a lovely way to spend a day together.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935949866\/\" title=\"Brothers by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2472\/3935949866_fb395e92b2.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"333\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Brothers\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This tree is not indicative of the size of tree you&#8217;ll find at Kilmarnock, but I was charmed by it.  It&#8217;s a Charlie Brown Apple Tree!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935149679\/\" title=\"Charlie Brown apple tree by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3631\/3935149679_06137d5bb6.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"344\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Charlie Brown apple tree\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Lucas was even more adorable than usual.  He loves apples, and calls any round-ish fruit an &#8220;abble&#8221; &#8212; nectarines, peaches, and tomatoes are all &#8220;abbles&#8221;.  He was beyond excited to see not only the tractor-pulled &#8220;train&#8221; that took us out to the orchard, but the fact that there were apples as far as his eye could see.  If he said &#8220;Abble!!&#8221; (you can actually hear the exclamation points) once, he said it five dozen times. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935943776\/\" title=\"Lucas eating apple again by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2659\/3935943776_9726181a63.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"333\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Lucas eating apple again\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Why should you pick the apples way up there on those branches, when there are tonnes of apples just lying around in the grass, waiting to be collected?<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935943052\/\" title=\"Ground apples by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2436\/3935943052_a7172a312c.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"333\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Ground apples\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>(I&#8217;d like to assure you that in the picture above, he&#8217;s actually eating an apple I picked for him instead of one of the ground apples, but the odds are only about 50\/50.  *shrugs*)<\/p>\n<p>I love the apples, I love the chance to get outside, I love to watch them enjoying themselves, I love to notice how much they&#8217;ve grown in the year since we last went apple picking.  But what I really love? The chance to spend time with my menfolk.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935165005\/\" title=\"Family portrait by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2658\/3935165005_87fa8fa1bf.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" alt=\"Family portrait\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>(It&#8217;s not the best portrait, but I love the matching expressions on Lucas&#8217;s and Tristan&#8217;s face!)<\/p>\n<p>I had better success with individual portraits.  The orchard light in September is lovely!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3937164514\/\" title=\"My menfolk by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm4.static.flickr.com\/3489\/3937164514_0ee9d6896d.jpg\" class=\"aligncenter\" width=\"500\" height=\"500\" alt=\"My menfolk\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>(Lucas is in B&#038;W because his skin tone was really uneven in colour, reflecting the red and green of the tractor we were in, and I haven&#8217;t figured out how to fix that in Photoshop yet!  Besides, I like portraits in B&#038;W.)<\/p>\n<p>It was well after lunch time by the time we&#8217;d picked our fill, meandered the length of the orchard, gone for an extra train run, and picked up a home-made apple-caramel pie, so we scooted up to Merrickville for a bite to eat and a wander down the main strip.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935950550\/\" title=\"fries and ketchup by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2664\/3935950550_9d825f949c.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"333\" height=\"500\" alt=\"fries and ketchup\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Merrickville is a picturesque little town right on the Rideau Canal, a haven for the artistic sorts.  These are just a few of the things we enjoyed.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3937080425\/\" title=\"Merrickville mosaic by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2564\/3937080425_7d37e5f85e.jpg\" class=\"aligncenter\" width=\"500\" height=\"500\" alt=\"Merrickville mosaic\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>So now we have three heaping serving bowls of apples, mostly Lobos and Macs.  (I&#8217;m disappointed, my faves are Empires but because of the cruddy summer they&#8217;re slow in ripening this year.)  Do you have any good apple recipes to share?  I&#8217;m particularly looking for an easy apple crisp recipe.  Mmmmm, abbles!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/3935150495\/\" title=\"Perfect apple by Dani_Girl, on Flickr\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2629\/3935150495_0cec01dfca.jpg\" class=\"frame aligncenter\" width=\"500\" height=\"333\" alt=\"Perfect apple\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>(There are even more photos <a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/postcardsfromthemothership\/sets\/72157622292987839\/detail\/\">on Flickr<\/a>!  And about 150 on the computer that I didn&#8217;t post but don&#8217;t have the heart to delete&#8230;)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Apple picking is one of my favourite fall traditions. We&#8217;d never been before 2005, but now I can&#8217;t imagine going a year without a trip to the orchard. This year, we headed back to our first favourite, Kilmarnock Orchard. It&#8217;s the better part of an hour&#8217;s drive from Ottawa, but the drive is beautiful on &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/2009\/09\/20\/apple-picking-2009\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Apple picking 2009&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,73],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2886","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ah-me-boys","category-ottawa-family-fun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2886"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2895,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2886\/revisions\/2895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}