Forget Pumpkin Spice, It’s Apple every.damn.thing & Earning Fall Fun{ds}

We spent a few days up in Nawth JaJaa and it was awesome; you should have been there. Cool and crisp air, nothing like the wet, drippy, hot air we have in SW Florida. Nothing. We had highs of 65-72 and I’m home now an it’s 95*. Not having boob sweat is one of my favorite pastimes.

My sidekick Kelly and I drove up and Coach and her husband Don flew up a day later because we decided we don’t want boys in the car. GIRLS CAR!! GIRLS CAR!! Just kidding. The guys had commitments and Kelly and I are committed to ditching all commitments for the rest of adulthood.

I wish.

It’s a 9 1/2 hour drive and for the most part, it’s a lovely drive. Ya’ll know about Atlanta though, right? Is it ever fun driving through there? hell.to.the.no. But other than ATL, it’s easy. I do most of the driving when it’s the two of us. Did you remember that I did ALL the driving on our two week tour of ‘wrong side of the road, wrong side of the car’ New Zealand? Why do I insist on doing all the driving you ask? Because I’m the self proclaimed best driver in the world. Also, I might be a bit of a control freak. Kelly stated that I have really good driving stamina, which brought me to the realization that my driving stamina is much better than all of my other staminas.

~~Apple picking season might be my newest favorite season~~

Through a few small towns we found many, many apple orchard houses. I thought it sounded weird too: Apple Houses. The orchard uses the houses to sell all of their apple wares. ware or wares? Apple ware? Whatevs. They carried everything apple; little fried pies, apple slushies. tart apples. sweet apples, apple bread. apple cake. apple cider. apple butter, apple bottom jeans. boots with the fur. *excuse me while I get low, low, low, low, low*

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I honestly didn’t even know there were apples growing in the mountains of GA or that this was their prime season; in the words of Gomer Pyle SURPISE SURPRISE SURPRISE!

Did you know there was such a thing as FRIED PIES? You probably did because I’m usually the last to know about such tasty things. We had a fried pie picnic right there in the parking lot; not greasy or yucky, but really really yummy. Surely eating fried pies while standing depletes some of the calories, no?

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Don and Kelly had a Greenacres moment and thought about ditching their lovely East Coast home for the mountains, but then they realized their best friends have a mountain house, so why bother?

After our apple shenanigans we stopped at a sunflower farm. My husband, ever the entrepreneur was so amazed at this and could not stop talking about it. Suzanne, can you believe this? OH MY GOODNESS! I’ve never seen anything like this before!

Was he obsessed over the field of sunflowers as far as the (old) eyes could see?

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Was he mesmerized by the sheer beauty of the bumble bees who were attracted to the sunflowers? Was he bewildered by the beautiful sky shining down upon us on this perfectly picturesque day?

No. He was astonished that someone thought to grow a boat load of sunflowers in an open field and charge humans who merely wanted to walk in and look at them $5 a piece. Suzanne, do you realize how genius this is? They are making a killing!

Do I see a sunflower farm in my future? Possibly. Think of all the posi-BEE-lities.

Kelly and I could have spent a lot of time walking through here enjoying the beauty, but we both had full bladders and are NOT fans of using a public port-o-let. So this ended up being a ‘Griswold seeing the Grand Canyon’ kind of viewing. A few pictures and then back in the car we went.

I thought for sure I would have lots of time to read and write blogs while in GA, but we were busy all.the.time. We only explored one day and the rest of the time we were setting up the homestead. We’re making lots of progress though and I will share some pictures very, very soon. You’re gonna DIE when you see my dining room table. But, please don’t; good design is not worth dying over. Also, I have to share with you some weird choices the previous owners (who built the house) made. I’ll never fully understand the human psyche.

I’ll be catching up with all of you soon after I get caught up with my actual responsibilities. And you thought this was ALL I had to do. Also, I’m still working up my nerve to move my blog back to WordPress.com this week. My stomach drops every time I think about it, so I’m making some prayer requests to the internet-techie Gods.

XOXO