Chateau Morrisette

On Saturday, my parents and I drove to Chateau Morrisette Winery. It was about an hour and fifteen minutes from Roanoke. I had heard wonderful things about the restaurant there, so I made a reservation for the weekend that my parents were visiting.

Part of the drive was on the Blue Ridge Parkway. This time of year, a drive on the Parkway is breathtaking in beauty.

We had such a nice time! We toured the winery, which I would highly recommend. We had such a wonderful tour guide, named Austin. He gave us a fantastic tour!

Then, we had our wine tasting. While I really didn't care for many of the wines, it was still fun, fun!

Then, we had a delicious lunch at the restaurant. It was heavenly to get one-on-one time with just me and my parents.

The 2015 Halloween Parade

While this is the third year for Nathan to be in the Halloween parade, it is the first year for Jack! It was so sweet to see both of my boys walking in the preschool Halloween parade. And of course they were the cutest! :)

Both of my parents came in town for the parade. So fun! And Scott was able to get away from the SICU for twenty minutes to see the boys.

Nathan's class, the Wise Owls, went first in the parade!

Then came Jack's class, the Busy Bees! I was so excited to see Jack in his very first parade. {Also, I might have wanted to cry just a tiny bit!}

Fall Festival

Yesterday evening, we took the boys to our church's fall festival. It was so much fun! Nathan was mainly interested in the games, while Jack wanted to stay jumping on the bouncy houses!

This year, they're a tarantula (according to Nathan) and Buzz Lightyear. I managed to snap some cute photos of the boys before we left. Do you like our giant spider in the background? (You should SEE the front of my house. Oy. Sorry, neighbors.)

We ran into lots of our friends at the fall festival!

And we went on a hayride! Fun, fun!

See this chocolate cupcake that Nathan is enjoying? He and I walked in the cake walk for fifteen minutes to get that puppy! Whew! Nathan kept asking, "When are they going to call our number!?"

We even saw one of our babysitters there!

Nathan, of course, wanted a black widow spider painted on his face.

Weeeeeee! Fun on the bouncy houses!

I love this time of year. (Okay, I hate the cold weather in Virginia. UGH. HATE. But I do love everything else!) We had a fun, fun evening as a family!

Autumn Apple Crisp

I'd tell you this would make a fabulous dessert paired with some vanilla bean ice cream; however, I just ate this for breakfast {no ice cream!} and it. was. wonderful!

You will need for the topping:

• 1/2 cup of all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup of old fashioned oats
• 1/2 cup of light brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp of baking powder
• 1/2 tsp of ground cinnamon
• Dash of salt
• 3 tbsp. of unsalted butter, cut into small cubes

You will need for the apple mixture:

• 4 large Granny Smith apples, peeled and sliced 
• 3 tbsp. of unsalted butter, melted
• 2 tbsp. of all purpose flour
• 1 tbsp. of lemon juice
• 3 tbsp. of buttermilk
• 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup of light brown sugar
• 1/2 tsp of ground cinnamon
• Dash of salt

1. Preheat oven to 375.

2. In a medium-sized bowl, combine all of the ingredients for the topping. Refrigerate.

3. Peel and slice your Granny Smith apples. It should resemble this:

4. In a small bowl, combine all of the ingredients for the apple mixture {except for the apples!}. It should resemble this:

5. In a large bowl, toss the sliced apples with the apple mixture.

6. In a lightly-greased 8X8 dish, spread the apples out evenly. Top with prepared topping. It should resemble this:

7. Bake at 375 for c. 35 minutes. Enjoy!

This And That

Baking banana blueberry buttermilk bread

Early morning snuggles. Who needs an alarm clock when you have these cuties?

Discussing inertia. Or adhesion. Or friction.

So. much. love. for this sweet boy.

At the volunteer appreciation dinner at church:

These sweet boys, in their shirts that BeeGee made

Mommy picked up Halloween socks at Target.

Cards with BeeGee

"Can you count my eight legs?"

Halloween costumes arrived in the mail.

More early morning snuggles.

A walk around Virginia Tech's campus. (These photos were taken about 50 seconds before Jack FELL into the koi pond. Soaked. Head to toe.)

Snuggled up with my babies.

Jack was finally the leader at school! He brought his Skipper airplane for show and tell, and he brought Curious George gummies for snack.

Nathan read his very first book! So proud of this boy!

My sweet Jack, snuggled up and napping. The boys are sharing a room and it LITERALLY could not be going better. Yippee!