Fall is in the air!

Time to play catch up considering my internet has been on the brink for a couple weeks...

Our weekend adventure began indoors on a Friday night.  Krystin, Paige (Krystin's BFF and one of my favorite teens) and I decided to make homemade granola.  Healthy and YUMMY!  Here are a few photos of the process...

I must sadly admit though...as amazing as these girls did putting together what promised to be a delicious batch of granola....I burnt it, to a CRISP...  Very disappointing!

Not a tasty treat :(

Despite the burnt to a crisp granola...I was determined to pull off my plan for Saturday morning to have a breakfast granola "bar".  In order to do this, I had to wake up and RE-make the granola...this time I let the girls sleep since I messed up their perfectly good original batch!  Amazingly enough, this batch didn't burn but I will tell you it was still a bit crispy for my taste (it actually took me several batches to get it right, come to find out the recipe I had used had a misprint in the cook time...go figure) but despite it's crispy texture, we enjoyed a delicious, do it yourself, full of health, granola "bar"... consisting of granola (of course), bananas, toasted coconut, vanilla greek yogurt, blueberries, strawberries, and raspberry puree.  Turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself and all the girls enjoyed it!  Who said healthy can't be fun?

After breakfast we all got ready to head out to the Eliada Home Corn Maze for a fun day outdoors.  Now, fall weather and I have a love/hate relationship because I do NOT like cold but I don't mind "cool" so we waited until mid-late morning to head out for some fun.  This was Adison and Mommy's first corn maze experience but Krystin and Paige made sure we looked like we knew what we were doing!

We started out with some photo-ops (typical mommy stuff) then we headed of to the corn cannons, moo train,  hay bale maze, corn box, hay ride...whew!

 By then my crew was hungry so we chowed down on some chick-fil-a and headed back out to the real deal...the corn maze itself.  Adison being the natural born leader that she is, made it a game to play follow the leader (she was always the leader) in and out and all around the maze as we punched off checkpoints and tried our best to make sense of the map we were given.  It took us about 45 minutes to make the 1.6 mile route and when asked if they wanted to go for the 2.8 mile route...I got a unanimous- NO!  Before heading home we just had to hit a few things for a second time...

So we headed to the tube slides.  A little backstory is necessary here--Adison is SCARED TO DEATH of slides.  No reason, no bad experience to contribute it to, she just decided one day that slides were the devil.  Needless to say, when we arrived that day, the first attraction we saw and visited was the tube slides and as I expected...Adison absolutely refused to participate.  When it comes to fears like these at an age like this, I don't force things because I have no idea where the fear stems from...I just let her work it out in her own time and in her own way.  Well, by the end of the day my little fearful girl cleared that hurdle and was an overcomer!  She begged to go down the slides (with Mommy of course)  Once we got to the bottom the first time, it was on!  We must have gone down that slide at least 10 or 15 times (or should I say it felt that way!)
I was so proud of my little overcomer...way to go Adi girl!  Things aren't always as bad as they seem you see, if you live in fear...you might just miss out on some pretty awesome stuff!

Much fun was had at the corn maze...so much that we just couldn't take anymore.  We had visited every fun thing they had to offer at least twice, survived the corn maze without getting lost and conquered fears.  It was shaping up to be one of the most awesome fall days EVER!!

I just had one more stop to make before heading home.....the Farmer's Market on Brevard Rd.  I am a local, a native, better yet I still live on the same piece of property I was born and raised on...that's right...VERY NATIVE.  But, I have never been to the Farmer's Market so, once again, Krystin and Paige in all their experience...took me through the Farmer's Market.  We shopped, observed, smelled the aromas, tasted the cider, bought pumpkins and collard greens and then we were finally homeward bound!

Days like these make me feel like a kid again and I soak up and enjoy every single minute of it.  I laughed almost all day at the fun my kids (Paige included) had.  This day was FILLED and brimming over with JOY and happiness.

Dear angel girls,
Don't ever forget to relax and enjoy this life.  Have FUN and LOTS of it!  God has given us this big awesome world and a lifetime to experience it...live it up!
Love,
Mommy