saturday in the country

Steve split and stacked wood.
All day.

So me and the boys did some other things to occupy ourselves.
We walked to the hardware store from the bridge. 
Actually Olaf, Serenity, and Micah rode their little run bikes while Christie, Donna, myself and my mom walked behind them, carrying the little babies.  And on the way back Olaf had to be carried too because apparently his endurance isn't that of his cousins :)  But we all had a good time out in the rain, even Forest and Kyler who both (blessedly) slept the whole time.

After lunch somehow both the boys ended up sleeping at the same time - yeah!  So I made applesauce, as shown below.

Does anyone else ever use these apple peeler/corer/slicer doodads?  They are AMAZING.  I want one, badly.  This one is my mothers.  I borrow it sometimes in the fall because it makes anything with large quantities of apples so much easier.  I swear we'd eat more apple pies if I had one.  (Hint hint mom, Sue.... Christmas... just sayin')

Nevermind the particle board countertop... we'll get our concrete one installed one of these days...

Since Wenatchee calls themselves the "Apple Capital of the World", we always have lots of places to get apples in the fall during harvest time.  They used to export more apples than any other place in the world, and do hold the world record for largest apple pie ever baked, but I think Japan is beating them in apple exports now.  That's okay with me.  There are still PLENTY of apples to go around.  Not to mention pears and cherries.

My applesauce recipe is this:  Put all cut up apples in a pot with some water to keep it from burning.  Bring to boil.  Turn down to simmer for like 1/2 hour, stirring every 5 minutes or so.  Put in the blender and pulse a few times until smoother.  Voila!  I don't add any sugar.  These apples were Fujis from Mom and Dad's tree, so they were already pretty sweet.

I just love making things to eat to put in the freezer.  This is my third batch made!  Although batch 2 didn't count because I sort of forgot I was making it, and burned it to the pan so badly it took steel wool, hours of scrubbing, and my sister in law's mom Donna to get it all off the pan.  Needless to say that batch didn't quite work out.  I am just thankful our precious All-Clad cookware survived.  I can't afford it again without a wedding registry.

Fire in the fireplace was nice too.

All in all a good day.