Fall break and a special visitor

I am so far behind in postings. Life has been crazy busy in our home. I'm looking forward to popping over and see what you've all been up to the past few weeks.

We recently enjoyed a wonderful visit with my son Nicholas. He came home just in time to enjoy the amazing beauty of a true autumn in New England. We were delighted to meet his girlfriend, Lauren. She is a lovely young lady inside and out.

For a little behind the scenes information, when Nicholas was growing up I felt it was very important to have his friends in our home. This provided me the opportunity to see the types of friends he chose to spend time with as well his behavior around them. There are a couple of sayings that I've heard over the years. They go something like ... your friends are the reflection of who you really are and, show me your friends and I'll know where you're heading in life.

I often hear parents of daughters say that they want to meet the young men their daughters are dating to "check them out" and make sure they will "treat her right." Well, I feel that should apply to both daughters and sons. When Nicholas began dating ~ sorry I have to laugh at this because he really didn't date that much in high school. He was always hanging out with his group {great kids} of friends. Anyway, I felt it was important for Nicholas to bring the young lady to our home for the very same reasons. Secretly, I think he also wanted our approval.

He brought Lauren to Connecticut to meet his family and show her around the area. I assumed that we would share snippets of time between their other outings with friends. I was thrilled that they spent almost all their time with us. It was simply delightful!

They arrived Saturday just time for the Fall Festival. They literally walked through that door and I put them both to work. Without missing a beat Lauren jumped right in as though she had visited before and knew the drill.




The weather was absolutely gorgeous! The sun was bright with just a little nip in the air. We met a few of our friends there and spent the entire day grazing on our gourmet picnic and laughing.



Later that night we built a fire on the patio and enjoyed hearing stories about college life. I am going back to school ~ they've got the life!

Check out Nicholas' sunburn. Who would have thought of bringing sunscreen in October?



To help Lauren feel welcome, I made here a little tray and placed it in her bedroom. I took this before I had a chance to place all the goodies. In it's original state it was black with spaces for photos. It really wasn't my taste so I painted it white and put scrap book paper in the photo slots. There was a letter of welcoming and few items to make her comfortable during her stay.



In the course of conversation, I learned that she had never been to an apple orchard, never tasted cider, nor had a carmel apple. Hmmm, we needed to do something about this and quick. After all, you can't visit New England and not check these off your list. Mission accomplished when we sent them back to North Carolina.



One of the last apple presses. The cider is amazing! The doughnuts, fritters, and pies aren't bad either ;)






 A sweet little shop and sitting area to enjoy your apple and pumpkin goodies.





I love this old iron fence.



Freshly picked pumpkins from the patch.



While the turkey was on the grill {dinner request from Nicholas} we busied ourselves with making carmel apples.



We had several different toppings. I went with the mini chocolate chips and crushed pretzels. Yummy ~ sweet and salty! I caught my husband licking his fingers after "taste testing" a few of the leftovers. I think we'll need to make a few more before the season is over.
Helpful tip for sticky carmel ~ use the non stick aluminum foil



Nicholas wanted a couple of photos with the dogs. Let me just tell you that this is no easy feat. I thought it was hard to photograph small children but I think I may have found more challenging subjects. Thank Bentley and Bozley for offering a little comic relief ~ ugh!




This is the best we could do before they had to be on their way.

It was GREAT having my little guy home and I had tears running down my face as I said good~bye. I am so proud of the young man he has become and I was very impressed with the gentlemanly manner he exhibits towards Lauren. I think it's a goal of all mothers with sons that they become true gentleman.

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