Creating Memories…

What a weekend..

We had Amy’s old­er sis­ter, her fiance and their three chil­dren come down for the week­end so we could all go to the Afton Apple Orchard in Hast­ings. What a blast.

I got off of work ear­ly so that I could vis­it with them and play games (we are such a gam­ing fam­i­ly) We played curs­es and scene-it. Had some drinks and turned in around 1 am.

We woke up around 8 or 9, got ready and left for Hast­ings around 10:15 am.

We got there at 10:45 am and it was already packed. We paid and head­ed down to the corn maze. We did phase 1 with the kids and then Amy’s mom took the kids to the play area while Amy, Me, Cindy, Jason, Jen­nifer, Gabe, Tyler (?) and Matt & Tony went on to phase 2.

There is three phas­es to this maze. Phase 1 takes about 15 min­utes. Phase 2 takes about 30 min­utes and phase 3 takes about 45 min­utes. Every year they change this 10-acre maze so it is nev­er the same.

After we did phase 2 we went and col­lect­ed the kids and ate lunch (with some bees). After lunch we all decid­ed to take the hayride and go get some pump­kins and some apples.

Well we tried to get on the first hayride and all of us would­n’t fit. Some oth­er peo­ple ran right in front of our group of 15 and jumped on. So the own­ers said that the next hayride we would be the first on (they have about 4 trac­tors that run all day). So we wait­ed and got on first.

Of course the first stop was the pump­kin patch. So we all got off and the kids each picked a small pump­kin, while Matt and Tony picked a 40-pounder. We then pro­ceed­ed to get on the next hayride.… no luck… so we decid­ed to walk to the next stop, but let Jason and the Boys take their big pump­kins back on the next hayride.

So, Mikay­la and I start walk­ing. The next thing I know, every­one is wav­ing to us on the hayride as they pass by. Of course, this just piss­es Mikay­la off and she is thor­ough­ly ticked off.

So we fol­low it to the next stop. I notice no one gets off and it turns around, so I start walk­ing back. Final­ly I tell Mikay­la that we can go to the park, but nope, she wants the hayride. So we walk back to the pump­kins and wait for the next one. Guess what. Prac­ti­cal­ly emp­ty. So we jump on and fol­low it around through the dif­fer­ent apples and back to the store.

The whole time Mikay­la is just upset so I keep telling her she can yell at mama when we get back. This makes her feel a lit­tle bet­ter. We get off at the play area where the oth­er kids are and I go to find Amy, who is on the hayride behind mine (she had to stop and get some Hon­ey Gold­en apples for pies).

So we meet down by the store where Cindy and Court­ney are wait­ing and Amy real­izes we still have to pick Rasp­ber­ries. Amy, Court­ney and I walk over and pick the best Rasp­ber­ries I have ever tast­ed. Of course we are eat­ing as we are picking.

We then walk back into the store (which is packed) and pay for our apples, (hon­ey gold­en and hon­ey crisps–which you can­not pick-only get in the store), our rasp­ber­ries, pump­kins, apple cider, and fla­vored syrups.

As we are tak­ing this all to the car, every­one else meets back and says the kids need to go home, they are get­ting crab­by. But Court­ney did­n’t get to go to the pet­ting zoo, So Mona (Amy’s mom) takes her. While we are wait­ing, Cindy, Jason, the boyz and I go take phase 3 of the maze. We all get thor­ough­ly lost. One hole sec­tion is a dead end.

Final­ly Cindy and I give up and we cut through the maze (we had lost the boyz and jay some­how) and start walk­ing back to the entrance. We see the exit line, so we cut through so it looks like we exit­ed. We then load up and go home.

We play more games when we get home, have din­ner and stay up and par­ty. Jason’s youngest broth­er came over and we all played scene-it. He brought his new lap­top, so I hooked him up with 20 gigs of music.

Sun­day morn­ing we all wake up and have pan­cakes and donuts (Amy’s dad stopped over and brought some) then the girls go vis­it their Grams in the hos­pi­tal while Jason and I play ESPN NFL 2K5 and he beats me 22 to 50. Then when the rest got back they head home.

All in all, we had a great time and can’t wait to do it again!