Just A Few Apples.....

Saturday morning, we drove up to Ararat, VA to visit Windy Hill Orchards. It was an almost chilly 70* at 9am and a perfectly clear day. It was a beautiful orchard in the hills. I picked Windy Hill because they use a low-spray approach and integrated pest management. This means fewer pesticides are used and therefore the apples are healthier for us to eat. The You-Pick apples are only $10 a bushel so it's quite a deal. We had the orchard to ourselves most of the time. I guess not many people think to go apple picking at 9am on a Saturday morning.
Apple picking makes Charlotte go a little nuts.....

Maybe it was the fresh air and sunshine....

The kids thought the long-handled picker was a lot of fun.

Jon took this amazing picture. I love when he thinks out of the box and takes such imaginative pictures.

After he took a few photos, Jon put on the apple bag and got to work. He's quite a fast apple picker.

Evan got bored with picking and decided to make his own game with the bushel boxes.

Windy Hill had so many apple varieties. It was hard to keep them all straight.

Look at this gorgeous Red Delicious apple! I shined it up on my shirt.

Most of the trees were loaded with fruit.

This was the biggest apple I had ever seen. I'm not sure if you can tell but this apple is bigger then a softball.

Whew.... after almost 2 hours, we had 6 bushels of apples to take home with us plus a gallon of apple cider for the freezer. We got 2 bushels of Stayman, 2 bushels of Granny Smith, and 2 bushels of Red Delicious. With the price of $10 a bushel, I figured the more apples, the better!

Now comes the work. I'm storing the 2 bushels of Granny Smiths and 1 bushel of Stayman in the back of my mom's garage where it stays nice and cool. I'll bake with those apples throughout the fall and winter. The other 3 bushels will be made into applesauce and apple butter.

It was a beautiful, fun morning!