Making Applesauce

Every year I try to make applesauce so Sunday we went to an orchard to pick apples. We've been trying to go for the last month but between the rainy weather and different activities we haven't made it. We headed out to the orchard after church. I wish I could tell you that I got all kinds of great pictures and we picked a lot of apples, but wouldn't you know it....by the time we got to the orchard (about an hour away) it was raining and extremely windy. We settled for buying a bushel of apples for sauce and some Honeycrisp for eating and headed home. That night we made 15 quarts and 6 jelly jars of sauce. Thanks to everyone's help and the "Squeezo Strainer" that Karen gave me, I was done by 10:30!

As you can see Natalie watched from the Exersaucer......she loves that thing!

I'm 3 months old!

Natalie is 3 months old now. She's staying awake longer and moving around more. She has rolled over from her back to belly - but only once - and Nate witnessed it! Steve came downstairs just as Nate yelled "She's rolling over". Sure enough - she was flipped over. She can raise her head completely up when she's on her belly and she gets her legs going enough to scoot around on her blanket.

In the pictures Nate and Sarah couldn't wait to rake up the first pile of leaves to jump in. It was a beautiful day so Natalie got to play too. Both kids are really good with her and enjoy holding her and making her smile.

Nate's Football Game

Nate is playing football for the first time this year. He's in the 5th/6th grade limited division. That means all the kids on his team are under 95 lbs, which is a good thing b/c he weighs in around 74 lbs and some of the 6th graders weigh 165 lbs!

It's keeping us pretty busy right now - Steve helps with the team and they practice or have games 3 nights a week. Nate plays several different positions including kicker. He can kick the ball pretty far - all that soccer helps out!