Apples and Apples

Yesterday I received an e-mail from Elaine (Chris's cousin Nathan's wife) in which she metioned that the family had been to several orchards this year but were never able to pick the apples because it was too expensive. However, they were able to find an orchard that would let them pick apples for free. Here are some pictures of them picking apples. The children are Isaiah, Alethia and Hadden.

After I saw the pictures of all the apples they had picked, I asked Elaine what she did with all of them. She said, "Last year, we picked a bit more; and I made 20 lbs. of apple butter, 20 lbs. of applesauce, and about a dozen cups of sliced apples (which I froze to use for apple crisp--in fact, I still have some in the freezer). We used the rest as snacks or for Nathan's lunches. It's quite a task to peel, core, chop, and/or puree all of it. I had to carve out almost 4 or 5 mornings to do it all. My favorite thing was apple butter. I cooked it in a slower cooker over night and woke up to the sweetest aroma! So, I'll probably do mostly apple butter this year (since I hardly used the apple slices for apple crisp, and I can get applesauce cheap in the stores). "

I remember when our family went and picked peaches at an orchard here in OK. It wasn't free and between me and my four siblings, we picked our money limit in about 5 mins. But, it was alot of fun.