Ganondagan State Historic Site

While autumn was still in it's stunning (and warm) glory, we spent a Saturday morning at the Ganondagan State Historic Site.


We practiced our hiking skills on their nature trail. There were signs identifying plants and how they were used by the Native Americans.



In the little visitor center, we picked up a scavenger hunt for the kids. It was a sort of hiking BINGO. They had a great time searching for the items on the list.


It was a fun little hike!

Apple picking overload.

Between the preschool apple farm field trip, and our 3 apple picking Saturdays, we've worn out our apple pickers.


On the last trip, the kids picked an apple or two apiece, and spent the rest of the time charging up and down the rows.


But, nothing tastes better than these fresh, sun-warmed apples!

A quick weekend away.

While the weather was autumn-in-upstate-New-York-gorgeous, we snuck out for a quick camping trip weekend.

First stop? Fort Stanwix.

It was fabulous for the kids; large fields of grass for running, tall grass to hide in, hills to roll down.

It's a large wooden fort from the 18th century, complete with cannons and pikes upon which to impale the enemy.

We camped next to a beautiful lake and spent the night listening to the ever increasing wind, and feeling the steadily dropping temperature.

In the morning we shiveringly packed up the car, then made a quick stop at the Oriskany Battlefield, site of one of the bloodiest battles of the Revolutionary War.

We ran up and down the hills, climbed a tree and ate some (not tasty) wild apples.

Then we drove (with heater on full blast) to the Munson-Williams-Proctor Art Institue in Utica. We toured some of the permanent collection with surprisingly well behaved children, and played together in the kid's area.


On the way home, we stopped at Wendy's for lunch. W1 and L1 were gleeful at the thought of "eating at a restaurant!".

For them, it was probably the highlight.

It's gorgeous every time.

We've been to Letchworth State Park many times, and it is always stunning. But never so beautiful as in the autumn.



And never so crazy, fun, noisy, and death-defying as it is with these guys.





We hiked, climbed, got muddy, smirked at the camera, gasped at waterfalls, found nuts-similar-to-pecans-but-not, ate a picnic, kicked leaves, lost a shirt and found it again, pulled H1 down from perilous ledges, and had an all around fabulous time.




On the drive home, we stopped and bought a container of 12 ice cream sandwiches and split it between the 5 of us.


Except H1 was napping in her car seat, so I guess it was between the 4 of us.


But let's not dwell too much on how they were divided up, okay?