A Fabulous Fall

This really has been the most fabulous fall! Over the past few weeks (and in addition to our fall weekend getaway), Nathan and I have gotten to do some really fun things to make this the most festive fall of all!

*Shortly after our trip to New England, I used the peck of apples that we picked in Massachusetts to make an Apple Crisp dessert. I found the recipe online, and it was super easy to make.

It turned out to be SO delicious! The flavor of the apples was so bright and rich, and the whole thing was so sweet (the generous amounts of sugar in the recipe might have helped that :). Either way, it was an amazing fall dessert and the perfect way to use our freshly-picked apples!

*Last weekend, Nathan showed up at my house carrying these:

It was such a nice surprise! We had planned on carving pumpkins before Halloween, but he took the initiative to pick them up, which was really sweet. He even brought a pumpkin carving kit (a knife, a scooper and some templates) that he had won at a work meeting, and that may have sparked his desire to get some pumpkins to carve. :) We hung out in my garage for a few hours cleaning out our pumpkins and carving them up.

We didn't carve anything too original, but I think they turned out great! Mine is the nice face (right) and Nathan's is, of course, the mischievous face (left).

Nathan went the extra mile and in addition to carving a face in the front of his pumpkin, he also carved "Happy Halloween" into the back. I love that behind his pumpkin in this picture, you can see the scary face from the other side!

*Last night, we drove out to Thurmont to visit Lawyers Moonlight Maze, the largest corn maze in Maryland! The theme of the maze is different every year, and this year it was Iron Man-themed!

The farm also had a pumpkin cannon, which shot pumpkins at some Iron Man-themed targets. So cool!

 The maze itself was separated into three sections with 7.5 miles of trails covering 42 acres of corn.

This maze was so much more difficult than any other maze I have been to - it had a crazy map and checkpoints to punch out the numbers on the map to prove we had found them. It was always so thrilling to turn the corner and find the numbered marker hiding in the corn!

I was a little scared that we would never make it out - I mean, how would anyone ever find us?? But we kept our cool and worked together to keep track of our location on the map and figure out where we needed to go. We backtracked a few times, but we actually made a great team and successfully made our way through the maze. :)

There was also an outdoor showing of Iron Man 2 and a tipi/wigwam with a campfire inside and all kinds of snacks and food. It was definitely the full experience and I would totally recommend it!

I have absolutely loved getting to do all of these fun fall things. More than any other year, I feel like I've really gotten to enjoy the season this year, and I'm so thankful that I've been able to do so many fun things and have someone wonderful to share them with. :) Here's to hoping that this coming winter is just as great!

Happy Halloween!