On our last night at Grandpa and Grandma’s house, Jesse’s cousin Devon came over. It was a quick visit, but it was nice to see her and her girls again.

Then we were up early the next morning to head to the airport.  We got stuck in quite a bit of traffic on the way.  There was a semi-truck that the cabin became detached from the container and was blocking two of three lanes.  We were getting worried that we would need to rush to get through security in time.  But we made it in plenty of time, and our plane was late getting in to pick us up anyway, so it didn’t matter.  We are home safe and sound now… back to work in the morning.

I got to pick tomatoes! I asked Grandma how many I should should get, she told me to pick all of them that were ready. It took me just a second to figure out how to pull them off without squishing them too much. Then the rest of them came off easily. We filled two baskets full.  Jesse was less enthusiastic about the tomato picking.  He said he had already had his fill of tomato picking by the time he was twelve, but I was happy to keep picking.  I washed my hands several times and they still smell like tomatoes.

Then I prepared one of the tomatoes I picked to have with lunch.  There is only one good way to eat tomatoes… sliced with vinegar, salt, pepper and sugar. That’s the way Pa (my grandpa) and Dad would eat them, and that’s the way I like them.  They were so good!

After lunch we canned the rest of the tomatoes I had picked. I had never canned anything before, so that was fun.  It was a lot of work though, I’m not sure I would want to spend all day doing that.

Staying here makes me wonder what it would be like to live on a farm.  I wish we could grow some vegetables for have an apple tree in our yard.  In the evening, just before the sun was setting we went out and walked around the farm.  We looked at how heavy the trees were getting with the almost ripe apricots, peaches, and apples.  Grandpa and Grandma were soon behind us pointing out what each plant was that was growing in their garden.

We had to hurry over to the hill behind the barn to catch the last bit of sun before it set.

We were up early for church in the next morning. Jesse made me breakfast from home grown eggs. They came from a neighbor and some of them were pink and some were speckled.

We had a yummy lunch at Taylor’s and a lazy, relaxing day for the rest of the day. It’s always nice to not have stuff to get done. We took naps, read books, and played on our computers. When it got closer to dinner time Grandma went out side to gather some apples to make for dessert.
Grandma pulled out her favorite cook book. It had been used more than a few times and the binding is barely holding the pages in anymore. The caramel-y top made those apple sooo yummy!
And then we went for a walk up the hill to the pond after dinner. We felt the cool breeze and listened to the silence except for when the occasional car drove by.

Then Grandpa met us in the driveway on the way back to the pond. We talked as we watched our shadows grow taller as the sun got closer to the horizon.