Apple Picking in Julian

Today we made an outing to Julian, the apple-picking capital of east San Diego County.

We were excited to take Joseph out to pick apples, because we thought he'd get a kick out of pulling fruit off of trees.

--Joseph in search of the perfect apple--

Despite his parents' best intentions, Joseph decided that there were plenty of things to do at the orchard that didn't involve picking apples.

--Joseph, no longer in search of the perfect apple, smacks a tree with a stick--

Joseph also tried to teach his parents that there was no need to pick apples, because there were plenty of great apples all over the ground.

--Joseph and a shriveled, rotten apple--

The highlight of Joseph's time at the orchard involved chasing around a skinny cat that mommy insisted had worms. (We don't have any pictures of this part of the trip because daddy was busy protecting Joseph's intestines by pulling on the back of Joseph's overalls any time he came within striking distance.)

The rest of the time at the orchard was a bit of blur for Joseph--likely the result of sucking on his hands after smashing fermented apples between his fingers.

Joseph did manage to make his parents laugh with his repeated attempts to take apples from the ground and re-attach them to the tree branches.

--Joseph picking, or possibly un-picking, an apple--

The other highlight of Joseph's day (and possibly of his life so far) was his introduction to apple pie and ice cream. As long as apple picking ends with apple pie eating, I think it's safe to say that Joseph is a big fan of apple picking.