the beauty of fall

After tomorrow, I will be just one oral exam away from finishing my current German course (B1). This means that I should probably be studying tonight, but instead I am catching up on my favorite blogs, listening to NPR (today’s Morning Edition), and contemplating how nice it will be to re-discover the joy that is regular free evenings. I already have lots of plans about how I will spend my evenings this fall, but one thing I hope to do is blog more and keep up on sharing photos from our latest adventures. So, in lieu of Deutsch lernen, let’s look back at the rest of the highlights from our October, and the best of fall, around Zürich…

First, the amazing harvest display at church from a few weeks ago.  An impressive visual reminder of one thing we should be thankful for this season. (See more photos in my Instagram feed at right to understand the full scale of the display.)

And along that harvest theme, I invited two coworkers over one Sunday to make apple butter and caramel pear butter. This is only part of the process which left us with approximately 20 liters of deliciousness.  I don’t even know how we will be begin to eat our share.

Finally, last Sabbath after church we headed out to Jucker Farm, just 45 minutes NE of Zürich, for an apple farm afternoon. We drank fresh cider, wandered apple mazes, wished for some crazy goats and rabbits of our own, and were amazed at the sheer variety that is the world of squash and pumpkins. And yes, that frog prince is covered in pumpkins and the award winning pumpkin was more than 500 kg (approx 1100 lb).

I hope your fall is also full of pumpkins, apples, and thankfulness as well.