Picked a Peck of Peppers

As I burn through my remaining vacation time, we spend three day weekends working on the house or taking day trips to enjoy the fall weather. Granted it's only 90 degrees instead of 110, but that's what counts as fall around here.

Friday, Dan and I took the two hour journey to Willcox, AZ, to go apple and produce picking!

Here we are, arriving at Apple Annie's.

My adorable husband, with his cheesy cowboy hat and Camelback, hunting for an apple tree that still has some apples left at the end of the season.

We found a good one and I lunged at it with the greatest weapon ever developed: the apple-picking staff. I may or may have gone up and down the rows of trees singing and reenacting the "Be A Man" song from Mulan...

Picking nearly perfect Asian Pears from high up in the tree.

We ended up with about a dozen apples and pears. I just need to now come up with a recipe to use them in. I've never made a pie before.

The other half of Apple Annie's is the produce. Here's Dan contemplating the perfect bell pepper. It took a lot of care and watch to keep him from filling up the bucket with all sorts of hot peppers: jalapenos, chiles, poblanos, habaneros, you name it.

Here's our beautiful bounty! A bowl of a rainbow of apples and pears and a whole other bowl of eggplant, peppers, and chiles.

The clock is now ticking on trying to use it all before it goes bad. I've incorporated some of the peppers and chiles into a batch of enchiladas, but I know I've got to come up with some more recipes pretty quick.

I do love our little fall tradition!