I ♥ Fall

This past weekend Saqib and I hopped in our car, and headed down 94 East towards Michigan to visit my parents for the weekend.  Most of our drive was completed while there was still daylight.  And in the sunlight, I really got a chance to see all the beautiful colors of fall.  The trees on the sides of the road were gorgeous!  They were still in the process of changing colors, and the leaves were still on the trees.  Through the green there were bright splashes of red, yellow and my personal favorite, orange.  Man.. do I love the fall in Michigan.  You don’t get a scene like this everywhere in America.

Whenever I see all those colors together, I always think of something my abbu pointed out to me once a road trip.  There are so many different colors, different shades, different tints of green, red, yellow, orange and brown, yet they all look so beautiful together.  Truly, Allah creates everything perfectly.

Saturday morning the fall-fun didn’t end.  After breakfast and just before lunch, we loaded up the car and headed down to Parmenter’s Cider Mill in downtown Northville.

The view from Old Baseline Rd.

I remember this place from when I was little and ammi took us.  It hasn’t changed much at all.  There’s still a fudge hut, and there are still a ton of bees and wasps flying around.  Cider and donuts are sold inside the barn, and there are still only two varieties of each:  cold or hot cider, spiced or plain donuts.

I was really looking forward to drinking the cider.  I had had some in Illinois, but to be honest, it just wasn’t the same.  The cider I had in IL tasted like sour apple juice.  The cider from this mill… it literally tasted like I was biting into an apple.  The taste was *fresh* and *crisp* like it had just been made.  And I’m pretty sure it had.  While I was waiting in line to buy the gallon of cider, there was a boy that kept coming from behind a door in the barn, with more and more gallons.  They were literally churning the cider in the back and selling it off right away.

The “spiced” donuts were covered in cinammon and sugar.  The sugar was crunchy and the cinnamon just right.  The consistency of the donuts was perfect:  cakey, not too thick, not too stretchy, not fluffy, not hard, just cakey.  Yummm… I want some now!

We picked up a bushell of jonagold apples on our way out, and later that night ammi made apple pie!  She added pecans, caramel, butter, cinnamon and a bunch of other “fall-flavors” to the apples and baked it all in a pastry sheet.  It was really good with some ice cream.

My new desktop background

Caramels, cinnamon, apples and pastry sheets, yummmmm!!

 Alhumdu’lillah, I’m happy the fall is here.  There are so many wonderful things (besides food… maybe) that this season has to offer.  What are some of your fall favorite activities?  Watching football?  Baking?  Wearing sweaters and bundling up?