With Halloween being a bit different this year we planned to have a Halloween party at home. But first pie for breakfast. We've been using up those apples from a road side stand in Wisconsin for weeks. Theo was not into costumes this year and wouldn't put on his Yoda costume. He finally agreed to a cape. Meadow has been planning for our party for weeks. She made this ghost piñata for the occasion. No idea what's inside. 

  For the first time in a long while we had no trips planned. With our abundance of apples we picked up last weekend I made German apple pancake for breakfast.  We bought two big bags of apples along the road on our way back from the cottage. We've been making apple sauces, dumplings and even a pie. And they're still not gone. The night before I asked Theo what we should do tomorrow. He said, "drive". I asked where we should drive to and he said playground. 

  Day 2 Meadow had a few days off from school and I have a few days of PTO to use so we took a fall trip to the cottage. We arrived on Tuesday evening. Wednesday happened to be our 9th Anniversary. It's tradition to have crepes for breakfast but we didn't have any milk. Waffle mix it is. Though we've only been married nine years we've actually been together for almost 15 years. I think that number matters a lot more than a legal document celebrating a party we had six years after meeting. We went from summer weather the week before to winter this week. Today called for on and off rain. Eventually we made it outside. My dad had apparently already brought in the docks and boat for the winter. With the weather we had this weekend, it was probably for the best.

We had heard that the the Mississippi River was being drawn down in Downtown Minneapolis. So we picked up some pizza and headed down to the river. The other side of the river was packed so we stayed on the west side. I don't know why they don't take advantage of cleaning up all the garbage. Perhaps everyone could just take a piece of garbage to the trash. It could've been cleaned up in no time flat.

  Scott had to take some sunset photos in Stillwater.  A fall color aerial 360. I hadn't been there in awhile so we tagged along. We left as soon as Meadow was done for school and headed for the St Croix Boom Site. I had heard there was a hidden waterfall and wanted to check it out. There's not a specific trail to it. From what I read you go down the stairs and take a left following the river.  I think it's an old state trail that isn't maintained and has way too much graffiti.