Sorry our day was so long that it requires this much time to tell you about it!
One of Ryan's patients told him about an apple orchard up near Peru, Indiana, that had really good apple dumplings. Don't need to tell us twice!! So we drove to Peru, got lost thanks to Chloe {Ryan's GPS.} She had us lost to the tune of ELEVEN MILES. Good grief, Chloe.
Finally arrived!
By this time in the afternoon it was still crazy cold, and raining as well, so we hoped they would be open. They were definitely open...and PACKED! So many people everywhere!!
Thought we might get new living room furniture:
Apples, apples everywhere!
They had a barn with a little petting zoo, so we checked that out before going to look for dumplings.
{The horse was camera shy. Looked right at us until I took the picture. Every. Single. Time.}
We went into the little restaurant for the dumplings and that was the first time our day hit a snag. When we walked inside, there was a gift shop and a wine tasting counter, so we walked past all that and stood by the "Wait here to be seated" sign at the front of the dining room. There were several empty tables, but when the hostess met us, she asked if we'd put our name in at the front door.
We hadn't, because first of all, we never saw a sign saying we needed to do that, and secondly, the front door had been crowded by people checking out at the gift shop, so we just squeezed past them. She took our name and phone number and told us it would be about 20 minutes.
How is this possible? There were about five empty tables! She said they had to call other people who had put in their names, and they could be anywhere on the property. If any of them failed to respond to the call, our names would move up.
So we sat in the {crazy hot} winery, watching the tasting.
I won't lie; I was pretty sad that we had to wait so long for dumplings and coffee, and while people from the wine tasting counter asked everyone around us if they needed anything, no one ever stopped to ask us! {Apparently it was really evident we weren't buying wine.}
About a half hour into our 20 minute wait, Ryan went to check on the progress and they said it would be about five more minutes. When we finally got called in, the room looked pretty much like it had 40 minutes earlier. We ordered a dumpling to share and some coffee.
Our dumplings and coffee ended up costing more than our lunch. Whoopsie! It was a good dessert date, and we did have fun experiencing the place. But I was really sad that it was such a hot, long wait for reasons that really didn't seem to make sense. :(
On our way home from the orchard, we stopped by the cemetery where my little nephew is buried. I hadn't been there in a couple of years:
Between the early morning, the busy day, and the cold and rain outside, we were pooped, so we came home and took a nap, and then I had
one more request.
Oh yes.
Apple. Pie. Chai.
Oh baby.
McConn's fall menu is BACK! We went
back to IWU and waded through the college students to get our first fall drinks of the season. Be still, my beating heart!
What a great end to the day! We topped it off with shopping for our Greentown-house-buyers and for our groceries.
Loved spending this day together!!!
