The kids had two days off from school for Rosh Hashanah that happened to coincide with Aunt Molly’s performance of West Side Story with the Melmark Players, so we went down to PA for a few nights. On Friday morning we went out for brunch and then to see Valley Forge!

It’s a great site, the visitors’ center is fantastic with a wonderful movie narrated by Laura Linney! We learned all about Washington’s order for the army to be mass inoculated against smallpox, I feel like February 6 should be a holiday to celebrate vaccination.

The kids also enjoyed learning about the log cabins the army built to survive the winter. Lincoln Logs!

Then we did the drive around the site and visited Washington’s headquarters and saw some replica log cabins which slept 12 men each!

That night we saw Molly’s performance — it was awesome!

We also brought along C.A.H. so we could play with Uncle Fran!

I thought this was a hopeful sign of things to come but now it just makes me sad…

But then I look at this pic and it cheers me up.

We drove back to Larchmont on Saturday in time for Sarah’s soccer game that afternoon. Here’s a pic!

On Sunday, we went on our annual fall outing for pumpkins and a corn maze, and this year the farm we chose also had apple picking! We went to Fishkill Farms, which was SUPER crowded driving in but then once we got inside (we needed a reservation) it was very pleasant. Small corn maze, but that was fine with the kids.