Black Walnut Season

We have five Black Walnut trees in our yard (and more young ones in the fields!) and every year we enjoy searching the walnuts as they fall from the trees. We have a very saucy red squirrel that also loves these trees and throughout the year leaves walnut shells all around the yard, deck, and porches. He scolds us very vehemently when we dare to come close to "his" trees (or even when we play in the fenced yard!), but last weekend we did some searching through the piles of leaves anyway! We found quite a few, but replaced them all for the little guy.

Freshly fallen from the tree.

One that's a little older and a shell.

The trees. It was a breathtaking day!

On the Farm

We've spent the past month or so down on the farm! We started using Winterpromise's I'm Ready to Learn preschool program this fall. The first unit is all about the farm and one of our activities is creating this farm mural piece by piece.

Here are some of the books we read during our unit:

The milk makers- Gail Gibbons
Farm Tales- Little Golden Book Collection
Farming- Gail Gibbons
Wake Up, Farm!- Alvin R. Tresselt
Farm Morning- David M. McPhail
Farmer Brown Goes Round and Round- Teri. Sloat
Market Day- Carol Foskett Cordsen
Horses- Elsa Posell
Farm Animals- Dorothy Hinshaw Patent
Find It on the Farm- Dee Phillips
Chicks & Chickens- Gail Gibbons
Our Farm : Four Seasons with Five Kids on One Family's Farm- Michael J. Rosen
The Scarecrow's Dance- Jane Yolen
Corn- Gail Gibbons
Wake Up, Big Barn- Suzanne Chitwood
Big Red Barn- Margaret Wise Brown

Corn Maze

The boys and I spent last weekend at my parents' and on Saturday afternoon, Sidekick and I went to our area's largest corn maze with my sister, my niece, and some of her college cronies. It was an adventure!

Optimistic and cheerful starting out...

Nothing' but corn...

Went in circles for a long time...

The maze from above. In celebration of the the 70th anniversary of The Wizard of Oz (movie), the design featured several of the characters. We spent the entire time somewhere between Dorothy and the Wicked Witch, I believe (the right hand side). We may have hit part of the Tin Man, but not for long. We only made it out when my sister took an unauthorized shortcut and we burst back into the daylight. Whew.

A New Look

As I posted a month or so ago, I've been having trouble with scratched corneas. After a recent eye exam (where the doctor saw three scars!), I decided to go "glasses-only" for the foreseeable future. My old glasses were ten years old since I've wearing contacts full time. I ordered some spiffy new ones and decided to get my hair cut too. My hair was nearing waist-length (can't find a recent picture where it's not tied back), and I wanted it just past my shoulders so I could still pull it back easily. My stylist got a little carried away, and it's much shorter than I wanted. I don't love it by any means, but I guess I'm used to it by now. Nothing to do by wait until it grows out!

Last November...



Last week...

September Recap!

We have an an unusually busy September! We've been on the go almost every day, and have found ourselves double-booked a few times! Here's a quick look at what we've been up to the last few weeks:

Nature walk at Rice Creek...

M. had the camera for most of the morning taking pictures for his nature journal...

Making playdough...

Visiting the orchard on a gorgeous Sunday afternoon. We had some apple fritters, took a wagon ride, did the maze, and of course came home with apples...

Experimented with making green smoothies (our new favorite snack)...

Reading about chimpanzees...

The "baby" turned 14 months old!

We celebrated Michaelmas this week with a co-op field trip to another farm for a tour and to play (no pictures!). Later that same day we attended the Upshernish of a friend. This family has three sons very close in age to ours and it was very touching to be included.

The next day our namesday celebration continued with a playgroup featuring apples...

A namesday gift for the boys...

We played outside in our new hazmat rain suits...

There you go! Our month in a nutshell. October does not look nearly as busy and I hope we can get back on track with our school schedule. We've been working on a mural on our at-home days I'm eager to share!