It's The Great Pumpkin!

Happy Halloween everyone! Our family really went all out this year, and we had sooo much fun! There were a lot of really late nights and long hours poured into the papier-mâché heads, but didn't they turn out great? And isn't our little Woodstock the cutest?

Carve It Up!

Somewhere between trips to the store, heating up the hot glue gun and sitting at my sewing machine for costume making we managed to get our pumpkins to the table for some slice and dice fun. E was set on using a skull template that came with our carving kit, but in the end decided she wanted to just go free style and she did the entire jack-o-lantern herself, knife-work and all! N just wanted something happy, but he was determined to use these little pink tongs from his play kitchen to clean it out. E sketched something on our blackboard that he willingly approved. I tweaked it a bit, so the missing teeth coordinated with E's little jack-o-lantern smile she's been sporting this month.

The chickens and Molly also got to celebrate with grated pumpkin in their bowls! We thought we'd be carving up our very own home grown pumpkins this year, but try as we might not one pumpkin grew from our vine! Tons of flowers (all male apparently) no fruit...next year, I guess.

"I learned how to do a big boy!"

N has graduated to the status of Big Boy. The other day I installed a Good Behavior Chart in the hall; each time we catch him obeying or listening the first time something is asked of him we offer him a sticker to place on his chart. When all the spaces filled we drove down to our sweet shop with the promise of a treat. Wouldn't you know it, without any guidance from us he chose the exact same suckers his sister did at that age!

Pitter-Patter

E is just growing up so quickly.  It's so amazing to see how she's learning and changing each day.This is one of the true benefits of homeschooling your child; you see the development in every aspect of their life. Here are a few things that she's done recently that I just couldn't pass up on posting:

This was a reflective assignment she completed for World History in our co-op. They were instructed to look around outside for what a cave person would use or need. Then she drew a picture of the Stone Age...hilarious!

This was the result of her and I having a discussion about what time her dad would be picking her up from her YMCA class. I told here that she would be dismissed from the pool at 4:05 and that would give her 10 minutes to rinse off, get into clothes and meet her dad at 4:15 in the lobby. We talked about what the clock would look like, and this was her reminder note she made for herself. 4 for the hour and 3 for the 15 minutes.

What May or May Not Have Happened

 

 I got a call on Friday morning saying E and N had been selected from a drawing (which, ahem, may or may not have been so random) of raffle tickets (which, ahem, we may or may not have padded the purchase of) to pick out a pumpkin over at our Rubberneck Farms. What I do know is, that this afternoon we went for a walk so the children could get their beautiful pumpkins. And it was a relatively strenuous walk back home for me with 2 pumpkins and N in the jogger, Molly on leash and E gliding along (not so gracefully) in her new roller skates. Thank you Mike & Melissa!

...and all was right with the world.

Our Petunia wants to be a mom. Every 2 months on the dot she starts showing signs of indisputable mommy-ness.  She sits in the egg box all day and night, to the great irritation of the other gals she commandeers their eggs, and all in the name of hatching babies. Each time I notice we're back in 'broody world', I set up the dog crate in the garage and break her of it.  It works, it's fine, I just can't help but wonder what would happen if we did give her a few fertile eggs to set on?

I did it.

I picked up 5 eggs from Jen, who's allowed to have roosters intermingling with her gals. I set up a private little apartment with her own food and water and nesting box and let her settle in. She immediately strode over, cocked her head this way and that eyeing those gorgeous eggs, gobbled up a large amount of food (broody hens rarely feed themselves), took a dust bath, rearranged the eggs, fluffed her feathers and slowly lowered her warm body right down. That was yesterday, and she hasn't moved! We're hoping to have chicks in 3 weeks (which coincidentally lands right on my birthday)! All the other gals are very curious about why she's getting the special treatment, it's quite hilarious to watch them circle her apartment, not sure how to get in. We gave 'em some extra clean straw so they wouldn't feel left out.

Garlic in the Ground, Tree's in the Trailer

Stopped by my neighborhood nursery and found a few things that got me out in the yard for most of the day. Inchelium Red Garlic, a Gravenstein Apple tree and a 4-way Combination Pear (Highland, Red Bartlett, Conference, Bartlett, Anjou). I love replacing useless trees with food trees; we took out a few ornamental's that had either died or were driving me nuts and quickly divided up the heads of garlic and planted for some good eating next year!

Camp Korey 2011

The sun was out this morning as we made our way over to Carnation for the second year in a row. We had a really great time with animal petting, corn maze, marshmallow roast, pumpkin bowling, tractor hay ride, and of course the search for the perfect pumpkins. We had a lovely time last year, but they made it even better for 2011. If you get a chance check it out, they're open every weekend in October for their Fall Festival 10am-4pm. Please support this wonderful organization.

Papier-mâché - chewed paper

Our Art Appreciation and Geography classes were combined today! We started our papier-mâché globes, and had so much fun. As we talk about each of our continents and land features we will be adding them to our globes, but today was up to our elbows in balloons, torn newspaper & flour/water glue.

Roller Skates

We got E a pair of roller skates. Yesterday she spent 2 hours practicing in our garage. It brought back plenty of memories of when my sister and I would tear around the ultra smooth surface in my dad's garage on rainy days...nice to have another indoor/outdoor activity.