What's New?

So, so much has happened since my last post! Just now, I looked through my photos, so I could share a little about our past month or so. Where do I begin?

David has been busily installing doors, which were an early Christmas present from Nana. A necessity for us ... to keep this little rascal out of closets and bedrooms! Yes, our house had no doors when we bought it.

 Forest also had his first haircut ever. This is a before of the front.

This was the back! I saved a few of those sweet, little curls.

 

There were dental check-ups.

There was the annual Veteran's Day parade.

We made our own veterans. Here's Forest attaching his eyes. Yes, they are both in their jammies still! 

We went on a weekend family drive to try and find some snow. Sunshine loves going with us!  

Then, Thanksgiving came and went.

Sienna studied about rain forests at school. This one was texted to me from her science teacher. She was writing about her frog's habitat.

We had a light dusting of snow at our house. Sunshine seemed surprised by it all.

Here's our cozy, little home with a bit of snow. 

Then, there was this ...  

... which leads us up to today. David painted our bathroom, tiled, put up beadboard, and baseboards. It was going to be ready for Christmas! And then, our other toilet leaked everywhere! All over our beautiful laminate floors, through the walls into this almost finished bathroom, and into our kitchen. We sure are thankful for our homeowner's insurance! 

Unfortunately, it's already disrupted our Christmas plans ... like going to go get a Christmas tree. Plus, the little ones and I are staying with my mom, while David stays at our house without a bathroom, so he can take care of our pets. 

We are hoping and praying that the contractor gets moving fast, since they've already ripped up all the wet flooring, baseboards, and beadboard. I am holding out hope that it will all be finished before Christmas. Our first Christmas in our own home. I'll keep you updated with the progress and hopefully, I will have some good news to share after I meet with the contractor tomorrow.

Farewell, October...

It's been awhile, friends. 

As October is nearing to an end, I decided it was about time to update my blog and upload the photos I had taken. We've been quite busy in our little home with lots of learning and being together doing our regular family rhythm, too. 

Sienna took this photo of the front of our little blue home on the way out one day. Of course, it looks a little different now. We have some pots of my lavender sitting in the flower bed in front waiting to be planted.

This was my attempt at a baguette to make garlic bread with spaghetti for dinner one night.   

Chai Guy just being ... Chai Guy. Oh, how we love him, so!

Halloween cookies ... the wee ones and I made together one day. 

Sienna in her kitty mask from a card Grandma Diane and Grandpa Paul sent in the mail. 

Kona jumped into the recycle bin a few times this month and sat in there. Not quite sure why? 

Sienna finished her first embroidery project! 

We studied about apples this month and finished the unit up with a field trip to Padilla Bay for apple cider pressing and to learn a little about apple orchards. Sienna got to use this apple press to help make cider. It was quite tasty!  

She also helped plant an apple tree. 

And, composted!

We carved our pumpkins together, roasted pumpkin seeds and saved some seeds for our own little pumpkin patch. 

We took Sunshine on some adventures. This is her pushing her head between us in the front seat.

We danced at Sienna's Halloween Party for her dance school! Sienna and Forest dressed up as hippies. This was the only photo I could get of them all night.

Our beasty friends napped a lot, too. I caught the next two photos of Kona and Sunshine during Forest's afternoon nap. 

It's been quite a lovely month together. Sienna just finished learning about Bats and will begin a smallish unit on Pumpkins and then, we will learn a bit about Scarecrows and perhaps make our own! I must remember to take more photos in November and update more often. 

A Day on the Farm

On Sunday, our little family trekked over to three of the farms on the Skagit Valley Farm Tour. This has become an annual tradition for our family. When we were getting ready to go, David took a few photos of the wee ones in front of our Autumn inspired home. 

Then, we were off to Gordon Skagit Farm, our favorite! Forest wanted to hold all of the pumpkins and ride on all of the tractors.

 

We each chose one smallish pumpkin and one larger one. David opted for a gourd for his smaller one.

Next, we headed over to the dairy farm, Golden Glen Creamery. We saw calves that had been born that day and the day before.

We also went on a hay ride together.

Before we left, Sienna had a rainbow painted on her face and then we headed over to Sakuma Bros. Farm.  

Sienna and Forest both planted a thornless blackberry plant to add to our growing garden.

Right before we left to go home, Sienna got to participate in a straw candy hunt. They hid candy all around the small pen and covered it with straw.  

We love visiting our local farms!

To see our farm adventures from past years: 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013

Why Homeschool is so good!

What's better than having your sweet kitty join you while you do your school work? Hmmm... maybe having homemade hot cocoa and chocolate chip cookies while you finish your work, too!

These photos were from Friday. Forest awoke from his afternoon nap to the smell of Mama's homemade cookies. 

On a side note, we had a scary thing happen yesterday. Forest threw a plate down from the table and it hit our sliding glass door. It ended up shattering into a million little pieces. We weren't sure what to do so we got some advice from my Uncle Mike, who told us how to get the glass to fall down and David vacuumed up the glass. The door was double paned so we temporarily have a one paned door until our new one comes. We ended up getting a very good deal at Lowe's on french doors (the doors were originally $700 and we got them for about half the price). Luckily Nana was over to help us and watch the wee ones. My Uncle Mike will be helping us install them on Saturday. Luckily, we are all okay and nobody was hurt. Forest thought the crackling sound the glass made was amazing. He kept saying, "Amazing." Well, not so amazing for us money wise, but it will be a story we can tell him one day!

Hello, Autumn!

It definitely feels as though Autumn has arrived to our little home. The past few days have been rainy with a little chill in the air. We have been collecting leaves and pinecones on our nature walks to add to our Autumn nature nook on the homeschool hutch.

The orange pumpkin is ours from our garden and the other one is from the market. Forest also had his own little pumpkin from the market, but threw it a few times like a ball in our kitchen. Sunshine ended up retrieving it and chewed it up a bit.

Yesterday afternoon a surprise arrived in the mail for Sienna! It was a Little House in the Big Woods paper doll book. There has been so much paper doll play at the table. It was such a sweet little book I thought I'd share.

And, while Sienna played with her paper dolls, Forest played with the barns and animals in the living room for a bit. It is a wonderful thing to have littles completely engaged in their play. He didn't even notice when I took the photos of him.

We moved some furniture around in the living room, because Forest kept diving off this little table onto the sofa. Now, it's found a perfect place below the windows in the play area for displaying our seasonal book basket.

Happy Autumn!