Fall Festivities

This is one of the best school projects we've done this year for Jane. A nature notebook.

Here she is doing leaf rubbings whilst listening to the lap harp...

One evening while preparing the school room for the next day, I thumbed through her notebook and found these sweet pages.

 The next best school activity this year has been the writing center. I found this killer typewriter at the BB for $1.50. Check out the stack of letters ready to mail this week.

 I like this letter Jane wrote, this part in particular... "P.S. Are we nature buddy's?"

 I love it when I find pictures on my phone like this one. I later found out it was Charlie who took it. How did he get so close is what I want to know.

Halloweeeeeen

 We LOVE pumpkin pancakes with cinnamon butter and maple syrup.

 We used these skeletons to learn the names of our bones.

I froze bugs in the ice cubes.

Jane made this spooky Halloween garland.

We had daily face painting most of the month.

Ghosty pancakes.

Halloween stickers.

Lots of dressing up all month.

2 lions, a lady bug, a unicorn, and a parrot.

The best part of this Halloween for me, was wearing a witch nose one morning and galloping around the school room on a broom, while cackling... They kids squealed and ran into the school room closet and locked themselves in together. It was HILARIOUS. They were astonished to see me act like that. I don't blame them, as I try to stay in my little comfort zone as much as possible. They were quite caught off guard. I can still see Charlie's face in my mind, looking at me incredulously, half liking it and half terrified.

Ward Halloween Trunk or Treat

Art

We had such a good reading time this morning that I wanted to share. 

All three of these books were very inspiring. 

Before There Was Mozart: The Story of Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier de Saint-George by Lesa Cline-Ransome

Handel, Who Knew What He Liked by M.T. Anderson

A Ballerina

Pumpkin Farm

We love this farm. There's lots of fun things to do, lots of animals, and lots of exotic pumpkins to choose from.  

Baby bottles in the back pocket. Hot.

Tim and Scarlet, both scared of heights.

They snuggled these bunnies.

Jacob and Scarlet together in one cart.

Scooloola

We made teeny tiny pancakes for the tea party.

Sometimes fairies drink straight out of the tea pot...

We finally made the glow fairies in a jar. This was wonderful. Empty a glow stick into a jar and add some glitter. Voila. It's still really neat even after the glow runs out.

Cello, piano, ukelele and now the lap harp.

Now Scarlet feels included in the morning music practising that goes on around here. Lap harps are actually sort of addicting because they are so easy. Anyone can play it instantly. 

Thanksgivs

On our way to Edmonton for Thanksgivs we stopped in a little town named Nanton. It's an antique wonderland, as you can see below. Jane collects skeleton keys so she found one here to add to her collection.

 We even found this figurine of Jon Heder...

 This antique store happened to be a candy store too. An amazing candy store. It has the greatest baking supplies section- every cookie cutter shape you ever wanted and gorgeous cupcake wrappers.

 This is Sholeh Zard. It's Persian rice pudding. It's saffron that gives it the yellow color. My mom and dad made it just right.

 Aunt Jenny did Jane and Scarlet's hair. She spent a long time doing it just right for the pictures. I forgot how much little girls love to doll up. It made me realize I should do that with them more- we usually just let their curlies go wild.

 When Jane's was done, she bounced all over the house, flittering and fluttering to the next mirror to admire herself ;)

 We named Ezra after the right guy. He looks just like his Baba.

 Baba is always working on something in the garage. I'm still a little confused about Tim never doing that. I just thought that's what dad's do. The kids were his handy dandy flashlight holders.

 Ezra melts us all.

The New Obsession

There has been many a chess session around here lately. Jacob and Charlie especially have been fixated on playing, but they all pretty much challenge each other constantly throughout the day. When we were with family over Thanksgiving Uncle Eli beat everybody so when we got home the boys were determined to find a way to beat him. 

Book Nerds

"His house was perfect, whether you liked food, or sleep, or work, or story-telling, or singing, or just sitting and thinking best, or a pleasant mixture of them all. Evil things did not come into that valley.

"I wish I had time to tell you even a few of the tales or one or two of the songs they heard in that house. All of them. . . grew refreshed and strong in a few days there. Their clothes were mended as well as their bruises, their tempers, and their hopes. Their bags filled with provisions light to carry but strong to bring them over the mountain passes. Their plans were improved with the best advice." (J.R.R. Tolkein, The Hobbit, 61)

This description of Elrond's house from The Hobbit is just what a home should be - a place to sleep, work, eat, sing, rest, where physical and emotional ailments are mended, where evil does not come.  

Jane finished reading The Hobbit in no time. She read it right after I finished reading it to the boys. I'd find her all snuggled in her room, by the lamplight with a sneaky smile on her face. A smile that meant, this book is good mom, real good. Afterwards, for her narration, she drew this fancy picture of Smaug sitting a top of his treasure hoard. The detail in her picture made me realize how much her imagination was stretching as she read this and how well she understood everything. She even decided to memorize one of the dwarf songs for her recitation piece this month. 

Charlie finished reading this Curious George Anthology to Jacob so that he could earn his watch. Now they all have watches, which is nice for me since I never know what time it is. We were looking through our recitation binder today to find him a new piece to memorize and we came across a poem that he liked but when he saw it was written by George Cooper, he said, "I'm not doing this one, I'm sick of reading that word." He never wants to read the word George again ;)