Nothing's Better than Family in the Fall

One of our batches of visitors was extra-special, and the girls crossed off the days for a couple of months until they arrived. Dude and Mom Owen stayed for a week, but we packed that week to the brim and spilled it all over the floor, and when they left, it seemed like they'd only just arrived.

 We followed the now-yearly tradition of going to the apple farm for their free haunted barn and greedy animals, a visit which was marred only by John's station wagon popping a tire at the base of the exit driveway.  Before that, though,  everything was peachy....or apple-y;  take your pick.  (PICK?!  Groan.  I didn't even intend that one.)







 Mom O. even treated us to a wagon ride.  Six bucks per family, and they were kind enough to count us as only one family, which, I suppose, we are.


 

Because the owners filled the woods along the trail with whimsical cutouts, a game of "I-Spy" ensued.  Luci clearly spies something, but your guess is as good as mine.

I know what I spied.  In spite of a wagon that was too jouncy for clear pictures, I tried to capture this girl.  Who gave her permission to grow so old?!

I also snapped this funny interchange.  (Luci still spies something, and your guess is still as good as mine.)

It was cold and windy.  Luci shrewdly sat next to Grandpa, smart girl.

 

Mom O. used the flash to capture some of the horror inside the haunted barn.  Oh, the horror! Even laid flat on the screen, it gives me chills.

And where are the greedy animals who need no food?  Don't worry.  We didn't neglect their swollen, little bellies.

I keep waiting for one of the animals to explode like an over-filled balloon.  One of these days, it's bound to happen.

We also slipped into the children's science museum after church on Sunday.  We hadn't been there in ages, and the girls used up enough energy for a battalion.  I don't know how Dude and Mom O. were still standing by the end of the day.  I would have happily been carried back to the car on a stretcher, but no one offered, more's the pity.

And amid a myriad of other wonderful doings, Dude and Mom took the children to Chuck E. Cheese's, early morning, mid-week.  We got 60 free tokens from Internet coupons and arrived to an empty wonderland.  (I take that back. I think there was one small girl under two there when we showed up, and I don't blame her a bit for wanting to just sit and watch our urchins roam the place.)  

They had a blast and are still talking about it, weeks later.  I share only one picture from this enormous day, and I share it to brag about another benefit of home learning.  While other children sit chained to their desks under fluorescent lights, ours ride the best school bus ever.  

And if that doesn't sell you on the virtues of home learning, you're a hard sell, and I don't know what will.

 

We had a lot of fun cooking fancy meals for them, but the best thing we baked was a birthday cake the night before their departure.  Happy Birthday, Mom O.!  We love you thiiiiiiiiis much! 

 

In the Present

Glove-clad, I've hung laundry in some Octobers past.  Not this year.  The threat of winter seems like a bad dream, half-forgotten and fogged over by morning's sunlight and noise.  This October calls for sunhats, and I couldn't be happier.

 

 

 

 

While we work, Ezekiel furrows his brown and tackles his job-- sitting on the lawnmower for 20 minutes straight.  I'm such a slave-driver.  (And, yes, that's the haircut I gave him at 9 o'clock at night as he screamed and flailed about, poor thing.  I'm just glad I didn't gouge out his eyes with the scissors.  He should be, too.  p.s. I've since tried to straighten it, because trying is good.)

Around Every Corner

We heap buckets, baskets, boxes full, but that many more again sit hidden in the grass, and that many more again hang heavy above.

 

After a late spring snow and a barren fall harvest last year, this year's abundance is a marvel at every turn.

 

Wild apples spill out of pastures and roll onto roadsides.  Cultivated trees threaten to break under their heavy load, and we see boards propping up branches everywhere we drive.

Boxes of free apples fill one corner of our basement, gleaned from trees that held more than enough for us and all others.  Even the animals have started to ignore the piles of food that plummet to the ground, and children stuff cupholders with neglected apples.

 We're storing this year for the lean times.  What bounty!

 

On Top of the World

When the kitchen glows crimson, we leave our seats and crowd the sunroom window.  Supper neglected grows cool on the table, and we run outside to fill the air with whoops and hollers.








 It's too much color to contain.



 

High Point of the Entire Year

This is the first year I've purchased a science curriculum. Usually, we learn primarily using library materials, field guides, and reference books like this, this, and this, which works well. This year, though, I bought this book to use for the first half of the year, and within the first two weeks of study, the girls had declared it the best ever.

"Why?" you ask?

Well, it may be because the first project involved creating an edible cell model out of JELLO and CANDY.   You bet it's the best ever!  (Aside: I'm also favorably impressed both by its clarity and scope of information.)

 Susie asked if she could "post" for a picture, and I obliged.

Millie's cell organelles were most easily identifiable, predictably.

 

And Luci's?  Well, let's just say that hers was edible and leave it at that.

Because Rebecca's Post Reminded Me

...that I never shared pictures from J & J's wedding. 

A friend of mine from church married a wonderful man a few weeks back.  Their meeting and eventual falling-in-love is the stuff of legends, but since it's not my legend to share, I'll leave it at that.  I was honored to be a small cog in a celebration for which the Father had so clearly been at work.  May they share many joyful years together!

I have over 300 pictures (!), and I wasn't even shouldering the brunt of the work (thanks, Rebecca). This long string of pictures is a drop in the bucket, and I culled about 20 additional pictures I had included when I realized how ridiculously long this post was.  I don't think I'd ever want to be a wedding photographer.  Golly.


She was a beautiful bride, even without the dress.


 

 

 

 

Better yet, though, once she wore white.

 

 

 

She and her girls were bubbling over and beautiful.




 

 

 

 

 

 

These handsome goof-offs were hysterical and irreverent.

 

 

Playing a rousing game of "hide the bride" while waiting for the all the guests to be seated.

 

 

The time has come!

All my snaps from the ceremony were just this grainy, so I only give these.

 

 

 

Best man's toast:

Best maid's toast:

 

 

Awww.

 

 

Watching the slide show:

 

First dance:

 

Pleased as punch mama and papa of the bride:

 

 

What they REALLY look like:

 

 

Just the two:

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

(And here's a technical question tacked on in hopes that someone can help me.  I use Picasa to upload pictures because it's a zillion times faster than using Blogger, but in the last week or so, somewhere in the uploading process, there's a bug that converts my black and white pictures to sepia.  I don't want sepia.  I want black and white, darn it!  I can't figure out how to remedy it; I even tried uploading from Blogger, but the same thing happened.  I don't know where the problem is, but it's driving me batty.  I'm batty enough already, so if you have any wisdom, please share!  

With my thanks, 

BattyGal.)