week #6 in review

I didn't do much posting this week because we didn't do much worth posting about! I mean, we did our "usual" stuff, movement circles, curriculum story, a few outings and activities, but none of them in and of themself was particularly blog-worthy, other than our trip to Buell's Orchard on Monday, which I did blog about earlier in the week. (This rare family photo was taken on the hay wagon there.) But I snapped a few photos during the week and saved them up for my end-of-week review.

The reason there wasn't a whole slew of photos from this week is because it was drizzly and rainy for a good part of the week (finally! Rain!!), so we spent more time indoors than usual. But the good news about that is how well the kids sank into their play related to the curriculum story this week. Our story was an Aboriginal folk tale about the origins of the Didjeridoo (a traditional Australian instrument), and it was far and away the kids' favorite story so far this year. They begged for it each day, and then immediately re-enacted the entire story after each telling (as they are doing in this picture).

One day the two of them created a Zoob (the building toy pictured here) family, and named them all. They then added skis, snowballs, and a dog to walk, having the characters interact with each other and go on a ski trip.

We also did quite a bit of planting this week -- we still have about 180 bulbs to put in the ground, but we did get the small shrubs and a few other decorative perennials that we bought this week during a visit to the amazing Variegated Foliage Nursery, where the kids had a great time exploring the gardens, and I had a great time spending way too much money on plants! (Actually, we took advantage of some really terrific end-of-season sales.)

Finally the skies cleared on Saturday and we were able to get outside and do some work around the farm, and the kids were able to get back to playing with all their favorite farm critters, including this barn cat that we call Cosmo, who is one of J's buddies. The cooler weather came with the rain as well, and it's quite a relief to have normal chilly fall weather with us at last!

Zoo Boy checks in on our fencing project after visiting with the sheep.

Books we read this week: Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert (one of our favorites books!), I See Animals Hiding by Jim Arnosky, and County Fair, by Laura Ingalls Wilder (which is one of the books in the My First Little House Books series, which we will be reading throughout the year this year -- a great illustrated introduction to Laura Ingalls Wilder's writing, geared in just the right way to this age).