Chickens!

 A princess and her chickens.



And Audra has been taking pictures in the coop.   
 Added Ancona chickens this year, first time in a long time we've had white eggs. (We have white, green and a range of brown colors).  I'm a little worried about the long comb, but they are quite striking.



Thrifted

 Even better than Black Friday and Cyber Monday, thrifted scores

A travel waterer for dogs, two brand new pyrex, two Christmas trees, brand new elastic, tulip fabric. $15

And the science score.  A former teacher's butterfly case, science game, brand new contact paper, alllllll those science books and clothespins.  $8. Plus this vintage magnet letter thing for $1. 



Thanksgiving 2021

We decided to surprise the kids and their bald old grandpa. We drove 7 hours with all our uncooked Thanksgiving dinner on Thanksgiving day to cook the next day. Kids had no idea I packed their stuff, nor where we were going. We treated my dad to no peace and quiet for a couple days. The snowstorm was a bonus. Also appreciated his wood cookstove is big enough for a 20lb turkey (whereas my woodstove is too small). It was a Thanksgiving to remember.




(This girl tried on my old prom dresses and also found my soccer jacket to wear).









ALLL my old barbies and apparently something good on his phone.  We had a great time and thank my dad for tolerating our idea and chaos! 




Hugelkultur Garden

 As another adventure in permaculture, I decided to try out a hugelkultur garden. The premise is you put bigger logs and sticks in a ditch, fill with smaller things, and it will breakdown to be rich soil. 

I am thankful my husband helped with the ditch. He's not usually into gardening, so this was a rare treat.  I had the kids pull whatever logs/sticks they could find from the hedge.  We heaped it with chicken manure, homemade compost and woodchips.  We shall see what happens!



The Start of Merrymaking

I love my new $3 wooden nativity from Dollar General (just purchased, they are in stock!). It's not supposed to be a window silhouette (it comes w/ a stand), but I think it works that way nicely. Kids have been clipping greens, putting in vases and tying ripped up red and green t shirts as decorations for them and allllllll  the paper snowflakes are happening again.  Tis a season to celebrate! 

 









Happy Thanksgiving!

 

Our 4-H club made Thanksgiving door hangers and delivered to the local nursing home. They saved them for Thanksgiving morning and we got a delightful Thanksgiving morning surprise phone call thanking our 4-Hers. Happy Thanksgiving!

November Beach Days

 We spent most of our school day today at the beach. Various stops on our walks for different subjects, lunch and reading in the car.  The Maine cold never bothered us anyway...



(This little one is wearing handmades galore!  I made the coat, my neighbor made the hat, I made the dress and the pinafore, I made the pants.  She picked her outfit!)







4-H Fall Fest

 I hardly took any pics, but we enjoyed 4-H Fall Fest this year.  Here are my trio with the crafts they planned and the tables they ran.  And my husband, who found the food.

Little Miss Anna-Kate and Lydia the Lamb. She thought Lydia the Lamb was going to come home with us.
And me...head to toe 4-H, sporting my new glasses.  
Kids got some awards, our club got the Community Service Award, Penny Raffle outcomes are always a hit. We are so thankful to be a part of 4-H! 


Our Picture Book Library

 I want to share this little blissful (mostly) picture book library that I set up when everything was shut down for covid.  Now, take a deep breath if you are a minimalist. I am not a minimalist when it comes to books.  This library is dedicated mostly to picture books....because I have other places for my chapter books and still more places for my vintage books and still more places for my personal encouragement books and still more places for my craft books and still more places for our school books and of course the kids have shelves in their room.  A run on sentence because that parallels to my book storage.  It runs on and on and on...

What can I say?  We read a lot when we are home.  If we are not home, we are listening to audiobooks in the car.  I read to my kids for an hour at the beginning of the day and an hour at the end of the day.  We take a rest in the middle of the day to read on our own.  Plus the kids and I all read on our own before we go to bed.  Books are a big part of our lives.

The budget for furniture for this little library was $0...because I prefer to be thrifty. Someday we may invest in better shelves, but right now, I used what we have or could locate for free.  Many, many thanks to my neighbor who gave us the couch and chicken lamp. I still need to decide what I will put on the wall over the couch, but anyway, this is what it is for now (suggestions welcome!).

Without further ado, do come to my favorite spot in our house, our (mostly) picture book library. 


These are mostly picture books, with some historical nonfiction on top. The cabinet holds games.
The other side of this shelf has more picture books and our audiobooks in bins.
This shelf holds activity books and picture books below. The far shelf holds some classic works, Spanish books and games (I keep meaning to stitch a curtain for the game cabinet.


The far left is the science shelf (and also a shelf I found on the side of the road for free and painted up. 
Picture books for history on the left, picture books for science on the right.
This is the science shelf i got for free on the side of the road. 

This is history, the shelf I found in the house and painted. The end shelf is mine as a kid and it has some chapter book biographies.
The red shelf has some story puppets on it.  I also found that shelf in our house, fixed and painted it. It holds puzzles mostly. 
Still wondering what to put over the couch. Horsehair plaster makes me want to be 100% certain what I add before making holes.


This concludes our library tour. I have shown you the chapter book library space, pic below. 

 I suppose I could take more pictures of the various book nooks around our house if there are any other book nerds out there.  Thanks in advance for not telling me I have too many books, for can one ever have too many books? I think not. 



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