Known around here as Joey Joe Joe Shabadoo, he died Thanksgiving week after a six month fight with Acute Chronic Hepatitis (who even knew a dog could get hepatitis?). Joe was a beautiful, sweet happy-go-lucky dog who loved nothing more than to snuggle.

We’ve gone apple picking twice so far this year. The first trip was with the homeschool gang to Melick’s in Oldwick where the kids got to try their hand at making cider — it was delicious. Then we all tromped into the orchard to pick a few apples. That was followed by a brief tour of the orchard and the grand finale - a hay ride around the orchard which was made much more fun by the sudden downpour.

At Izzy’s request, it was a penguin-themed birthday this year. We started the day off with birthday balloons and presents and delicious birthday apple pie which the girls had helped to make and then we went off to Grandma and Grandpa’s for a slumber party. The biggest birthday surprise of all was waiting there — Aunt Squiggy and boyfriend Antonio!

One of our new favorite places to visit is Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton. We love it so much we went twice this fall - once on our own and a second time with our homeschool friends. Hard to say which part we like the best - the wonderful sculptures (most of which you are allowed to touch — we are SO spoiled now for any other museum), the beautiful grounds, the peacocks… And I have to say, the docent tours our group had were outstanding.

Silly me - just like when Christmas hits the stores before Halloween, I used to get very annoyed (not to mention righteously indignant) when Halloween pumpkins started showing up in the supermarket mid-September. That was, until we learned this year that if you plant your pumpkins the autumn before (and by plant I mean smoosh a decaying jack o’lantern into the garden) they actually are full grown in September.

Here’s our very first — we’re so proud :)

With the change in the season, we are taking nature walks again and that has been great fun - Joe is also enjoying getting out and about and being able to frolic unleashed in the field.

The girls get very busy on our walks collecting bit of nature and we always come home with bags full of autumn delights - acorns, hickory nuts, interesting twigs and branches and leaves of course.

We had another fun trip to the farm on Friday - made even better by blue skies and cool air. Adding a bit of magic to the day were the many horses out on the drive down and, when we returned home, the special garden friend we met on our porch.

Been a bit of a slow return to reality. Don’t know why, but this year the post-holiday fog has been a bit harder to shake off (perhaps because it was such a truly wonderful vacation).

It was a beautiful, lovely, relaxing, joy-filled holiday.

We spent the week in a gorgeous old farmhouse surrounded by fields and wildflowers and blueberries. The location was perfect - just a half hour from Bar Harbor and the entrance to Acadia (where we played on the rocky shore nearly every day) and 20 minutes from Ellsworth (where we dined - and dined and dined - at Cleonice, browsed the wonderful 2nd-hand bookstore, and shopped at both my new favorite shoe shop and - much to the girls’ delight - at a wonderful toy shop).