Fence-Building, chicken-coop-moving, and other autumn adventures

Our biggest house project of the fall has been to create a garden and move our chicken coop across the yard so that it's next to the garden. Nate has been putting in lots of hours to build a sturdy, deer-proof fence. Last week he was far enough along to pull the chicken coop to it's new spot. Let me tell you, those were some surprised chickens!

Our blueberry bushes finally went in the ground that we bought at the shore in September, and soon Nate will put in our fruit trees. There's still more to do, but the progress is very encouraging. We're looking forward to planting lots of delicious produce next spring! 

The garden is modeled after the Back to Eden garden, by the way, so we're using wood chips to keep the soil moist and cut down on weeding. 

This is the outline of our new garden. 

Nate's building the fence himself––a time-consuming process!

The chicken coop at it's new and improved location 

after Nate dragged it across the yard with backhoe-power.

For the first time, Rusty had complete, unfettered access to the chickens! 

Thankfully he was well-behaved (mostly).

Silas had a home-made robot costume for his Halloween parade at school. 

Nate even put a little flashing light behind the heart to make it look like it was beating.

Rowan's homeschool coop took a field trip to a farm, and he enjoyed 

picking out a small pumpkin and taking a hayride with his class.

On an unseasonably warm day in October, we went hiking at Green Lane Park. 

Allie noticed she could be as tall as Nate if she stood on a boulder.

A friend's mom taught me how to curl Allie's hair using rags. This was our first 

experiment with it. I should've take an "after" picture––they came out very cute 

the next morning. Allie was thrilled with it.

Rowan enjoyed our first real fire in the fireplace.

Our Little Guy is Growing Up

Rowan turned 4 years old this week, which was a great celebration for most of us. For me, it was bittersweet. I really wanted Rowan to stay little, but as one of my favorite blogs is aptly named: Babies Don't Keep. And neither do little boys.

We had a small party for Rowan, and the highlight 

for him was unwrapping his presents! 

Allie made this gift for him––a block of wood 

on which she painted a yellow "R" for Rowan.

Family portraits

The anticipation of blowing out that cool number "4" candle put a smile on Rowan's face.

A few days later, we celebrated Rowan's actual birthday with presents just from us.

Allie, the newest gift-giver in our family, had been in the store one day with Rowan when he saw this squishy fish and said he liked it. She decided she was going to do enough jobs to buy the fish and give it to Rowan for his birthday (this was over the summer). She made good on her promise, and had the joy of giving Rowan a present he really liked!

Rowan's card plays a silly song that makes him smile and dance whenever he hears it. 

He keeps it in his nightstand and listens to it every night before he goes to bed. 

The terrific trio!

Hanging with his Daddy.

What's Up With the Paines?

I wanted to share some photos of the kids -----> they are literally growing so fast! And then I remembered this old blog where I used to post stuff. I'm a little rusty on how this works, but here goes!

Allie began 1st grade this year, and was enjoying her math work on this particular day.

Rowan is doing preschool now, and loves activities that involve play dough!

Silas' teacher took this picture during his first week of 3rd grade.

We adopted a kitten (the second time this summer, but the first kitten went
to live with my parents) and named him Cole. He and Rusty became tentative friends. 

One week when our science unit was on flowers, Allie got an edible flower for lunch.

Rowan's edible flower.

The kids love playing with these pattern blocks,
and make some amazing designs!

We rolled some flower petals in water to make colored liquid.

In late September we did the Walk-for-Life to support the Pregnancy Resource Clinic.
Nate and the kids ran across the finish line and someone snapped this photo for their website.

Our beach vacation to Ocean City, NJ in mid-September.

Silas had a blast in the ocean all week. He barely left the water's edge. 

Some days were chilly and windy thanks to Hurricane Jose, 

but we got several beautiful beach days at the end of the week.

A family photo on the boardwalk during the hurricane 

(thankfully it went far out to sea and didn't cause too many problems).