October

Hello, friends and family!

It must seem that the Reddigs of Wisconsin have lost their blogging mojo. And alas, that may be true. Or at least when the time arrives to blog, memories and creative streaks are well past their peak. But, a few things have happened in the last month that we'd like to keep record of.

Robert celebrated his 29th Birthday with a dinner at Bunky's restaurant and the gift of a new Wii game (the Legos Star Wars) and a gift certificate for golf lessons. Following that Matt and Jen and the kiddos from KC arrived for a long weekend of boating, farmer's marketing, Trader Joeing, circus museuming, Pride and Prejudicing, zooing, and faux camping. (Just don't tell the little ones that roasting hot dogs and marshmallows in your own backyard and then going to sleep in your own bed isn't actually camping). We had a great time with them and Mary Ann and Luke got to see who had the strongest willpower/personality and we think it ended in a draw. Rose was torn between wanting desparately to be a big kid like Mary Ann and Luke and being a doting big sister to Faith.

We also have closed the season on our garden. Our tomato plants did fantastic, unfortunately we missed the largest harvest while we were gone on vacation and our compost will be rather tomato heavy next year. Until Katie learns how to can, she may have to limit herself to 2 tomato plants from now on. (No, Nana, that is not a hint for possible Christmas presents). We also harvested 16 pumpkins from our homegrown pumpkin patch and a huge number of gourds. Our house is decked out for fall!

The homeschooling experiment is going well. We're focusing on prereading skills, prewriting skills, and math concepts. Mary Ann is very excited to realize that the words we say have sounds in them that she is starting to associate with letters. It's pretty cool to see her stop mid-conversation and start sounding out a word with so much excitement and recognition. Rose is doing a good job too of participating. She is sorting colors and learning the sounds of things as well. She really wants to do everything Mary Ann does and does not fall for it when I try to give her a modified version of an activity to work on.

Robert is working on setting up a shed to give us some more storage and allow both cars to be in the garage for the winter. That has been quite a project and the girls have been able to help with things like putting washers on screws and things. They both think they are ready to use the power drill.

And today marks the end of our first boating season. We had a final tour of the lake and locks with our friends the Beiers and then pulled the boat out to be winterized and then stored.

And on that note, this post will close. Until next time, folks!