We are well into my favorite season---Autumn---and Katie and I are making the most of each day. I am still fighting a cold, but life goes on, as they say. Tired or not, there is not a moment to waste. Although we have been mainly at home the past two days (today we did make it to the store), we have been working on some quieter projects. We wanted to do an apple print project and we've been trying to catch up on our baking. (I meant to bake some bread today, but that will have to happen tomorrow after Katie's music class).
Yesterday, we commenced our apple print project. We cut a red delicious in half and used our red tempura paint to make a print of one half of the apple:
Here, we have made several prints. We tried pressing hard and soft, and we did one exercise in which we covered the apple with paint and then stamped it in a row until we could see the paint fading in the print.
While it dried, we went outside. Katie, here, was telling me that Tuna Cat just petted her elbow with Tuna Cat's tail...
Pretty little Katie with her hair in red-bowed pigtails. We decided to let the apple prints dry over night and finish them the next day.
This morning, we played before heading to the market.
Good morning, Tuna Cat.
We love to look for "pokey pods"---the little seed pods from the trees.
They have developed a mutual affection for each other.
In the afternoon, we decided to make oatmeal cookies to make the whole house smell like fall.
Katie adds her own ingredients: her bendy bunny.
I gave her a spoon and she helped to form the cookie dough into balls. I love my perfect helper.
I gave her a spoon and she helped to form the cookie dough into balls. I love my perfect helper. While the cookies baked, we finished our project. We glued our best prints onto some green construction paper. We also counted the seeds and glued them between the prints. Katie helped to write all of the words on the paper. I guided her hand as she held the pen correctly, which she enjoyed. I asked her for descriptions of the apples (which we also tasted), and she said "4 seeds" and "tasty" so we wrote that down. We added a red ribbon and hung it on Daddy's office door.
Ways to extend this lesson for Katie when she is older include: comparing and contrasting prints of different apples, cataloguing the seeds, doing a taste test of several different apples and charting the relative sweetness, etc. Also, it would be easy to add on a lesson about Newton or any other apple-themed tale. And of course, we are planning on making an apple pie this season and maybe trying to pick some apples.
Katie's newest hobby is to water---to water everything. We have let her play with the hose this week while I finish up chores in the kitchen after dinner. It has been so warm lately. She really goes to town and tries her best to water all the plants...and the chairs and her wagon and herself. It's pretty cute. Here, she is watering a couple of our new morning glory plants.
Filling up a bowl of water for Tuna Cat. She loves to help with the feeding...
Katie invented her own tool: she uses her sidewalk chalk bucket as a small watering can. She even figured out on her own how to hang it from Grandpa's fountain so that it self-fills while she waits. I had no input into that---smart girl! Here, she is watering our olive tree, the one from our wedding.
I remember how much I was going to miss our morning glories when we moved, and now we are growing more. I take Katie out almost daily to look at all the new buds and growth---in part to impress upon her the fruits of her diligence at helping to water them. She knows they are growing and thriving because of her work and care for them. 
Beautiful girl in the afternoon light.
And so it was a lovely October 1st. We made a roasted lemon and thyme chicken and could hear the salt crust crackling. I love whole roasted chicken. We also made scalloped cheesy potatoes and orange rolls (which, I admit, were both a short-cut tonight, as I used some store-bought help on those two items). I try to make as much from scratch as possible, but sometimes a person needs expedience. It was a delicious meal, and Katie loved helping to prep the chicken.
Tomorrow Katie begins her Music-in-Me class in Fallbrook and I am determined to awake with a clear head and nose!
Yay for cozy fall days!
