september

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Autumn is here, my favorite of seasons.  

We have had a full September so far. 

It started with our sunday school picnic for church, at a lovely state park in Southern Vermont and today, I snapped this photo of F enjoying a giant cookie at one of our final farmers' markets. 

We've been cooking and canning, harvesting and processing, freezing and drying.

We've slowly begun homeschooling, and completely skipped lessons for days while we used my grandpa's tractors to chop the first field corn we've ever grown, and filled our barn full with hay for the winter.

We've celebrated our 13th year of marriage, and enjoyed our annual date night when our dear friend offered to babysit while she visited for several days.

We've harvested "too many pumpkins" and fired up our woodstove on chilly mornings.

We are trying to squeeze in the busyness of summer into the shortening days of fall.

This mix of pictures pretty much sums up our August.  Lots of farm work punctuated with days at the lake with friends, days inside canning and days at farmers' market.

I have worked hard this summer to try and prioritize breaks.  Breaks from weeding and harvesting and canning and housework.  In the past, I've looked back at our summer months and realized I had not taken the kids swimming or on a hike or to visit friends nearly as much as I had hoped to.  So, this summer I made a point to do that.  I'm behind in canning and my herb garden is overgrown, but August was full and fun.

a day at our friends' airstream "cottage" on lake st catherine

one of the many cantaloupes we snuck from our farmstand

spicy dill pickles

an afternoon with our college friends (and their kids) on lake beebe

an after-bedtime load of hay

cantaloupe vanilla bean jam (which ended up more like a sauce)

a day trip to visit adam's family near boston

farmers' market

an afternoon at our friend's home on lake bomoseen

back to homeschool (sort of)

a surprise while doing chicken chores--raspberries are ripening