Looking Back: Fall 2019

Hello, friends! This week I’m going to play a little catch up here on the blog. I’d like to begin with some highlights of our past school year, but even just the highlights would be too much for one post, so I’m going to do this in three posts: fall, winter, and spring. Today I’ll share FALL 2019!

We started our twelfth year of homeschooling in late August 2019. The chalkboard below was our photo prop for first-day-of-school pictures.

One of our favorite ways to end the summer season and start a new school year is with an outdoor performance by our city’s symphony! My oldest daughter and her friend invited some of their college friends who were new to the area as a way of introducing them to some of the performing arts our city has to offer.

We told them to each bring a water bottle and blanket, and my younger daughter and I packed picnic boxes for everyone which included chicken salad croissants, broccoli salad, fruit, and brownie cups. A picnic enjoyed alongside a live outdoor symphony on a breezy night definitely starts a school year off on a right note!

Back at home, we hit the ground running on our fall lineup of lessons. My son was very interested in archaeology this year.

Afternoons for this guy were spent outside under the guidance of his imagination! I’m not sure what was going on here with the night vision goggles, but I’m pretty sure it was top secret!

We are blessed to have friends living a few doors down from us who also homeschool, so our kids can easily get together to ride bikes, swim, or do a craft together. When we studied Johnny Appleseed, our sweet little friend walked over to join us.

For my daughter, autumn is always a wonderful season for time at the barn. Lots of horseback riding in those months!

At home, she tackled her first year of high school like a champ! I’m enjoying going through high school again, but this mom needed some coffee to get through hydrogen bonds.

In mid fall we went camping with two other families and enjoyed a long weekend of biking, hiking, campfire meals, and a very special worship service together around the campfire on Sunday morning.

Oh, and I can’t forget the mud creations!

The days on the campground were warm, but the evenings were cool. This was the beginning of our cooler temps and when we got home, the wild life in our area was emerging to soak up the fall weather.

We saw several deer at our fence every morning! And I spotted the foxy little guy below on my way home one day.

Fall also brought in beautiful corn and cotton crops in our area. My kids have always called the cotton their “Alabama snow” since this is the only way we see white fields. We get the real stuff about every five years, but it only sticks about every ten years, ha!

And while the fields were white with cotton, the woods and mountain ridges were beginning to display hues of orange, red, and yellow.

In late October we took a trip to the beautiful Biltmore Estate! I posted here and here so I won’t include more photos in this post. If you missed my Biltmore posts, be sure and check them out! It’s a gorgeous destination!

Each fall a historical fort in our little town holds a colonial reenactment and it’s always a great educational opportunity.

The reenactors spend so much time with the children, sharing history and answering questions.

And the costumes are quite impressive! The couple below let me take their photo and I believe the wife told me she made both of their outfits.

My son studied Daniel Boone in history one week and I found him doing his own little reenactment in our backyard. I’m not the least bit worried about our security with this guy protecting our woods!

We finished a fun fall season with a scrumptious Thanksgiving meal at my parents’ and lots of treasured family time!!

There were many other activities and memories made, but as I said before, these are just some highlights. In my next post I’ll take a look back at WINTER 2019/2020.