Exideuil and the Farm we are staying on....

We have time out of the house most afternoons, one afternoon I took the boys to a local town called Chabanais. We took a walk down the side of the River Vienne... There was a really beautiful light and it was very, very cold. 

Look at the water. It was really amazing!

The boys found a hole with tree root bits in. Of course these were fossils and they began excavating them. 

They scaled walls.... 

... and caught snowflakes on their tongues... 

Back at the farm, Caden made friends with the ponies and the donkey. 

I took them to see the newborn calf which Caden and Miles have now named Lisa. Lisa is here with her Mummy. 

This is another, older calf that is drinking milk from a bucket with a teat. She is so tame, we scratched her head and laughed at her long tongue trying to get the teat to drink more milk. 

The boys are loving all the other dogs here. They are throwing sticks for George the irrepressible, here. 

One morning we listened to the Just So stories by Rudyard Kipling. The boys both did some drawing but Caden did a comic strip to show the main events of the story. I thought his work was excellent, I am really proud of him for this. He was really happy with it. 

It says... 'he was a man of infinite resource and sagacity', 'the whale swallowed him into his warm inside cupboards' and 'stop here for Ashuelot and stations on the Fitchburg Road'. I loved how Caden made the drawings look like what he intended. The first is the Whale talking to the mariner on the raft. The second is the mariner inside the whale and the third is where the whale drops the mariner off at his 'natal shores'. Those of you who know the story will know these are very 'Kipling' words and sayings. I think this is so wonderful!

We went to visit another family in the area one afternoon who have a home educated daughter. They played beautifully all afternoon with this little girl. They made farms, ran about and played outside with the ice in the garden to sell in their shop. I stayed indoors with the mother, it was freezing but the kids didn't mind at all. 

We also had a few movie nights in our room to have quiet family time and try to get some early nights. We are missing home. The boys are missing their Dad and we miss our boat and our friends.