Autumn weather..

Autumn arrived with a vengence today, after a week of beautiful, mild, sunshine-filled days.

Here are Ella and Tom in the garden trying out their new car seats.

Today has been drizzly, grey and miserable. Still, we've been getting into the swing of Autumn by continuing to collect bits and pieces for our nature table.

Ella's friend Eddie celebrated his 4th birthday on Monday, so Ella and Tom went for birthday tea with Connie and Ed.

We have all been suffering with colds and sickness bugs lately, so we haven't been too far. However, at the weekend, we went to Banbury to pick up some chicken feed, so we're all ready for the arrival of the hen house tomorrow. If we have good weather on Friday, we'll go and collect the hens. Ella is very excited...

We found a great playground on the way to Banbury, with a huge wooden fort which has a zip wire attached. We went there while Karl was cuddling chickens on his chicken-keeping course. We met up with my friend Non and her children. Here's Tom with Non's Ella and their neighbour - they seem to be eyeing up Tom's apple, with a view to taking a cheeky bite.

Ella, Tom and I visited our friends Vicki and Chris recently too. Ella and I take part in an on-going study into hormones and stress, and recently we visited the research team at Cambridge University.

We had a lovely day with Vicki and Chris and their children Matilda and Jemima, followed by a morning in Cambridge watching the punters on the river. Woody and Wendy came with us, and here they are with Ella outside Kings College.

Nanna came out of hospital yesterday, after a knee op, so we hope she recovers quickly.