Grumpiness, but loveliness too.

I've not posted for a while, partly because what we've been doing mostly is sorting out the playroom and partly because we've all been a bit under the weather.  M and I in particular have been rubbing each other up the wrong way and we've had a few days when we seemed to do like but get very angry, shout at each other, fume for a while, apologise, have a huge cuddle and then start over again a short time later. 

In amongst the grumpiness and playroom sorting though there have been things going on.  We've been making more of the Christmas cards and K & M have come up with a remarkable amount of different designs, considering that there are only 12 holes to play with!

Old photo, but more along these lines.

M has been back on Khan Academy, watching more videos and doing exercises using coding.  K has been putting a lot of time and effort, as I mentioned previously into a fancy dress costume for Scouts.  The theme was CBeebies and she had a few ideas, just in case her first one didn't work out.  We went charity shopping and found a perfect pair of trousers and a jumper - both green (both also an adult size 8 and they both fit her pretty well!).  Then she got cracking on making the rest of the costume.

The work in progress.

All her own work (I helped staple on a chin strap but that's it).

In case you haven't worked it out yet (I needed clues) - she had decided to go as Lola from Charlie and Lola, when Lola dresses up as an alligator.

Even though M wasn't going, she wanted to dress up to drop off, and since K was going as Lola, she decided to stick with the theme....

She dressed all in white and had talc in her hair.

She was Soren Lorenson, Lola's imaginary friend!

Both girls have decided that they're going to wear their costumes (including white face paint for M this time) on Saturday to the Christmas party of friends' that we've been invited to, even though it isn't actually a fancy dress party!

 

K has also finally got around to writing the letter to go with the Blue Peter ship that she made, so this afternoon she just made it to the Post Office in time to send it off.

 

The Blue Peter ship.

Fingers crossed, please, that this is considered enough for a badge! 

 

Now we just need to finish tidying up, so that there's space to put the Christmas tree up, decorate the three, do the last bits of present shopping (mostly the girls who still haven't quite finished), make some more chocolates, wrap the rest of the presents, marzipan and ice the cake, do the food shopping (A does that) and then we can relax and enjoy Christmas!

 

Just a couple of things that I meant to write about previously.  Firstly, we finally finished Pied Piper a at the weekend, snuggled in my bed on Sunday morning.  The second thing is a conversation about Christmas presents that we had with the girls about a month ago.  In our house Father Christmas fills a (fairly small) stocking and presents are from people, so it's clear who gives what.  K & M don't write to Father Christmas asking for what it is they'd like, but I do ask them to write a list so that if anybody asks for ideas then I can make suggestions.  They did this, but M told me in a very serious voice, and K was in complete agreement, that we had given them 'too much' last year and please could we give them less this year.  We tend to give them one biggish present (last year it was a Lego Creator set each) and a few smaller presents as well, quite often educational things that I would probably have bought anyway, but kept until Christmas and wrapped up!  We and Granny and Big Grandad (who also give them quite a few smaller things rather than one bigger present) give them too much.  They do each have quite an extensive list of things they'd like, but it has been made perfectly clear and K in particular has explained at length, that although she would like any of the things on the list, she does not want all of the things.  So after some discussion, it was agreed that 2 or 3 presents from A & me was acceptable, but no more!

A busy afternoon.

While A was out refereeing korfball this afternoon, K, M & I were all very busy in our various ways.  I made the first batch of mince pies of the season, with some help from M.  K has mostly been making a box modelling head part of the fancy dress costume she is putting together for Thursday.  I'm not allowed to post photos yet, but will be doing so once it's completed.

Meanwhile M was having another go at coding.  Again she needed a bit of help, but I'm sure you'll agree the result is pretty impressive!  It's for S, my best friend from uni, who loves the Mr Men.

Once K had done as much as she could of her costume, and M had finished on the computer, she continued with her coding from previously.  Hers is completely her own work, with no help from me at all.

It is apparently a Christmas vampire, and she got the idea from a Jeremy Strong book.  I asked her about what's on its head and it's a widow's peak.

You shouldn't assume....

....and when I say you, I mean me!  Yesterday, my friend, E, told me about how she and her children had had a go at the Hour of Code on Khan Academy.  She said that she and L, who is 8, in particular had really enjoyed it, but that her daughter, C, who's 10, had thought it was okay, but wasn't so keen.  I decided that I would suggest to K & M that we should have a look, but didn't think that it was really going to be their 'thing', or indeed mine particularly.  Boy, was I wrong!

We started off using my login, and the three of us watched together.  The vidoes are very cleverly done, with a commentary and a split screen, with the coding on one side and the shapes and pictures that the coding produced on the other, and you can pause the video and play around with the code and see the result, before continuing with the video.  Then there are some specific exercises to complete and finally a challenge to produce your own picture.  I did the exercises, with some input from the girls and then had a quick go at the final challenge.  I got really rather excited when I managed to put the star on the top of my Christmas tree!  I may well go back and do some more work on it, but K & M were impatient to have a go themselves.


My greetings card (so far).

As they were both so keen to get cracking, I got my laptop out for M while K went on the PC, and they each worked their way through the videos and exercises.  K had to go out for her ballet lesson, so although she has made a start on the final challenge, she hasn't finished yet.  M got rather frustrated at times and at one point thought she'd lost all her work, but fortunately she hadn't.  I did help a bit, particularly with the beard and smile, but she did the vast majority of it herself.

Another friend has recommended this site, which is where the Hour of Code comes from and I think we will certainly be exploring it.

In other news, we went to the library this morning and had a look at and a talk about a book on the subject of Fairtrade, which we've had out for a while and not got round to reading.  We didn't read it from cover to cover but I read parts of it and we discussed them.

Getting stuff done.

Yesterday we spent all day in town, not a favourite pastime it must be said.  I don't like town at the best of times, and it's horribly busy in December.  Still we managed to get quite a bit of Christmas shopping done and I hope I can manage to finish the rest online or by making things (mostly chocolates!).  We also went ice-skating though, which was fun.  We didn't get home until late enough that it was pretty much time to get ready for the last swimming lesson of the year.

Today was one of those days when we packed quite a lot of more overtly educational stuff into a really rather short space of time.  We watched a short video about apartheid on BrainPop, which I have heard good things about from various friends, so I've subscribed for a month initially and if it looks as though we'll get our money's worth, I will change it to a year's subscription since that it considerably better value for money.  After watching the video we did the quiz together and then read the extra 'FYI' sections, as well as talking through the activity sheet.  K decided that she really liked the look of the site, but thought that it was the sort of things she'd want to do with me, rather than on her own.  She did then proceed to watch a couple more videos, including one of digestion, for which she then got 9/10 on the quiz, on her own while I was busy elsewhere, but in the same room.

Whilst stirring our lunch of risotto, I also started to read them a book that I had bought whilst in town yesterday; the children's version of Nelson Mandela's autobiography The Long Road to Freedom and then finished off afterwards while we were waiting for friends to arrive.

This morning, there were some satumas on the side in the kitchen and M was playing about with them, trying to arrange them in different shapes and she told me that she needed one more to make a square number, or two more to make them into a triangle.  She could however arrange them to make two squares.  So I asked her if she knew about cube numbers and showed her that she had enough to make a cube.

Our friends, E, C, L & J arrived shortly after lunch and while the children disappeared upstairs to play for a while E & I had a cup of tea, then we all went to a soft play place, since the playroom is out of action and much of the contents spread around the rest of the house!  E & I had a good chat and crunched some numbers to work out what it will take to keep the fantastic Asfordby HE group going.  I greatly admire all those who run groups like that, as keeping the balance between making them financially viable and available to those who like to come but for whatever reason can't commit to coming regularly isn't always easy and organisers can end up out of pocket, which clearly isn't right when they're the ones putting the time and effort into running them!

We parted ways at the soft play place and K, M & I came home and with a little bit of persuasion I read a chapter of Pied Piper, which then turned into two.  Both girls are enjoying the book, although the subject matter is challenging, but the chapters are really long, so it's not as easy to pick it up when we've got 15-20 minutes to fill for example.  I've suggested we make sure we read a chapter a day over the next few days, which are all fairly quiet, to get it finished as we seem to have had it out of the library an awfully long time. 

Hectic days and a weekend away.

As is often the case at this time of year, things are rather hectic here.  K is, rather reluctantly, moving on from Brownies, but is unsure whether she'd rather go to Guides or Scouts after Christmas, so last week tried out both.  She's still not sure and is returning to Scouts for their final session before Christmas before making her decision.

We also go up to see Nana and Little Grandad at this time of year for our Little Grandad's birthday and Christmas visit.  To go over Christmas itself would be a bit much for them, so this is a way that works well for all concerned.  While we were there we made some more Christmas cards, similar to the ones we made at Fun Club last month, although this time I made fewer holes.  The girls came up with quite a few different designs, with no input from me.

A selection.

I also found a few cards left over from Fun Club, which have more holes along each side of the two triangles that make up the star, and both girls were also keen to do some of the more complicated design.

M at work.

And K.

Jolly holding one that M had just finished.

We stayed until Monday morning and then set off to go straight to Asfordby, for a Christmas craft and present making session.  There were bath bombs, various decorations and our cards to make along with some general box modelling and play.  K & M each spent quite a while threading tiny beads onto wire to add as tinsel, to turn a pine cone that had been sprayed green into a Christmas tree decoration.

It was very chaotic when we got home as we needed to start emptying the girls' playroom ready to be decorated.  There is an awful lot of stuff in there!  Fortunately most of the crafty stuff could stay in the 'doodle drawers' but we also have three big shelves that needed to be emptied.  K & M aren't keen on change, which combined with tiredness, didn't make for the most cooperative of atmospheres, but we made a start and got enough done for A & me to be able to move the furniture that could stay, including the ridiculously heavy piano, into the middle of the room.  The decorator isn't starting until Wednesday, but A is away until Thursday night, so it needed to be done before he went this morning.

Today was the usual busy, busy, busy day.  Piano lessons this mornings, some Christmas tunes at M's request for her, a couple of Christmas pieces and continuing with what she was already working on for K.  Then gymnastics after lunch.  While the girls were doing that, I played Carcassonne, after a fashion, with a French toddler which was fun!

We then popped to the shops, very reluctantly and stroppily in M's case.  K wanted to go to the charity shops to see if she could find some green clothes, for a fancy dress costume she is putting together for Scouts next week.  I'm not allowed to know what she's going as until the costume is finished, but the theme is CBeebies, so I'm rather intrigued.  We found a pair of green jeans in adult size 8, which are a bit long and rather too big round the waist, but are a good enough fit that with a belt they'll be fine and a small adult jumper, which again is on the large size but not ridiculously so, which is rather scary!

The girls had korfball this evening, and a friend takes and picks them up, so I had a bit of time to myself to do some LLL work.  They've been in bed for quite some time, but it's coming up to 11 o'clock and since we've got a busy day again tomorrow, with Christmas shopping and ice-skating in town and then swimming lesson in the evening, I think it's time for me to go and sort them out!

Busy days & a brain

On Monday, I took K & M to a follow-up drama session to the Harry Potter one they had a while back.  They really enjoyed it and I got to have a hot chocolate and a chat with friends in a café while they did so, so great all round really!  Before we went, M finished her Ironbridge.  It was really important that she did so, I didn't realise but the reason she'd made it was as a thank you present to KL for organising the trip.  K also wanted to give her something so gave her a balloon flower that she'd made.

The finished article.

Tuesday was one of those very busy days.  It was the first Tuesday of the month, which means Fun Club and traditionally the December one is a Christmas celebration, with a talent show and a bring and share lunch.  The talent show consists of performances from anybody who would like to take part, so we had quite a few pieces played on various musical instruments, including the piano, clarinet, saxophone and recorder, several group dances and a couple of mini plays, one with puppets and one with dressing up and songs.  M had really wanted to do the puppet play that she and K did with Granny, Dino Rescue, but K doesn't like performing in public, so instead M played Deck the Halls on the piano.

One audience participation piece, by J, one of the founder members of Fun Club had us all chuckling.  It was a HE version of the 12 Days of Christmas and goes thus:

On the FIRST day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Can you do this legally?"
[last time only: "Just you wait and see!"]

On the SECOND day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Will they socialise?"

On the THIRD day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Do you give them tests?"

On the FOURTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"What about P.E?"

On the FIFTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"YOU ARE SO STRANGE!"

On the SIXTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Will they learn to read?"

On the SEVENTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"How will you do science?"

On the EIGHTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Look at what they're missing"

On the NINTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"What about school trips?"

On the TENTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"No leavers' hoodies???"

On the ELEVENTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"I could never do it"

On the TWELFTH day of Home Ed my neighbour said to me:
"Can they go to college?"

After Fun Club, we had the usual dash to gymnastics, followed by a dash home and then to friends', S, A & J, for playing and tea, before korfball.  So, we were in the house for about half an hour between about 9.45am and 7.15pm (just gone 6pm for me), which in terms of mess is always a good thing, as if the house is reasonably tidy it stays that way and if it isn't, at least it doesn't get any worse!

Today we had our return trip to Nottingham Uni, for K's turn to take part in a research project they are doing there.  We have confirmation that she has a brain and she told me that she saw her own brain waves, so it must work too!



We just had time to come home, have a bit of a rest and sort ourselves out before it was time to head out again, this time for swimming lessons.  It's a rather busy week this week!

Post trip activities.

Just a very quick post today after my mammoth blog-a-thon over the past few days.  K & M both had a pyjama day today.  M had a bit of a meltdown about re-writing her Christmas list, she wanted to change it to add everything on her Hogwarts list that she doesn't already have, and was struggling to write it neatly enough.  We sorted that with the suggestion that she could write it on the computer and print it out.

Both girls did also do some writing though, using their new quills that they bought from the Victorian Post Office in Blists Hill.

 M also started work on making her very own Ironbridge.  It's not finished yet, but here it is so far.

Recovery, exam and poetry.

On Thursday night, M was 'too tired to get to sleep' after the late nights and excitement of our trip to Ironbridge, and really did struggle to do so, so it's not surprising that we had a quiet day at home.  K finished off her Blue Peter project and now just needs to write the letter to accompany it before we pack it up, send it in and keep our fingers crossed that it earns her a Blue Peter badge!

After a relaxed day on Friday, today was quite busy.  K had her Grade 2 ballet exam this morning, which I took her to, and A had a bank appointment.  M was very happy that A thought of asking our friend S, mum of her best friend J and A, if she would mind looking after her, as our usual babysitter wasn't around.

K was very relaxed about her exam, it just doesn't occur to her that it's something to be nervous about.  Afterwards she told me that she thought it went okay, but that she had made one obvious mistake, when the music was slower than she'd expected and she went too fast. 

Around midday I had a phone call from the library to say that if we were still interested, the event that we were on the reserve list for, had some cancellations.  So after lunch, we went along to Gargling with Jelly with the poet, Brian Patten.  By the end of the first couple of poems, which were about annoying siblings, and involved a brother with strange dietary habits who ate, among other things, a tortoise and the postman and a sister who microwaved a pet, K was sitting with her fingers in her ears.  Despite the fact that they were clearly over the top and not meant in the slightest bit seriously, she was quite upset by them, so she left and went to read a book in another part of the library where she couldn't hear anything.  M & I stayed and for the most part enjoyed it.

Our first residential home ed trip - part 4.

The final day of our first, but certainly not our last, residential home ed trip, started unsurprisingly with packing.  In addition to the tiredness, another reason I had been keen to have K & M back in with me, was to try to ensure that we had all our things in one place to make packing as easy as possible.  As it turned out I found a pair of M's socks, K's slippers and a wolf hat/scarf in friends' room, but I haven't found anything missing since we arrived home, so I think it was a good idea.

K, M & I had visited all but one of the museums that are open at this time of year, so before returning to Blists Hill, we paid a quick visit to Coalbrookdale Museum of Iron.  It was a bit too quick really, but we can always go back again with our annual passes.

We moved on to Blists Hill Victorian Town, where we met up with E, C, L & J at the candle dipping workshop and spent the rest of the day there with them and other friends for part of the time.

The candle dipping was very clever.  The children started with a plain white candle, with three containers of melted wax in front of them; red, blue and yellow.  Then under instruction they dipped the candles into the hot wax and the bucket of cold water next to them to produce rainbow candles, a couple of the boys chose to do green candles of varying shades.

K candle dipping.

And M's turn.

The end result.

 After candle dipping we visited lots of different shops, businesses and homes.  Including the chandler, where we saw how they would have made the candles from scratch.  The 'nodding donkey' was an ingenious machine, that allowed several dozen candles to be dipped at once, but was also a balance scale that 'nodded' when the candles were finished after 25-30 dips.

The chandler and his nodding donkey.

We went in the drapers, where I bought some hessian with the plan of doing some rag rugging and the lady in the wood turners, very kindly cut up and sharpened a wooden clothes peg for the purpose for a few of us.  Although the original plan had been to make a rug, a visit to the doctor's cottage changed that.

A rag rug wreath in progress.

And a finished one!

So now the plan is to make our own rag rug Christmas wreaths too.  K & M spent some of their money, which we had changed at the bank into Victorian money at the exchange rate of 10p to the farthing, in the Post Office.  They each bought themselves a quill pen for the price of 10d.

Upstairs we had a look at the little Post Office museum and were very impressed with this cycle.

We also had a look at the school, a couple of different cottages, as well as the plumbers and the blacksmith, as well as buying some rolls and flapjack from the baker for our lunch.

The blacksmith at work.

We took a trip into the clay mine on a little train and learned about the children who worked down the mine and the dangers for the workers such as blackdamp, which snuffed out lives as well as candles.

We left Blists Hill at about half past three for one last very quick visit to Enginuity, mainly so that I could spend money buying various Christmas presents in the gift shop, before heading home.

We all had a fantastic time and K & M have been asking about keeping in touch with various new friends as well as having enjoyed spending lots of time with old ones.  Thank you very much KL for organising it!

Our first residential home ed trip - part 3.

On Wednesday we went to the Jackfield Tile Museum.  Fortuitously we happened to arrive in time for the guided tour of the factory, which at this time of year is only once a week.  We were shown round the factory, which was quite interesting.

Most tiles are pressed from a powder.

More shaped ones are made from liquid poured into moulds.

After looking round the factory, we went into the museum, which in the first section told the story of the village of Jackfield, where the factory was situated.  There was an incredible new video clip of the awful destruction caused by the abandonned clay mines, which was flooded.  The subsidence caused as a result was in the order of a foot every two days and it is still a problem in the area, despite works to try to prevent it.

Upstairs there were many, many tiles to look at!

Some individual examples.

K was particularly taken with two of the Shakespeare scenes that were there.

As You Like It

A Midsummer Night's Dream

 For the afternoon we moved on to the Coalport China Museum.  The children enjoyed doing the trail, answering questions around the place, finishing by finding the bear that the clue pointed towards.

The bear!

K got rather frustrated, as she wanted to do the trail without any help, but didn't want to get left behind on her own.  Since M did want help and consequently managed rather faster than K and rushed on ahead.  The tiredness caused by two very late nights certainly didn't help either.

After looking round the museum, we returned to watch the glassblowers, who had been on their lunch break when we first came to their workshop.  It was fascinating.

Seeing all the stages it takes to get to the finished product, not to mention the fact that gold leaf was involved, it's not surprising that the beautiful vase is so expensive.

Then we returned to the watch a woman making clay flowers - very clever!

Making a daffodil.

The result!

And some more that she'd made earlier.

Finally we finished off with some painting.

Concentration!

And from K too.

M & I painted mugs, which we had to leave there to be fired before posted on to us, while K chose a money box, which she could take home with her.

K's cat, Peggy.

M's mug with Christopher on it (3 times).

And my mug, back...

...and front.

After finishing our painting, it was a bit of a rush to get to the bus stop to drop A off to get the bus to Telford, to get the train home.  He had a meeting in London on the Thursday and was then going straight to Brussels for another one on Friday.  As it turned out we needn't have hurried because the bus was 15 minutes late, but not so late that he missed his train fortunately.

The girls and I then joined most of the rest of the folks in having fish 'n' chips for tea.  Later on, K & M joined in a game of Uno with the French children, the fact that some of them speak little or none of the others' language not seemed to pose a problem at all.  This was followed by a game of Carcassonne, with a mixture of seasoned veterans (K & M), novices and absolute beginners.  I think everyone enjoyed it though, and given that at least one of the beginners has since bought their own game, I think it's fair to say that it worked well!

After a fair amount of stropping from M on the Tuesday and a really rather tearful K at the China museum on theWednesday, due, I'm pretty confident, in no small part to overtiredness, I insisted on K & M sleeping in with me for the final night.  They did protest somewhat and hardly had an early night, but I think it was a good idea, so that we could make the most of the final day of our trip.

Our first residential home ed trip - part 2.

On Tuesday, we didn't get going particularly early, unsurprisingly, but since the museums open at 10am and none were more than 10 minutes drive away this didn't really matter.  We walked down with 4 other families to the Museum of the Gorge, where we looked at the 12 metre long model of the Gorge as it would have been in 1796.

Looking up the Gorge.

The Iron bridge in 1796.

After having a look around the museum, we then all watched the video presentation before K, M, A & I left the others, rather reluctantly on the part of K & M, to have a look at the bridge as it is today, before heading back to the hostel for the car.

The bridge in 2013.

We then met up with my second cousin for lunch.  Last time we met was almost 3 decades ago, which he has no recollection of, but I recall quite clearly as I ended up in A&E getting gravel scrubbed out of my knee!  We had a lovely lunch together, chatting and playing Shake Spell, before he headed back to work and we headed for our third museum, the one that K & M had been most looking forward to, Blists Hill Victorian Town.  A couple of weeks before our trip, K & M had asked if I would make them Victorian outfits for them to wear here and had been rather put out when I had said no, with a couple of rather busy weeks leading up to our visit, but when it came to it I don't think they'd remembered that they'd wanted to dress up.  We had a couple of hours here, visiting various shops and cottages, including the druggist, the Post Office, the sweet shop, the photographer's, the chandler, the wood turner (who was also the undertaker), the doctor's surgery and cottage and the bank, but there was plenty more to see when we returned on the last morning of our trip.  As Blists Hill closes at 4pm and Enginuity doesn't close until 5 o'clock, we returned there, to show A, for the last 45 minutes or so, before a quick trip to the supermarket to get something for tea and then heading back to the youth hostel.

That evening, having played Shake Spell with F, between the first museum and lunch, I got it out to show A, F's mum and quite a few of the adults ended up having a play, which was quite fun.  K & M again had a sleepover, this time with 6 of them in the room for 2!  A & I nearly had our own sleepover with L (who is French), who asked if she could come and sleep in our room and that her mum, Au, had said it was okay, and when I told her that K & M wouldn't be there, she told me that it was me she wanted to share with because I speak French.  Au and her children, N, L & T used to live in Nottingham, but are now in Liverpool, so it was really lovely to catch up with them.  I am particularly fond of L, since Au told me she asked her why I have English children, when I'm French, after I talked with her in French at a mutual friend's birthday party!