Things that have been happening.

Things have been pootling along quietly here lately.  We've been taking it pretty easy and not really doing much outside of the usual weekly things (piano and French horn lessons, swimming and korfball, ballet and Scouts for K).  M's still very much under the weather, to the extent that she hasn't been going to Brownies mostly (she tried last week but I had a call that she was feeling dizzy and grotty again and wanted to come home after half an hour), I think we will be paying another visit to the doctor soon, who said to come back if she wasn't better in a month or so about three weeks ago.

Things that have been happening: 

K has been writing her thank you cards.  She always puts a lot of thought into the design and from the glimpses that I've seen of the inside, and the occasional questions how to spell words, she's also writing more than just 'Dear X, Thank you for the Y.  Love from K', which is definitely progress on previous years.

The car has 'Pull Me' written on it - to reveal the Thank You.

K & M have both starting using www.studyladder.co.uk, which quite a few folk had recommended online and a friend had said that her children were enjoying it.  There is quite a lot that you can do on there for free, so I asked the girls to have an explore and see what they thought.  Initially M wasn't really interested having looked at one small section, but after K had had more of a look, they have both got quite keen and indeed have continued to be so.  I don't cough up for many things online, but have done so for this.  Time will tell if it continues to go down well, but for now they are asking me to set them tasks each day.

I've been continuing with The Wombles with M and we're now on the final book in the set The Wombles Go Around the World, so I think we'll be having a look on our globe to see where Orinoco, Bungo, Tomsk and Wellington visit.

K has also been doing some more maths, continuing with worksheet that's I make to go with this book.  We're onto the final section 'The Data Gang', so she's done a worksheet on average, including the brilliant rhyme that I saw on Facebook a while back and made a mental note about.

Hey diddle diddle, the median's the middle

You add and divide for the mean

The mode is the one that you see the most

And the range is the difference between

We have also, finally, picked up again with the Usborne History of Britain books, with Tudors and Stuarts.  It's been so long since we started it, that we went back over some of the pages we'd already read, but have now read about the English Civil War and Charles II has just come to the throne.

M has decided that she does want to learn French, which is something that I am very happy about, but also find very difficult.  As an ex-French and German teacher, unlike with other subjects, I have preconceived ideas about this that makes it tricky for me to see things in a different way, but we will get there!  

Today is my lovely mother-in-law's birthday, which has sadly gone completely unacknowledged by my father-in-law, who is ever increasingly living in his own little bubble with dementia.  Our parcel did arrive in time though (I only got it in the post yesterday afternoon, so was a bit worried it wouldn't), with home-made chocolates (by me), a card (by K) and crochet decoration (by M) and a cousin of A's called round and took her some flowers too.

M's freehand crochet decoration.

Finally, we (A, the girls and I) went to a concert, as recommended by M's French horn teacher.  It was a brass ensemble he had been recommended.  They were absolutely brilliant, both musically and in terms of the entertainment value.  They're called Mnozil Brass and are an Austrian septet, who play, sing and are just hilarious.  Do check them out on youtube, here and here for example.