Rather a lot of K & M's toys with some help from K, M & A put on a nativity play yesterday. It started with a teddy bear with wings playing the Angel Gabriel who visited first Mary and then Joseph (both played by dogs) and who used smelling salts to revive them when the fainted with shock. Another dog played the Empress Audrey who declared that everyone had to go to their home town for the census, so Joseph took Mary, who rode on a donkey played by a cheetah, to Bethelehem. The cat hotel manager who happened to be a donkey-lover let them stay in the stable. Mary gave birth to Jesus, a kitten, and breastfed him before the shepherds (two dogs) turned up with a lamb (played by a lamb!). Finally the three wise giraffes showed up, bringing with them emminently sensible gifts of a rattle, teething ring and teddy bear, and the news that Queen Heroda was coming to kill their baby, so they'd better "skedaddle pronto". This they did, by being whizzed across the kitchen floor to safety.
Thursday, 24 December 2015
Monday, 21 December 2015
Still here!
Things have busy round these parts, but now we've nearly finished everything for Christmas and I'm feeling that I'll be able to breathe a big sigh and relax after tomorrow. It's A's last day at work tomorrow and my choir Christmas social. We've still got a bit more to do before we're ready for Christmas, but apart from a few foodie things and wrapping presents, nothing that would be disastrous if it weren't to happen. I really should practise playing carols though, having agreed to play the organ for the children's mass on Christmas even though!
Last week was ludicrously busy. There was a Christmas party at the Old Dalby home ed group on Monday, to which M took her French horn and played Little Donkey, which made up a bit for having missed doing so at Fun Club when we was poorly. Tuesday, the girls went to play with friends in the morning before gymnastics in the afternoon and korfball in the evening. On Wednesday, after M's French horn lesson first thing, we headed over to Derby to spend the day with our friends C, S, G & F, and go to the HE climbing session at Alter Rock. Thursday was the girls' last piano lesson of the year first thing and then their Scout Christmas party in the evening (more on that in a moment). Friday was much less busy with just a Christmas party of friends who live across the road, which the girls chose to go to rather than the last gymnastics of the year.
To get back to Scouts, they had a secret Santa for which they had to buy a present for the person whose name they had pulled out of a hat a couple of weeks earlier. They had both put a lot of effort into their presents, for which there was a limit of £2. M had picked the Scout leader and she crocheted her a brooch and bought a nice notebook from a charity shop and had enough to get a couple of coloured biros to go with it. K had heard that her recipient liked meerkats, so spend money on a small cardboard box and got quilling. This is the result.
She has also made some stunning Christmas cards for various people; here are a few of them. She has also quilled a present for M, but I haven't yet got a photo of it and can't say what in case she sees.
Last week was ludicrously busy. There was a Christmas party at the Old Dalby home ed group on Monday, to which M took her French horn and played Little Donkey, which made up a bit for having missed doing so at Fun Club when we was poorly. Tuesday, the girls went to play with friends in the morning before gymnastics in the afternoon and korfball in the evening. On Wednesday, after M's French horn lesson first thing, we headed over to Derby to spend the day with our friends C, S, G & F, and go to the HE climbing session at Alter Rock. Thursday was the girls' last piano lesson of the year first thing and then their Scout Christmas party in the evening (more on that in a moment). Friday was much less busy with just a Christmas party of friends who live across the road, which the girls chose to go to rather than the last gymnastics of the year.
To get back to Scouts, they had a secret Santa for which they had to buy a present for the person whose name they had pulled out of a hat a couple of weeks earlier. They had both put a lot of effort into their presents, for which there was a limit of £2. M had picked the Scout leader and she crocheted her a brooch and bought a nice notebook from a charity shop and had enough to get a couple of coloured biros to go with it. K had heard that her recipient liked meerkats, so spend money on a small cardboard box and got quilling. This is the result.
She has also made some stunning Christmas cards for various people; here are a few of them. She has also quilled a present for M, but I haven't yet got a photo of it and can't say what in case she sees.
Friday, 4 December 2015
Another week gone.
Things are plodding on here. Both K & M are making Christmas cards and presents, although of course I can't say too much about that.
K is continuing to spend quite a lot of time trying to crack one particular puzzle on Lure of the Labyrinth and both K & M are doing some French on Duolingo pretty much every day. Mystery Science is also still going well. K and I have finished off our first 'unit of study' The Birth of Rocks and M decided to give it a go and has now done two of the four 'mysteries' in that unit too. K meanwhile, rather to my surprise I must admit, agreed to write a summary of the unit; what it covered and what she learned and possibly something additional that she looked into to follow up something that she found interesting.
A few weeks ago, K did actually get round to writing the letter that we had talked about, about home education and her thoughts on it. Unfortunately she managed to lose her first draft (and it still hasn't turned up) and as a result of this, the final result was rather less comprehensive than the earlier version or notes I had caught glimpses of. The summary, however, would be that she wants to continue with home education but thinks that she will probably want to do some qualifications at some point. The other thing that resulted from the letter was that I learned that her method of using punctuation is rather unconventional and not entirely successful. For the letter, she wrote the whole letter and then went back over it and added punctuation in. Consequently, we've done a bit more work on punctuation and this week, she did another piece of writing (I gave her a choice of three topics) about her trip to Granny's last week and put punctuation in as she went along and it was much better. One thing that I have learned is just how much of my punctuating is by instinct and feel rather than knowing 'the rules', particularly with commas. So we've had a look at our Basher Punctuation book to help out with that side of things.
Unfortunately M hasn't been too well this week, which scuppered our plans somewhat in the first half. On Monday we had plans to go into town with Granny, get some shopping done and meet up with A for lunch. M really wasn't up to town though, so we cancelled lunch, Granny and K went in the morning, then we had take-away pizza for lunch back at home, before I went in on my own in the afternoon.
Tuesday was the Fun Club Christmas concert and M was very unhappy not to be well enough to go. She had been planning to take part and play the French horn. Nurse Granny sprang into action and stayed at home with her, while K & I went. I have played the piano to accompany carols for a number of years now and had agreed to do the same again this year.
On Wednesday Granny headed home and since then we've had a couple of low key days and fortunately M was well enough for Scouts on Thursday evening, when she was invested. Just like K though, she decided that she didn't want Mummy and Daddy there. Ho hum.
K is continuing to spend quite a lot of time trying to crack one particular puzzle on Lure of the Labyrinth and both K & M are doing some French on Duolingo pretty much every day. Mystery Science is also still going well. K and I have finished off our first 'unit of study' The Birth of Rocks and M decided to give it a go and has now done two of the four 'mysteries' in that unit too. K meanwhile, rather to my surprise I must admit, agreed to write a summary of the unit; what it covered and what she learned and possibly something additional that she looked into to follow up something that she found interesting.
A few weeks ago, K did actually get round to writing the letter that we had talked about, about home education and her thoughts on it. Unfortunately she managed to lose her first draft (and it still hasn't turned up) and as a result of this, the final result was rather less comprehensive than the earlier version or notes I had caught glimpses of. The summary, however, would be that she wants to continue with home education but thinks that she will probably want to do some qualifications at some point. The other thing that resulted from the letter was that I learned that her method of using punctuation is rather unconventional and not entirely successful. For the letter, she wrote the whole letter and then went back over it and added punctuation in. Consequently, we've done a bit more work on punctuation and this week, she did another piece of writing (I gave her a choice of three topics) about her trip to Granny's last week and put punctuation in as she went along and it was much better. One thing that I have learned is just how much of my punctuating is by instinct and feel rather than knowing 'the rules', particularly with commas. So we've had a look at our Basher Punctuation book to help out with that side of things.
Unfortunately M hasn't been too well this week, which scuppered our plans somewhat in the first half. On Monday we had plans to go into town with Granny, get some shopping done and meet up with A for lunch. M really wasn't up to town though, so we cancelled lunch, Granny and K went in the morning, then we had take-away pizza for lunch back at home, before I went in on my own in the afternoon.
Tuesday was the Fun Club Christmas concert and M was very unhappy not to be well enough to go. She had been planning to take part and play the French horn. Nurse Granny sprang into action and stayed at home with her, while K & I went. I have played the piano to accompany carols for a number of years now and had agreed to do the same again this year.
On Wednesday Granny headed home and since then we've had a couple of low key days and fortunately M was well enough for Scouts on Thursday evening, when she was invested. Just like K though, she decided that she didn't want Mummy and Daddy there. Ho hum.
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