31st January 2008

Well this week has been eventful in some ways to say the least.

Its less than 48 hours to go until Mag gets his transfer exam results. With that in mind and the fact we need to decide within a week or what direstion his next years education will go.

We have looked at two grammar schools and another one to go to tonight. So far we have 50 / 50 rate of liking and disliking the schools for various reasons. I cant name them here but I was disapointed with one and it's set of grades, and the other school seemed to thrive. One of the schools has zero tolerance for bullying and the other has recently suspended a victim of bullying because he suffered mental concerns due to the fact he had a broken bottle pushed in to his face and this happened in school. Dont get me wrong, we dont live in a 'bad' area, in fact we are all pretty civilised here but I still wont take any chances when it comes to my much loved children.

Mag on the other hand is showing resistance to enter back into the school system again, and I dont blame him after the good year we have had. We have had a huge amount of fun while we have been home educating and I feel the children have grown so much as a result of the good balance of education and play.

So we finally made our minds up and we are going to continue to home educate, and this decision I am very happy about.

There may be a few technical issues to iron out with regards to him sitting any exams, and this means we have to find a facility where he is allowed to come in as an external candidate. This is some time away so we have plenty of time to sort it all out.

So it looks like I have a new profession - teacher!

Early Hours 23rd January

Is it ever going to stop raining?

All this global warming stuff - well you can stop now if you like. I hate it all, I hate the cold, I hate the damp, I hate the winter. i have a bad case of SAD I think.

It has rained non stop for ages here and no sign of drying up yet. Yesterday the road above us and the road below us was flooded. out village had flooding and I pity those poor people who don't live up the hill. I don't know the extent of it all yet as I haven't been brave enough to stick my nose out the door for a day or so.



I did speak to civilisation (if you could call them that), AOL that is - my modem router decided to stop working. I don't know what is going on there, if it was the bad weather or a power surge or what but it just died. So I rang my current supplier of Internet hoping they could get me going again ... they did better than that, they are only sending me out new equipment and a PS3 for free. HAPPY DAYS, no 1 son has not yet come back down to earth, now we just got to get some games for it ...hhhmmmm weren't they a second mortgage last time I looked? Forty squid a game - well it looks like I am going to be working for another few years to pay for all this. Joking aside I am happy about it.

We had this big debate at Christmas ... Mag's friend got a Wii for Christmas, which we were absolutely delighted for him. But us having four children has explained to Mag that we could not justify a present of that value, a Wii and a hand full of games was running close to £500. That's all fine and dandy then you got to be fair to the other children too, and before you know it you could go over board and in debt just to keep up with the trends. So feeling guilty because a friend suggested we should 'save up' and Mag's other friends got Wiis and Xbox 360s and wot not from the man in the red suit. we wondered if we were being bad parents, after all how do you explain to a child you cant justify it when its not you who brings the Christmas presents anyway, surely the elves could knock something together in a few minutes?
BUT we have the Internet in virtually every room, 3 computers and 3 laptops in our house, millions of games including many up to date ones ... we also have an extensive book library, a wealth of knowledge at our finger tips in the written form and electronically - so why should we feel guilty for not providing what is deemed to be a compulsory toy?

So after all that has been said we get one for free - now that is a smug grin which is coming across my face ... our children got their Christmas gifts and an up tp date games console, and that is our reward for being patient.

16th January 2008

Looks like we have a budding chef in our house! Mag made dinner for us last night and we all survived, joking, it turned out well.

here is his recipe

Ashley's Sausage Pasta Bake

What you need

good pack of fat sausages
3 carrots
olive oil
some paprika
ketchup
BBQ sauce
pasta
cheese

Cook a half pan of pasta according tot he packet directions and drain

cut up the sausages into small bite size chunks
slice the carrots wafer thin
sprinkle a bit of olive oil round a frying pan and fry the carrots and sausages till browned
add sprinkling of paprika at this browning stage
once sausages are cooked add a splodge of BBQ sauce and a good lashing of ketchup
stir and cook for another moment or two

grate a stack of cheese

mix coked pasta, sausage ketchup mix, and cheese in a big Pyrex dish.

throw the dish into a hot oven until its cooked to your liking

serve and enjoy!

15th February 2008

My two girls are a hoot, and everyday they come out with something new especially baby Sol who isn't really a baby anymore. Sol's speech seems to have suddenly exploded the last while, she repeats virtually everything you say to her and I am pleased as its a far cry from how she was just a couple months back.

Sol's Quote for the day ... She was playing on the floor and I was sat with her, she lifter her toy box up and trumped (farted, passed wind if you are polite), usually she says "me trump". So I said to her "Sol, what was that?" and she said back to me in the huskiest voice she could find "dirty girl!". It was so funny and I have no idea where she learned it from.

Toni's Quote for the day ... We were doing out table work this morning, we call it table work as it isn't school work! Sat reading some three letter words which contain vowels and correspond to certain pictures. there was a picture of a man with his wig blowing away in the wind. Hollie had never seen a wig before and thought it was quite funny, I had to explain to her that some people who don't have enough hair would wear wigs. "Daddy used to have a wig mummy, now he doesn't wear it anymore" Of course realising DH is receding she assumed his previous hair was a wig!

13th January 2008

Not that I mind - advice that is.

We home educate, and as a family we always have our ears open to new ideas and things.
This little mini rant is about a friend, who shall remain nameless and has experienced the ups and downs of the difficult and long drawn out decision to home educate. She was there when we researched and dug up all sorts of statistics regarding how good it was for children. Don't get me wrong this isn't an attack on the schools system (well not really) but we made our choices based on what was available to us in the rural area in which we live. I have read and read about what the children need to learn, spent money on books and downloaded the curiculum guidelines. Anyways - this friend went to an open day held at a school which isn't too far away from her home, she loved it which is wonderful. I am sure it is the right school for her child. So on returning from the school she advised me that I should go and look so I know what to teach my children next year.

Ever feel like banging your head off a brick wall!

Saturday 12th January

I am so tired today, was up too late last night doing stuff in the house and on the net. My own fault really, I did brighten up this evening once the children went to bed. It has been a busy few days with DH being away, he left on Wednesday morning at 5.30am and will returning at some point during the night tonight.
He called me today whilst standing in Old Trafford at the beginning of the Manchester united v Newcastle Utd match. You could hear the crowds and the noise was tremendous, I guess to be there would have been a real experience. Manchester United went on to have a 6-0 win (thank goodness) which has pleased all the men in our house. I am only sorry now that we didn't find a way to get Mag to go over to see the match.

NEWS!! Manchester United moved back to the top of the Premier League with a 6-0 thrashing of crisis-club Newcastle at Old Trafford....
WE LOVE MANU!





The children had fun today playing with the dolls today. I was fortunate enough to get Toni a baby alive for £15, and Sol a baby Annabel for £10 in the sales this week - I love the January sales! The children all had Christmas money, and we always ask for money or vouchers it just makes more sense to spend in the sales than just a few days previous. Sol took to her 'baby' like a duck takes to water. I was taken aback to see her using the bottle to feed her baby, she kissed it and played with it just like it was real.


The funny things that children do - Sol loves the washing basket, first off the baby went in and was being rocked but then she decided that she should pop in too.






My neighbours (and friends) treated me to a Chinese meal take away tonight and we watched a movie. It was I Am Legend with Will Smith - it was kind of freaky. Enjoyable in a Will Smith sort of way but a real thought provoking film. I came home to discover my no1 son had left the back door unlocked. So I stealed myself to step into the back garden to see how clear the sky was as last night the stars were so bright, but then I had second thoughts and quickly closed the door.

Well here I am after 11pm, and the day is almost over.
Awoke early this morning to the chorus of hungry children lamenting about how they will die if they don't eat. As if!
My step father stayed with us last night as my husband was away on business so he was good in helping get the children organised today. Seb went off to playgroup as usual at 9.15 and our school day stayed at home.
Mag is learning about the Ancient Egyptions just now, and boy has he done that topic to death ...but he likes it so what can I say. We did some fractions for maths and some connectives too. i was looking on amazon for a good song or music book for the little ones also, I think I have found what I am looking for so I might go back on tomorrow to buy it. Toni was good today, she did heaps. Her reading is brilliant now, she is only 5 and I am amazed at how quickly she picks things up. She did some very simple multiplication or should I say 'sets of' 2 and 3. Its funny how much maths little children know, much more than we give them credit for. Ask them about if siblings have so many sweets and they know exactly how many more or less they need to even it out! Try it and see for yourself.

We have had some strange discussions of late too. My mother passed away just a few weeks ago and the little ones were fairly accepting of this. but just this week we had got some new cold water fish, we have tropical ones too but we just started a cold water tank. Anyways - we popped four gold fish in the tank last week and straight away we noticed one was sick. So I treated the water, stupid me for not lifting the fish out as we ended up losing all four fish. We cleaned the tank all out and started again, this time with two black moors. That's by the by, the children asked where the fish went. I told them that they went to fishy heaven in the sky hhmmmmm to a five your old this is a great puzzle. So how did the fish get there? They swam?
So how come grandma is in heaven but you buried her in the ground - DOH I walked right into that one. The explanation we gave was that a person's body is buried and their 'feelings' go to heaven, it was the best I could do when put on the spot like that. So all day we have had lengthy discussions about peoples feelings.

So when talking to a five year old ... be careful what you say or tell them as you never know where it might lead.