Decorating plates & Eating Healthy

I started the day with my free trial delivery from Graze. One of the other home educating mums suggested that we might like to try it so we did! Pop over to http://www.graze.com/ if you fancy signing up. They send you these little boxes of fruit, veg or other things which make up three of your five a day F&V. It was yum - not sure whether or not we will continue after the trial - I might have to talk out local shop into keeping more exotic fruit and doing this service them selves!

Then there was this - it is a finger mouse. I haven't tried it yet, it was £2.00 from ebay and is a mouse that goes on your finger funnily enough.

Toni is still not the healthiest girl on earth and her eye looks sore, she still made it through the day's activities though.

We decorated cups and saucers with special paints that you bake on. Oh did I tell you my oven has packed up so that is a tough one .... neighbours come in handy there.

acting the fool!

Oh this one I did ......

Just kidding.

A Week In Photos - From Spider Woman To A Chef

Dressing up - Seb got a chef's outfit for Christmas and the children also all got aprons. The vet costume and the bee outfit were from previous events.



The tooth fairy also visited out house. As you can see the tooth that fell out was a top one, that top tooth was hanging by a thread for a couple of weeks (until I got sick of listening to the tears every time we ate). Underneath it was a quite well grown tooth so it is so no wonder it hurt.



 she is lovely. (Do you think I am biased?)

Yesterday the children were playing with various games.

This is 'our' family: Roy on the left, followed by me dressed as spider woman, Toni, Mag, Seb in the builder hat, and lastly Sol on the right.

Sol had her eye test at the hospital last week, as a result she got two new prescriptions. We went to Specsavers to order her glasses this time, and they turned out okay. Usually we go to our own optician but I did not have time to go there after doing a huge list of errands that particular day. Specsavers was in the shopping centre so it was hand to get to. The downside to Specsavers is that the only offer one free repair for each pair of glasses, our usual optician offers unlimited. I am sure it is the same NHS/government fund that pays for them so it does make you wonder why this service is not available there. For a three year old who wears lasses all of the time this is an essential part of the service. Anyways Sol was thrilled with her Mr Tickle, and Little Miss Naughty specs.

Toni has also been sick for the last couple of days, last night and this morning her temperature hit 39.5 C, it is coming down now at last. I think her tonsils are a bit red looking and she was sick, but I think she will be alright after a day or too in bed.

OOPS

I have just realised that for some reason the comments box HAD been switched off on my blog for almost a fortnight. So apologies for anyone who has viewed my blog this week and not been able to post a comment.

Jellybeans

Jellybeans, we are sick of them! Our friend, who we agreed not to swap prezzies with at Christmas, thought it would be funny to buy some Jellybeans. In fact not just a few jellybeans but a several kilos of them. She got them from Woolworth's as they closed their doors for the last time recently.

So here we are wondering what to do with all the Jelly beans. We did not want to throw them away, and to be prefectly honest the children cant eat any more.

Here is the deal - for a short time only if you post a comment and contact me with your address (UK only please) on XXX we will send you a little bag of Jelly beans. This is open for the first 20 people. Free Gratis - just because we love to blog and give away things. Charity begins at home and all that.

Let this be a warning - To all parents everywhere.

I am fully aware of the fact it is now the 9th of January and I still have not posted any Christmas photos or stories ...

Well here is a warning for all parents out there.

Back in November Argos and Tesco were competing with each other and had a massive sale on many toys. We took advantage of that and managed to get three of the children new bikes and they all got scooters too! For six weeks those bikes nestled in the garage, for six weeks they were cosy under blankets and other boxes. They lay undiscovered until Christmas eve ...

On Christmas eve night Roy went out to the garage and started building those bikes, each one a master-piece in its own right. Roy was so proud, never before had he made up so many bikes in such a short space of time. Come midnight with tools and cardboard discarded he wheeled the bikes and scooters into the house.

Christmas morning was started when Sol 'discovered' three shiny new bicycles in the dining room, from there on in the place was alive with screeches of excitement.

Weeks go by and the children are well trained at putting the bikes away when they have finished playing with them.

Yesterday whilst Seb, Mag & Toni were sat at the table doing a project we had a visitor. Out of the blue during this visit Hollie said she saw boxes for the bikes and helmets in the garage. Wide eyed I just stared at my visitor, "got out of that one!" she was saying to me whilst trying to stifle laughter.

Well ... I had to think quick and I explained that there were so many bicycles on Santa's sleigh that he had to put them in boxes, that Santa was worried the pedals of each bike would get caught in the next bike's wheels.

"But mummy, I thought Santa was Magic, and why would he leave the empty boxes in the garage?" Hollie puzzled further.

Well that Santa guy is a scruffy old man - he left those boxes on the driveway and daddy could not believe the mess he had left behind. Daddy put the boxes in the garage so that he could recycle them, but I am telling you that we will have to ask him next Christmas to to take his rubbish with him when he leaves.

So just let this be a warning to you all.

Hot chocolate & grass growing

Today the 5th January - we thought we would get up early and start the year enthusiastically ... except that despite the children being up early every day for a fortnight they decided to over sleep. Roy had to go and do the 'work' thing and I had to make start with the children. It has been three weeks since we have done anything that resembled skool.

Couldn't start the day without a giant mug of Cadbury's fudge flavour hot chocolate from the lovely mug that Santa brought me.

We decided to use one of the Christmas gifts given to Roy and I from our neighbours who are also very good friends. They had got a chuckle out of this grass 'monster', they bought it thinking it was rather rude looking. The children oblivious to what us adults find funny duly watered the monster and we talked about what is needed to make things grow .. uhhum.

This month brings us to two years of home educating. We have evolved as a family and enjoyed the enhanced lifestyle that education at home has brought us all.

I personally have read many more books than I ever did, a few of them about other peoples theories on education, some of those books were quite alarming or disturbing in a good way of course. Things I had never thought of about the school system before, things to make you think about how you are bringing your children up. Not that we ever had any issues with Mag's prior schooling. Mag's school was unique, his school had 26 children and boasted as close to one on one attention a child could get whilst being in an education establishment. When his school closed down we looked at alternative schools. The other schools could not offer to us that same environment so we took fear and decided to try teaching the children at home. I wont say it was an easy decision to make, but once we did we embraced it whole heartedly - I think I always was a home educator just waiting for the chance to do so.

Anyways - I don't want to ramble (or maybe I do) ... this WAS leading somewhere at some stage ...

We took the last week or two off from real life as an opportunity to discuss what direction we are going in this year with regard to the children's education. Mag is still intent on doing his first GCSE this year though I am not sure he is quite ready. He has been working incredibly hard at a subject he loves (amongst others) - mathematics. The exam forms need to be filled in this month, and he has a school who will take him as an external candidate if we decide to go ahead.

With regard to learning, Mag follows a slightly structured style, following on from what he did in school just came naturally to him. We have found he is learning a broader range of things that he would have been in school, his appetite for knowledge is huge.

For the younger children we are not quite unschoolers, yet we are not strict schoolers. We do skool every day but when life gets in the way we don't! The children do spend their mornings making things, doing 'projects', they love nature work, stories, drawing etc. Toni is an excellent reader, and Seb is brilliant with numbers. Sol has a great imagination and can role play many situations. We do what I call 'structured' work too but the emphasis is on making the time the children have fun and rewarding.

Materials we have purchased this last year have been minimal, I was lucky enough to get to go and scavenge when our local school closed down. We got loads of reading books, drawing paper, exercise books, jigsaws etc We have purchased workbooks from an education website and a few books from amazon too but on the whole we didn't need much which makes life easier.

The Launch of SHAE

Yesterday the 30th December 2008!

 Roy had asked for a boat from Santa Clause - and a boat he got!

Yesterday it was dull but dry so we decided to head into a nearby town called Bangor and launch Shae the speed boat at Pickie Park.

The promenade.



Waiting ever so patiently for the time to launch



This is it ...




And she is off like a good un...

Shae's maiden voyage was successful, well almost. She had a bit of propeller stutter and started off going round in circles but once she got the hang of it all there was no stopping her. Shae whizzed around the pond like a good un until she ran out of puff. It was then she was packed into a bag and marched around the park with the children.

Some views from around Bangor Marina.