Petits Haricots

All this year we have been meaning to get to Kentwell to the tudor reenactments having heard so much bout them. various things got in the way, camping, canada, my family visiting etc, all good/fantastic/brilliant etc but left us with one opportunity to go, this last weekend for Michaelmas. Got there pretty easily as easily found and parked the car off the lovely winding tree lined drive and had a brunch before going in to save the i am ravenous as soon as in approach we also picked up a geocache right be the gate and dropped of a geocoin.

we then went in, confusing everyone by having paid with in advance and showing them the email on the iphone. did get sorted and in though the shop looked tempting, and had to promise a fossil to bb to get beyond the shop Nice to be welcomed in tudor english on the other side, and have some tudor peddlar wares just ouside to view. Then we set off, I think we talked to most people, and got a really thorough feel for tudor, and the re-enactors were all v friendly. favourites to talk to were the heraldic man, the alchemist [v much so], dairy and the corn favours ladies. mostly due to the amount of time they were happy to talk, and going beyond what we asked as well. particularly the corn lady, but all were good. SB most impressed with alchemist, corn favours weaving and the still room, both for their manner and the jobs they were doing. she offered herself up to work in the still room, but has to be of 14 summers – some while yet then! I loved the alchemist, as he made me laugh and was slightly bonkers and genuinely interesting and also in no order, the dairy, dyers, weaver, corn dollies and lutanist. but apart from the cotte, where i think there was some in-joking going on that made us feel a bit intrusive – everyone answered loads of questions and were very enthusiastic. We looked round everywhere, had a great lunch in the barn of some yummy soup and adored the carved tree. there was a little bit of drama, with a catholic relic being escorted back to bury st edmunds, and did like the idea of life moving forwards rather than being static. we only left as it was closing, with an icecream from the shop and a drive home. we really enjoyed ourselves and will encourage other families to visit too.

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not to lose out on educational opportunities, we listened to our island story, but both girls fell asleep.

very tempted now to be a tudor myself and buy a rebec and early music recorder. must not give into temptation!

when we got home both girls enjoyed reading some of a series of books we have had for a while – graphic non fiction. must have got from the book people. think they are excellent!

Not such a brilliant week home ed bookwise, have to be honest! but the kids were historying on weds, and out most of friday and a whack of tues with hospital visits. SB finally got to some maths she is having a struggle with – word problems that rely on a bit of subsitutions of equations [not quadratic as yet ] so we did a longggg bit of that and she started to get the hang of looking for the bits of puzzle to fit in. BB is finding her maths easier, she has got a handle on her hundreds, tens and units with a bit of help. Anyway, we are hoping for a better week this week tho loads of appointments this week too, so lets see.

ANyway, have blogged weds historyetc, and it was sandwiched either side by visitors, before by jax and co – v lovely, fair bit of chatting and cuddling soa who is quite gorgeous, and also talking about making secondary HE work and friendship groups [and there is now an online space for them to meet v safely] . Fterwards nana stayed whilst grandad had his gallbladder out [not without complication but not too drastic] and the puddle girls stayed. so a v jolly sociable week, and lots of late nights!! I think that makes up for lack of HE sometimes

Friday also a jolly day as after dropping nana at the hospital to pick up grandad, the beans all went to the deependers and had a fabulous time. I believe the adults were making electronic kits the kids seem to have had fun designing , building, sculpting, whatever with boxes. BB brought hers home with her. She has continued to add to it and has had great fun and excellent planning and making from it – including the rocket launchers she built must make sure i take a photo.

At the weekend we went to kentwell – which i hope to blog separately – to visit the house but also to see a smaller tudor re-enactment. And sunday DH put the first of the white paint on our arched window – woohoo Me and the girls did home ed and i also did sewing. I am trying to play at least one board game with each girl each week, and also a wii session, so mission accomplished the rabbits had a good tidy too.

Have i said bb wanted a tropical fish tank for her brithday [and lego etc etc] and so we got one from ebay, and are currently testing every other day the ammonia and nitrite levels as we need apparently a number of bacteria before introdicing the fish

first historyetc of the new term and we are off to a flying start with book 2 of SotW . these chapters recap the fall of rome, the celts taking back britain and then being attacked by the anglosaxons, and the coming of christianity to britain and the art of illuminating. also a bit about byzantium/constantinope.

These are the texts we are predominantly using this year

And for some extra celt/anglo saxons we have been reading

We had the pleasure of jax visiting the night before and had a good catch up and chat about moving on to secondary school home ed, life stuff etc. I cooked croissant/choc brioche and pain au chocolate bread and butter pudding – it was yummy as was the bit left over that we then had for breakfast. kids on the whole got on v well apart from one incident better completely and quickly glossed over…

everyone arrived early the next day, and we had a full house! v glad the deependers could make it as they are currently having a v tightly scheduled week so we had loads of crafts and the day went v quickly and was excellent . thankyou to everyone Z brought anglo saxon cooking, and it was all really delicious oatcakes, creamcheese and honey squares and something else also yummy. B brought weaving, I was particularly impressed by BB as although hers was small, it was really perfectly tensioned. SB also did weaving but not sure where she has hidden it. Merry brought her rather fab celtic motif hama bead patterns which I would really recommend, some really beautiful designs made. Gina brought lots of glitter glue and made calligraphy badges. I also did a different calligraphy badge, around their initials, and also read a bit of beowulf and had them design and illustrate their own anglo saxon chronical – lots of monster stories and some cross with how to train your monster . All worked out well. Jax struggled a bit with the tablet weaving, but having worked it out, we are going to do that next time and K ceremonial anglo saxon badges also worked really well.

Lots of socialising, lots of giggling and lots of good friends learning together. Perfect . hopefully Merry will like some of the books, and photos may follow. Did miss the 3 kids who are now schooling, but glad they are having a great time. Home education is a choice not a life sentence currently the home educated contingent of puddle girls are resident, and i need to start chasing them off to bed . Def looking forwards to the next one

i don’t like the fact that i am blogging so little. it means that i am not home much, it means i am not seeing my family much, it means that i am feeling disengaged, not part of what is going on, separate from family and friends . I don’t like it.

The girls did pretty well as a home ed week, with a fair bit of chugging along with the bookwork. SB has read lots of books – not much of a surprise! Friday they had arts award and came back with some great gouache pictures. BB fell nastilly off her bike on monday and her hip bone is still sore. hmmm she is still running about and cycling and trampolining. i think prob whatever it is, time and rest is the answer… the usual clubs and groups have got going again, and SB is working towards grade 4 ballet this term – fingers crossed! they have been listening to bryson’s short history of almost everything in the car.

we weren’t sure what BB made of it, but she was apparently chipoping in when they talked about Kelvin and glasgow university. DH likes listening to it anyway, and hopefully the girls pick something up

SO on returning home [late] on friday, i was determined to ignore all work! We went to the fair in the village. just small, but fun, and i laughed and enjoyed watching my girls so happy. i prob was a bit indulgent wrt the number of rides… SB loves to dodgems, and BB got a bow and arrow from hook a duck.

Saturday was a relaxing day at home. we thought to do some home ed type stuff in the morning, particularly as raining! SB did some maths – has got to bodmas, tho explained in a less antibarbara way and BB was happily doing subtraction. SB also did a quick viola and piano practice, whilst BB and i did professor layton together. With lunch we watched one of those Brian Cox looking at planets, and BB had remembered alot about us seeing jupiter and saturn through a borrowed telescope. After lunch SB and I made tomato chutney, and BB and DH did diy – putting together a computer desk. SB and i picked the ingredients – loads of ripe toms, some apples, some chillis, lots of mint as well as ustilising our onions and garlic. SB is a great cook and we enjoyed making this together. the onions made me weep excessively however! Whilst this was bubbling, we were doing a geog extension q from galore park. She decided to make a poster to exhort ppl locally to do their bit for global warming, so has come up with a design and the words she wants to say. pretty fab in rough if she does it in neat, she wants to send to blue peter for a second badge and also put in our window… BB therefore also wanted to do something, and decided to write out the caterpillar poem and illustrate it. This was a v stressful experience. she went wrong half way through, and would accept no crossings out and so i wrote it out, and after some practicing she was happy with her toad, but then drew a bird… some sobbing later i wrote it out again, she practiced a bird on the failed one, drew on the new one, and prefered the old but only wanted one bird… we gave up and cuddled at some length, had dinner watching bang goes the theory and read harry potter for bedtime [sb is getting dark materials from DH and harry potter from me, but bb shares the book between us]

Sunday saw SB resolutely loll in bed and read until midday and then be a bit waily because she had missed baking bread. i have the patience of a saint on occassiona and promised we could juggle making bread with eating lunch and prep to go out and we did, and she was v happy. BB had got up, and watched some dinosaur prog, played prof layton with me and then made bread. both girls v good at making and kneading, we are using river cottage bread book, and both doughs were left in the conservatory when we went out geocaching.

when we went out, the weather was so fab that DH was wondering why i was bothering to hunt around for packamacs. 10 mins down the road we were in a tropical rainstorm, without the heat. mmm. BB was grumbling about geocaching in pouring rain, and i was being resolutely optimistic singing italian colour songs at the top of my voice. BB fell asleep and the weather was less awful tho clearly variable as we reached our destination. Followed shortly by le ciel rouge. the first geocache was an excellent hide, we both suspected it from the start, but initial investigation proved fruitless, having exhausted other possibilites we tried harder at it, and this time had thegreat reveal we then followed the circular route with another micro success and a large cache to swap tat and TB’s and then had a romp across freshly ploughed fields – nice and muddy! we knew from the google map we were near enough following the path, it just had been ploughed across so entirely invisible. a ftf though next and a wrong path choice [like everyone else it seems reading the logs] had me doing a roll under a metal gate, as my muddy slippery shoes didn’t have the purchase to go over it – it was quite high! giggle we found number 5, skipped number 6 and did number 7 [bb's find this time] by this point we had been drenched by a number of showers, and fortified with loads of chocolate – some of the children are pretty receptive to a chocolate boost so we decided to then cut across [along a path for a change] to number 16, micro not quite at coords, 17 – footpath sign pointing to entirely the wrong direction, and then a fairly awful trog across v v muddy fields with our shoes accumulating inches of mud chocolate and 2 finds kept the kids going, but when it started to pour it down, and we were v v muddy, bb lost her will to live. I think she had done pretty well tbh. SB fell over in the mud, but she is such a jolly girl she laughed and got on with it. both had chosen to wear crocs against my suggested wellies… a fail to find for last one mostly cos it was raining and we had had enough! so back to the car. once off the mud and onto the road good humour returned for all and we paddled in puddles to get off the mud. Had a great walk, and lots of laughing and chatting.

Back home bb and sb knocked back and proved their loaves – sb a plait and bb in a tin. unfortunately i left it 15 rather than 10 on high, so sb;s top slightly burnt, but otherwise they look good. girls had bath and shower and dh made a yummy winter walmer sausage in gravy with mashed pots and cabbage. mmm mmm. watched in front of yesterdays doctor who and the stories and bed. time for my bed too

we have found a number of books helpful at getting over both the straight forward, and the not so straightforward things

if i were to order them in ease of parental viewing, it would be 2,1,3. bb and i have read 2 comfortably together, sb and 1 i think are a good age match, i bought 3, and gave it to her so she could read it, but think might want to pre-read before you decide

see, we get about . i had a conference up in glasgow, and i am currently v keen to maximise time with family, as work is eroding on this time hugely for one reason or another. so decided we would all go up by train, and then dh and the girls would museum for 2 days and i would join them afternoon of one of the days, and then for the third day. excellent we had a plan

the journey up was pretty uneventful [well apart from a minor problem with tickets, luckilly resolved in the nick of time] we played board games – mostly ingenious, mostly SB – ds-ed [not me!] and read books. did play i spy – arguing with bb over s and c starts in some cases, which she is right, are unfair to her and silly games on the iphone. weather was lovely up and journey v easy loved that as we were staying at the premier inn charing x in glasgow that our train from edinburgh stopped at charing cross, making the whole thing v much easier. i did feel ill going up tho, and when we got to hotel, a bit late to catch the last conference session that day, so went with DH and girls to ‘the park’ where they had a great time running around, and then we ate prob the best meal at the little cafe [really really lovely seed past salad - you know, that tiny grain pasta]

next day saw me leave bright and early and part with huge wads of cash at the conference! it was a v good conference on the whole, and i also saw some ppl i hadn’t seen for a while, so opportunity to catch up etc. definately worth the money! that afternoon session was on the section not so relevant to what i do and the AGM bit, so i skipped out and joined dh and the girls at the science museum across the clyde. they had already looked round loads of it, and so took me to their favorite bits BB was ecstatic and loved it lots. SB said she is getting to old for a mostly levers museum that was a bit of a shock!! but she did seem to be enjoing it loads anyway it has changed a lot since we were last there when SB 4-ish and bb v little but we still got sb to put on the tabard with the body parts for good measure.

by the time we wended our way back to the hotel bb had ‘gone over’ . not helped by not having any money, and sb buying bb a birthday present with hers, but not wanting to let bb know, and so not showing her what she had bought etc etc. sb is such a darling and a fab big sister. BB really did want a telescope tho. she has added it to her birthday list, but wants it to be exactly that one [nat geograph] we snuggled bb and she pretty much fell asleep on the train back so we let her snooze a bit when we got to the hotel and then had dinner there. not a bad meal either.
placed here to remember seems better tho

i conferenced solidly the next day with another early start. dh took the girls on a boat trip up the clyde to the transport museum – newly opened. they enjoyed both the boat trip and the museum. the glasgow tall ship has moved to there as well. when i finished the conference they were still there, so i walked from the secc [at a fast clip as it goes past a very building/derelict area] i got shown all the fav bits, and did like how the old glasgow underground used to work. obviously we were there just slightly too long, as the shop closed, and bb had a massive melt as apparently they have the best drinks bottle she has ever seen there. if they had an online shop i might buy it for her birthday. they don’t, and i didn’t see exactly what she fancied anyway. cf the telescopes above. we walked to the train station and she pretty much fell asleep on the train back… this time tho we went out for a meal, and went to the pizza express. we all had yummy food, the kids behaved perfectly and all was right with the world! think it may have been fri they watched x factor? or is that a saturday thing? i actually fell asleep!! first night for ages – having an insomnia thing. was v happy to have family up with me for conference. SB is turning into a young woman as she is at threshold of teenageryness, and bb is leaving babyhood at 6. just want to capture all the precious time i have with them.

loved saturday had a big breakfast and then had arranged to meet some scottish home ed friends at the hunterian museum. unfortunately it was shut [cue massive bb wail, partic as she had wet trousers from not quite going past the slide in the park...] so we met at the huntarian art gallery [cue bb, it is just pictures, i hate looking at boring pictures] lukcily there was a welcome institute thing on dirt in the foyer, so we got to look at ascaris lumbricoides and other worms. one of the few things i remember about worms is what they look like on barium meal and follow through . girls v interested, and picked up some parasiteology mags to read later. then they did the craft – bb made vibrio cholerae – she made the flagellum particularly curly whirly, SB made influenza and H made lactobacilli H also ate some insects, which we thought was v fab and brave they were apparently quite nice! so she got a peppermint and ant lolly as a reward! the girls all did a handwashing excercise. was partic impresse with SB, and bb not as bad as anticipated then sb and i looked at the pictures, sb rather likes art galleries, but bb wailing was off putting, so we all went to the botanical gardens instead.

following a theme, the cafe was rather unfortunately shut! so we had food out of a van, and bb was v persistant in keeping pigeons away so friend didn’t have to shudder quite as often by proximity sensors . we then warmed up in the large glasshouse, and i partic liked the tropical bit bb partic liked the fish bit [it reminded her about a promise for a fish tank] and sb was happy with it all really. i did wonder whether we were being a bit boring company, espescially as it had taken them ages by bus to join us, but i am not that good at scintillating [always oscillate there between rolf harris and caractacus and PET scans] but i very much enjoyed seeing them it is good to see the real ppl behind the online friendships and just chat. could have done with proper cafe being open tho!! they went back home, and we raced around the other glasshouse [and got told off!] it had the nepenthes in it – i do like carniverous plants and then we found a micro geocache too.

walking back to the subway [we thought we couldn't make bb walk much further...] we went past a coffee and icecream place [we should have stopped there on the way too the botanics!] and treated the girls to icecream – they were v happy before getting on the underground and walking to the tenement house, as we had just got time to fit it in. great shame that we didn’t have current national trust memberships with us – so quite expensive, but v interesting, and declared worth it. SB was particuarly taken by it.

finally we walked back to the hotel, and even i thought we might have done enough walking… BB had a bath and we went out for a curry. the walk there was ‘illuminating’ we were quite early in the evening, but obviously glasgow starts its ‘revelry’ much earlier than i am used to i enjoyed the curry, partic the one sb chose. bb’s came extra spicy, altho requested extra mild, so a modicum of fuss there…

having collapsed into bed, the next day we ambled to the park for a chill out before catching the train home.
great time in glasgow and lovely to meet friends

my parents and my sister’s children came to our house for the august bank holiday weekend. I declared this to be family thanksgiving. it is/was the year anniversary of my sister’s death. something that i find i still can’t talk sensibly about and actually feel guilty when i write anything about it anywhere. i think this is because other people have had a hard year too and writing about my own hard year would perhaps add to the burden of friends too greatly. SO, i thought i would just take this opportunity to say how much i loved my sister, and how desperately much i hoped that she would live and beat the breast cancer. i miss her hugely. i mis her for herself, her generosity and her grumpiness, i miss her for our shared history – she is my only sibling, the person you rely on to know really who you are as you get older, and all your misdemenours, and i miss her for being the person to roll eyes over other family members with. I grieve that she won;t see her kids grow up. they woke me on the morning of our thanksgiving day with their laughter and merriment with my 2, and all this laughter and merriment is now without her. However, i give thanks that we are strong as a family, that particularly due to my parents huge efforts my nephew and niece are coming through this, knowing they are loved and adored, part of a big family who understand their sadness but aren’t trying to trap them in it but helping and wanting them to go through with love and laughter, and not be defined by the losing of their mother. we gave thanks for the many years we shared with viv, and the fun times we had together. we gave thanks that she acheived so much of what she had wanted to. we gave thanks that we had each other. and we managed to get through the day having love and laughter. the kids did lots of playing, some crafting and a bit too much telly watching together on the saturday. i made lovely lasagne with home grown produce. we toasted all those we loved and lost. hadn’t planned to, but e pointed it out.

on the sunday we went to little gransden airshow. have to say M and bb were a pain, partic M. this is because they didn’t have any money left, and SB and E did… so they spent some [only a v little!] whilst M had a major sulk and bb a wail, but tbh she controlled hers way before m did. did enjoy the airshow. partly as had chosen it to do something dad would partic like [and thought m would] SB and e prob enjoyed the most, tho bb lightened up in the end!! would i go again, well prob not, but for plane enthusiasts do think it was a good show.

played board games and wii games at home. the next day was a chilling at home bank holiday sort of day. we went to the park in the village, and this time it was e’s turn to put on her parts, and actually she is quite a pro!! shame, as otherwise it would have been a lovely family amble and play!! however, i do like that my nephew and niece can have strops and tantrums as well as hysterical laughter because it shows things are normalising for them. last year, they pretty much got all they wanted as ‘recompense’ [well, not really but you understand why] and now they are getting used to being normal again.

i love my family

lots of this week has been taken up by holiday orchestra. sb has been going for a while now, and chose this time windband, choir and boomwhackers. unfortunately, her tooth still isn;t fixed as the dentist thinks the bone is tender still, so may not survive she has been referred to the hospital for review of it. she is really worried it will come out and have a false one, but has manfully been struggling with a diamond shaped tooth all month now. however one of the number of things she just can’t do is… play the clarinet.

so this sun we did some emergency viola prac, thought she was nearly grade 1 standard with a bit of luck, [well,she could sight read 2 of the exam pieces] and she can easily read the clef and translate that into notes on the viola. so dh asked on mon if there was a possibility she could transfer to the beginners strings. i think they couldn’t believe their luck as she is only viola so she has been given a fair bit of praise and practiced each night. i think it helps that having advanced at other instruments she can count rests etc. on tues we had lfish and they did some practice together which worked really well [well, apart from bb shrieking and wailing through it...]

As well as holiday orch, we have a plan to wrap up the things we should have finished last year, so we can start the next year on time! this is story of the world book 1 – i have been reading a chapter a day, tho we haven’t done additional reading, galore park junior history 2- 1 more chapter to do and galore park junior english 2 – 3 more chapters, so perhaps not there! the history i am keenest to finish, as we tie in with historyetc, and much better to be running alongside than behind. following merry;s lead, i am suggesting she practices writing in sentences now that writing isn;t so awful to her. we practiced out loud – why does the cat have a black tail… the cat has a black tail because it is a black cat etc etc, so she gets asked why was julius caesar a good emperor and she answers…. Because he conquered lots of countries. obviously this is a work in progress!! She does like the galore park junior books tho, and we do 2 question sections a time, so work through fairly slowly. She has enjoyed reading a really ancient book on kings and queens of england that i was given as a child.

BB has also done some home ed this week. she was moaning about what a noun was for some reason, and i caught sight of first language lessons so we started with a noun is a person, place, thing or idea. she has enjoyed it so far, and memorised the caterpillar poem. i remember stopping at chapter far too many with sb, still on nouns. but we shall see this time. bb rather likes having her own book to do with me currently! her reading has come on, and she is reading level 4 ORT and songbird books quite happily.

thay have both done a fair bit of lego this week as well. sb prefers sylvanians, but bb is a lego addict x x she bought some more with some birthday money found [tho i think it might have been sb;s] and so a lego city is springing up. she bought a couple of books too – a couple of beast quest !! and some lovely books tiddler and zog by julia donaldson. also dh bought some chead dvd, so they ahve watched the 3rd narnia – v nice, and also raining meatballs – v odd and i’m not sure i particularly liked it.

this weekend we are expecting my mum and dad. was aiming for a lovely ambling about time, putting them first and easing them over the first anniversary of my sisters death. however bil is off to china, so my nephew and niece coming too. i love having them visit but had other plans this weekend. however, we will have a thanksgiving feast for family love
SB and DH back from the holiday orchestra concert. her fav bit was the boomwhackers but the viola bit went well too

we had an under the sea theme this year, and I have to say there were really really fabulous costumes lots of thought and skill and a fair bit of humour . I do love party weekend. A chance to chill out with friends, the kids meeting up and having fun and just general how nice it is to be a home educator, and have this bunch of fab people as your not-school gates crowd

Party started with picking A and F up and taking them home with me on fri night. we had curry, chatted, baked and maked [ ] picked lots of fresh produce from the garden and the girls slowly worked out a pattern of getting along, as they don’t meet that often. SMall world that I went to school with F’s best friend’s mum. we stayed up late being convivial and didn’t get up too late the next morning to do all those finishing off things.

kirsty and James were first to arrive, and we decided all quorate at 2 and had the feast in the dining room lots of good things to eat, but think we had reduced cakeage this year, so will bake more next year! [or increased demand ] however, we did seem to have reduced demand for alcohol. not entirely sure whether that was drivers and pregnant ppl or lack of the stalwart drinkers

It was lovely seeing everyone, and i had a lovely time, chatting, chilling, eating and take photos the kids all seemed to have a great time, and this is the first year without a major breakage disaster too – so fab!! love our fire for the outside too, kind of camping but not getting cold. there was plenty of bedspace too.

today was a chilled affair, with lots of tea, coffee, chat in the conservatory, not much tantrumming from tired children [actually none really] and pancakes . when ppl had left, bb took herself straight off to bed!! SB did a mega long viola prac. as her tooth hasn’t been repaired yet, and may not be repairable, playing the clarinet currently not possible so she decided to get her viola to approaching grade one standard today, and i think she has managed it. certainly if she regularly practiced she could do grade 1 this term. hopefully they will let her swap for holiday orchestra.

Anyway, thanks all our fabulous friends for either coming to the party or sending us happy day vibes. Next year’s theme is mythical creatures

this week is the run up to the anniversary of my sister’s death. This year, i cannot help but think of it, but in the future i plan not to. i mostly think of it to help my mum and dad through a difficult weekend. But thinking of death and life, i wanted to put some of the blessings down here, because although my sisters life cut short, i think she, like me, had a lot of joy and blessings. kind of in the order they happened

1. I have been blessed by a loving home and upbringing, with parents that cared deeply for me and strove to help me succeed. they backed me emotionally and supported me always. Being short of money and with outside stressors did not stop them from making my sister and I a priority.
2. i have been blessed with my wider family. loving grandparents, aunts, uncles, sister, great-aunts, cousins etc. they have enriched my childhood and adulthood. thankyou for the love and laughter that has surrounded me.
3. i have been blessed by my musical skills. they, and the encouragement i was given to persue them, have given me hours of joy over my lifetime.
4. i have been blessed by my education. the teaching and the learning have given me joy in piecing together the world and how it has been and maybe works. I have been blessed with the opportunity to enjoy education and the time to take it further, well past the age when many have to work.
5. i have been blessed by my life partner. We met when i was just 19, but 23 years later and i am still blessed by his humour, love, caring and friendship.
6. i am blessed by my work. i don’t always think this! but i have been given an opportunity to make a real and tangible difference, and that is both an honour and a privilege – as well as being something of a challenge. i am lucky to find my work rewarding and valuable.
7. i am doubly blessed by my children, who are the centre of my universe and a joy in my life. Their presence improves each day, with laughter and unconditional love.
8. i am blessed by my environment. i live in a lovely house, with a lovely conservatory in a lovely area. I don’t have to deal with pollutions, contaminants, natural and not disasters, war or famine. I am thankful for this.
9. I am blessed by my friends, whose care, chivvying and laughter have supported me in dark times and cheered away the grey.

When I count up my blessings, it would be churlish to rail against fate for those that I have lost, or the work-family sacrifices that i might be making. I have already had a good, fulfilling life and am thankful for it.

So where is 10? well i have saved it currently. I do hope to add the blessing of health and longevity or grandchildren or seeing my children grow up to be fulfilled in their lives to my list one day. i dont want to have had all my blessings yet