Petits Haricots

this is becoming a bit of a stalwart arrangement in our home ed calendar! so we went to wicksteed park to camp and the lovely em and nic were already there! [just completed their feedback with a couple of minor nags] so we set up in what really was quite gale blustery weather! gradually the babs arrived, and the kirsty. the babs tent snapped, luckilly they brought 2, and kirsty’s was adjusted a few times, but when right was fab with the wind. kids had a merry time playing, we chatting, and the first night done! next day we got up bright and early, relieved to see tents still standing as had been VERY windy! and went to wicksteed rides

Due to some ticket thingies, we all had wristbands this time, which was a v good idea! bb was soooo adventurous! [go bb!] with going on the monorail cycle thing, the dodgem boats, the cars, bouncy castle, teacups and sort of the big slide [tho i did have to rescue her and go down together]. way more than she will normally do!! SB is always adventurous, but this year also did the canoeing and that single person boat that launches off a slide! great time, with much more running about by the older girls, not needing to be with adult, and making for a good friend filled atmosphere as well. SB had a ball!! i really enjoyed the company of em and the babs as we watched our offspring have a great time! the circus was enjoyed by SB, but not so much by BB. tho O was partic cute!! finally i ended up at the park with BB, and a few texts and calls made me a bit teary, but a nice hug from my husband let me put on my brave face! i so wanted to show happy times to my girls to make up for my teary snappy times!!

merry and family arrived, The Babs borrowed our frontier, which needs a little bit of tlc after a couple of years in the hayloft, jax arrived with new tent, then tea hidden in the tent with a massive rain squall, playing and then a lovely evening and toasted marshmellows for all the kids and pimms, chatting, loving, laughing and crying with lovely friends. an evening which reminds you of what good friends you have, and how the internet can be a fab thing. i wouldn’t have known you without it!!

the next day was festival of history, sad farewell to em, and a quick drive. we decided to make it easier for BB we would plonk at watch for the morning and wander for the aft. we very much enjoyed the new prince malik’s lancers and were just settling in to watch the roman century [mm, i love romans!!] when the most enormous rain drenching occurred, and although BB was waterproofed, it was miserable, and she wailed, so we decamped! hid in the artisans bit, and then when that drenching over, looked around. SB and BB made a wax seal, and heard all about their invention, dick turpin etc, the made tiles. The dyer shew SB and myself how to use a drop spindle, so we bought one, and a lucet. another huge rain squall, and SB and I hid with the plasterer, and had a 20 min talk all about plastering roman and renaissance and showing us bits. we were both enthralled. BB drilled a hole into a reindeer antler and made a necklace with chris there with a man with an exceptional beard and great friendliness! we then met up with others at the victorian beach as the rain passed, and bB played with the sand whilst SB listened to storytellers, and then both listened to the fab BZents. we had jax and family with us in the aft, and went to the stalls first, on our way to agincourt. i love how the stallholders are appropriately dressed, and happy to talk at length about their crafts. girls bought beads, and i bought the all odinseye bracelets. we didn’t get to agincourt since we were v much distracted by the alchemist on the way! he was v fab!! agincourt was won by this point, so we went to the games bit for BB, and then home. another lovely eve with friends and fireside laughter and jollity! some of the deependers and also the pies had joined us!

packing up took not so long the next morning, also helped show how to take the frontier down, as the wind was starting to wwhip up. then helped jax with her tent, unfortunately whilst we were in it, the wind whipped out the few remaining pegs, and it came down on us – owww!!! never mind! still, we went off, and went to the parade ground to sit, and watched the american war of independence [and chatted about it] some departed romans and then wandered around the jacobite and civil war camps before meeting up with the deependers for a restorative cup of tea, play in the sand, and a second attempt at agincourt – which we did manage to watch! it was rather good too. we didn’t watch harfleur this time, which SB then moaned about as we saw it last year [v excellent]. quite a good impression of raining arrows! we beetled back and SB an I saw the ww2 finale, whilst chris and bb went back to the games. SB also wanted to watch the parade, so we did. finally we all met up and chatted before leaving to come home. little chef meal with jax, home, and bed!

thankyou to all the friends who make me smile and help give me the strength to keep smiling!

woke up far too early by my little lark BB. it would be alright if she came and just snugged, but she rolls over me, blows raspberries etc etc and thoroughly wakes me up! sun shining tho, so making hay required!! daddybean sailing again! i had girls up, dressed and breakfasted and got rabbits sorted. for the day, we have a day rn on the grass, and i used bits of slate etc to make a non burrowable bit around the inside of the edge. it seems to have been successful.

SB did a lovely clarinet prac, and then struggled with ledgerlines in her grade 2 music theory and BB did some cooking mama. i hung out washing, found NT cards and carpark thingy, packed bags etc and managed to liaise with Z despite BK failing! so we had a plan!!

we arrived first – always like that! was uncertain, as something has happened to the car clock in the family car, and i didn’t think 19:53 seemed likely! something also has happened to the rear mirror as well [shouts at the maintenance man!]. so i felt partic flustered driving out, and hope wasn’t speeding past the police [loads of traps about at the moment]. they were 5m short of where 30 becomes 60, so it is a possibility .

anyway, we had a look around houghton mill, and i had a camera fail after a couple of pics – battery ran out, and the spare was also juiceless. wasn’t too bothered as Z always has a camera on her. Unfortunately she had left hers at home, and wasn’t to upset because i always have a camera on me… luckilly she took a few shots with her camera-on-phone. With NT membership, it didn’t matter that it was a half hour dash! they were milling, and always v interesting. there are now some binoculars to look long the waterway – we mostly saw splashy humans!

Joining lecielrouge we set off to first geocache, which was a fail. we thought we could see where it might be, but it wasn’t, so after trying from 2 angles, we gave up and moved on! luckilly we got into our stride and had a really fab walk with not too much flagging from BB [and nearly 4 miles in total] luckilly, the longest distance was to next geocache, which was found v easily, and TB’s moved on. SInce Z had baked some choc brownies [delish!] we all had one and perked up, and i provided cherries and drief fruit – not quite so exciting!! an easy enough and pretty shaded walk to the next geocache, with a stop to admire a foal on the way. a nice scramble up thro brambles, but then easily found again. then a leisurely walk back, with BB getting into the groove of walking [i was a bit worried she would have a bit of a melt] and poor W being harrassed by the 3 bigger girls to carry them. it was a hot day to carry 3 girls with an average age of 10!

we didn’t do the 4th one, as BB needed a loo stop, and TBH, i was thanking lucky stars no melts had happened, and tho happy for the others to go on, and take BB to relax by mill, we all came back. another look for cache 1 – still a fail! so icecream and a bit of watercolour drawing. – mostly of tents rather than mills and cherry trees that were around a beautiful. then a final attempt at cache 1, and abandoned :sob: fab day tho, thankyou to le ciel rouge.

BB asleep in nano-seconds in car home [as anticipated] and daddybean home when we arrived. he has passed his sailing level one. rabbits still in day run – phew! so relaxed, SB coloured, BB ds-ed, then watched the last 2 episodes of robin hood whilst eating dinner, and to bed. Both SB and BB ‘won’ a book for doing lots of things on their home ed options list, so BB picked a dr who book [surprise] and waiting to see what SB will pic. the last one she chose was

which sparked quite a lot of discussion.

I can no longer remember who set the ball rolling for these, bt think it might be jax. we have done a photomeme day every year since 2005, except this one. SO I am remedying this error! As long term readers of the blog will know, daddybean is the main home educator, and i am the nagger/facilitator that gets carried away by buying supplies to assuage my guilt at being a working mum! but i don’t, as a rule, work wed and weekend. SO i thought i would blog today, as typical or atypical as any other home ed day. we currently follow an eclectically resourced child led approach for SB, and autonomous [with occasional nudges] for BB

so this morning. daddybean up and out as he has a sailing course to go on [lucky daddybean!]. my mum was next up as BB and I were having a tickle and raspberry blowing fight in my bed – TBH, i was trying to maximise my horizontal time! we also play love sums, as in i give her 2 sums, and she tells me which one is the one i love her [tradition says this is the one with the largest figure!] so 4 +7 or 10 – 3. she is pretty good at it. she then scampers downstairs whilst i get up, dressed etc and rouse SB. bless her. she goes to sleep late and wakes up late. an owl like her mother! [tho i actually wake with the sun, and then try and laze!]. a snuggle and cuddle, and she too is up and breakfasting. grandad is up too, so a full house! My mum and dad have been staying since thurs eve. a short break, as with my sister not so well, they are highly committed to helping out with her kids. Dad had a golf match approx hours drive away, so a cunning excuse to visit. mum had chivvied the girls thro loads of home ed stuff the prev day, incl music practices. it is good when the girls are enthused about doing stuff, as my parents are def in the unsure of home ed category [and maybe privately even less positive!]

anyhoo! we are on today, and today started with games. SB loved card games, in partic donkey, and cos she can’t hold all her cards, a subtle peak usually enables me to ensure that myself or mum donkey most of the time. and today it was mum! she, obviously, is doing similar and we got ourselves into a huge giggle about it and were told off by SB.

we then did some ds animal crossing. mum i think is quite addicted! and her other grandchildren also play it. she now has a hairdresser, so i dusted down ‘summerly’ and went to visit. also dropped off loads of different fruit and things with SB, who had deleted hers, and so restarted.

dad moaned and groaned about dses being the bane of existance. he did this about videos, cds , laptops, digital tv etc etc. bless! so instead, he and SB played bowling on the wii!!!

lunch and we waved them goodbye as they needed to do some taxi-ing for my nephew now sis can’t drive. the girls had some money to burn at the sweetshop – at the end of the week we tot up BB dry nappies and SB fingernails [that are not down to the quick!] debate the answer and pay up! so some munching on sweeties whilst deciding what to do as too late to go out. so BB wanted to paint with glass paints some bug prints, and SB wanted to do oil painting and SotW. failed with the oils as couldn’t find turps. SB did some really lovely watercolours instead.

i read about the ottoman turks from SotW and we did lots of chit chatting too, all sitting in the shade in the garden by the rabbits. Unfortunately, our rabbits have acquired digging! Skittles is now 19.5 weeks and Snowy is 15.5 weeks, and female spaying usually happens between 4 and 6 months, vet dependent, so will need to keep an eye on how old they are!

general playing in the garden, an ice cream break! SB wrote some of her journal

we blew some bubbles and then SB noticed a baby bird too young to fledge on the ground near the wisteria. Chris had noticed a birds nest there before – putting a bit of a hold on window, and i had seen whiskey cat looking suspicious there earlier, before i shooed away. so we carefully got bird to hop onto some cardboard and then into a box, which we had rabbit hay some suet treat bird food and partially closed in the shade near the nest so it could calm down. when i went back to check, it was calmer and chirping, so i opened the box, tho it couldn’t get out, and put on ground nearish nest, and we looked to see if a mummy bird popped by at all. to our delight she did, shew s roughly where the nest may be, and after a number of false runs, did at least 3 feeding runs in our presence. phew! chris was due back, so we left as is, as he knew where nest was to pt back, and i didn’t want to disturb any other babies.

SB did some mathletics, which she says chris has started her on too easy a level. i dunno which.

BB trailed with me as i made the dinner requested by bb on the BBC vegetarian summer magazine – basically cheesy potato, broccoli, cauliflower and pea. was yummy! chris returned and placed baby bird in nest [removing a dead chick] and we saw several more feeding runs, so all ok. He also sorted out the concrete slabs under the rabbit run as we can’t have them on grass now they burrow. seems v mean! ate yummy dinner in front of bang goes the theory, and there you are, the end of the home ed day. bedtime stories of the children of green knowe for SB and an usborne puzzle book for BB. no idea any more if typical, but we enjoyed each others company, when played together, talked together and learnt together.

and yes, i do plan to add a few photos!

addendum – looking for the link on amazon, i find that this is based upon a house in hemingford grey. when we have read the books, we may go and visit [by appointment only] anyone else likely to read the books and want to visit??

where are we! i am blogging, so must be wednesday! so, so far this week, monday apparently at 2 days ago is unknowable! AH yes, primarily ballet exam, practicing for it, doing it, and then ballet lesson and some playing at the park. sylvanians spread over the floor suggest possible play! BB loving her new colouring book

SB did a viola prac with me and clarinet. i can’t believe how happy she is with the viola! again, i am not to play it so i am not! looking at the blogring we are gaining quite an orchestra! but she still has the good posture [more or less] she had on the violin, and the easy playing style. i plan to just let her get on with it, and then, if she carries on, suggest either a teacher, or allowing me to start! as always she loves the clarinet [tho wants to take up oboe when older! - i forsee someone who can play grade 1 on loads of instruments!] and is trying to practice more as got into the training band at holiday orchestra – woohoo!! and also gamelan and djembe drumming, so def v happy. we watched the first of the last of doctor who as well. i do like rory [sad but true!]

SB in partic had a good home ed day yesterday, seemed to have done lots of bits and pieces, clarinet, maths, english – galore park, french – collins, DK project book – the body as well as swimming – getting the certificates, and the new dance class [which bb isn't going to again] luckilly i wasn’t too late back from work, as DH had lost the house key whilst out, and they were on the drive waiting for me… BB did some reading to me of 1a magic key books. and i read to her, and more dinosaur colouring. we also made some scones together whilst SB at dance. these were semi-disastrous as i used a new to me recipe adjsted to be dairy free, i will not be using it again!

wed – ie today – we went pond dipping – woohoo!! and with the manor borns and le ciel rouge. we managed to meet up in a timely fashion, even tho i thought we would be late due to granting a cookie making wish of bb’s. even better, the place had its own longer nets and trays, so off we set after a restorative cup of tea. found somewhere to be dipping and started. we did really well! some red mites, damsel nymph, leeches, lesser and greater boatmen, newtpoles [lol], shrimpy things, sqiggley things and freshwater mussels. the fish were too fast for us. after a fair bit of dipping, then we had our lunches. hmmm, bakery fail! Z ate my scone with home made jam, bt clotted cream for watirose, bt michelle nearly died eating it, so was relieved of the effort i didn’t think it was sooo bad, jst a bit heavy! SB ate loads of mark 2 anyway. more pond dipping, bt some of the newtings had demised duje to getting too hot, and us not tipping them back into big water . then the girls did some drawing of what they had found. the manor borns left, we wandered back to cafe not that long after for ice creams and cold drinks – did i say it was sweltering?? cos it was! Z and i had plenty of time to chat whilst children [crazy loons] payed on the outside exercise stuff. V proud of BB as now happy to go on zipwire all on own, and v proud of SB for being so helpful and just all round lovely.

we nipped back to z’s to see where they lived and be nosy – yes, fab extension! v jealous of open plan kitchen, and hopefully will go back for longer! [if bb's enormos tantrum at leaving hasn't pt you off!!] BB fell asleep fairly instantly in car, whilst SB and i sang along to italian. sb had brownies, the pair of them jdo, but also investigating a couple of new books, BB loves the music theory and sb the scientists book and then second part of doctor who. ok, so how did he escape? hey??? and rory, ahhhhhh

sorry about that. and the h key is sticking, so having to remember to give it a jolly good thump! [if the word looks odd, see if it is missing an h!]

so , where are we – reads blog to check! o yes. forgot to say:

tues, SB got her 9a and 9b swimming
wed, she got presented her judo green/white belt
thurs she did something well at gym, but i can’t remember :blush:

she has tried hard with ballet practice, so i am really keeping fingers crossed she does alright in the exam, but… she has stubbed toes and twisted ankles non stop this week, and TBH, fairly certain she broke end of toe on thurs when dropped mayonaiise jar on it… anyway, she has worked hard for it, so hoping she goes ok. it is her grade 3!

i guess generally bits of home ed happened, bit of tidying up, extra ballet class etc on friday, and soon after i got home thebabs and family arrived = woohoo! we made sure to get the kids fed and watered this time before we got started gaming – alhambra, the children played outside, went on the wii, and were finally shooed up to bed to ds/sleep according to preference! they were somewhat disappointed that they couldn’t make jam and crumble with the wild plums they had harvested from the garden!

they still woke up early! i went into work, and then met up with them all at a historical reenactment fair going on near where i worked. it was soooo hot! i found them all in the shade lunching, so joined them, then we wandered around the encampment a bit, peered at some stalls, wailed that too hot [bb!] and then watched a reenactement of hereward the wake beating the normans. we were refreshed at that point with icecream or freshly made lemonade but although we fancied seeing the last reenactment thingy, we were all just far to hot and made our way home. luckilly paddling pools were supplied with freezing water, and children cooled down and recovered equanimity! loved watching the younger 3 ds supermario bros. laughed and laughed and laughed! the bigger 2 nade a wild plum. apple and fruit that needed using up crumble, pretty much all by themselves, which was yummy, and the younger 2 made wild plum jam, pretty much all by me – which was also yummy!! kids then sat infront of spiderwick chronicles after dinner, whilst we played another game! [v lucky not to be called into work!]. we used the interactive deck of agricola, and my hand was dreadful, so i admit to having a slight grump! i do love agricola, but only after about the second or third round, as always feel daunted before that!

when i went into work this morning not a dickybird [or child] was stirring! which is most unusual! they had when i returned tho – mixture of outside paddling pool, sylvanians, ds and wii play i think. geocaching as an option had been discarded due to the too hot factor. i facepainted 3/5 – and actually thought the flower/hummingbird far more successful than anticipated. BB seriously flagging tho. guests left 2ce and still forgot something SB did ballet prac, watched bang goes the theory, snaffled all the remaining toblerone bits, and went to bed [in a protracted kind of way] i am now going to bed too, but had a suprisingly quiet on call weekend [well, i still am on call, so shouldn't speak too soon!] and lovely guests, enjoyed by all. thanks for visiting.

not sure what happened on monday! girls did things?? ah yes, it was an HE gym session, and also SB ballet class. tues was mostly tidying the house [rofl] and a golf lesson, then in the eve swimming for both, but unfortunately BB doesn’t want to carry on the dance class after all, as she felt it was a bit too busy for her. SB enjoyed it though! And we were joined by the manor borns – well, 2/3 of them anyway! and it was lovely, and distracted me from being maudlin with a 1 year since little nanny died. I still v much miss little nanny, who was such a big part of my life, but she had a full life, full of laughter, fun and love as well as her share of tragedy to overcome. My sadness at her passing has been overtaken by my worry for my sister, but she is not at all forgotten.

the girls all played beautifully together, and we adults chatted – to way into the night in the end – a bit naughty, and left me a sluggard in bed the next morning. but i did manage to drag myself out of bed, and then set out some science. we did a young scientists kit on surface tension, which worked really well, and was a v bubbly mess! i think the boat bit was the most fun… SB had a half size viola arrive in the post – an ebay bargain! and she had great time playing that, and c played her old violin, which i nearly offered for her to take home… lunch was made ready and eaten – not pasta! michelle and i expended effort blowing up the pools, and then the girls had a great time splashing about. SB raced off for ballet prac, BB nd C then did some watercolour pencils and painting and general playing before SB returned, and then all 3 of them went off to Judo. simple tea and a late departure of the manor borns, who i hope had an easy drive home!!

now i am off to bed, after a lovely, rejuventing day