Posts (page 2)
Or at least he was last night! You see, I clearly don't have enough to worry about all day so I need to create something to worry about all night as well. Last night my slightly strange brain decided that Prince William was my boyfriend. Not in the lovely romantic, fine dining, yachts and palaces sort of way; no my brain needed me to work some stuff out! I spent most of my night trying to avoid the press and BOY does that fella get hastled by the press!
By the morning I was exhausted. We had run from the press, hidden in strange places and had them jumping out of the wardrobes at us! Not only did I have him to look after but I was also looking after my parent's house. Not the house up the road, but their old house in Somerset. We were driving up and down the motorway and all along the press were on our trail. I was so delighted to wake up to a noisy, but simple, house this morning!! My life is pretty straightforward with breakfast, chores and schooling to sort out. Without all the stresses and strains of royal life!
When I was working in American taxation in London, I used to dream about tax returns! I hope no-one is analysing this? I am just weird okay! I used to create the most difficult tax returns with executives living in four different countries and ten different businesses. I had tax credits and tax treaties with a pile of additional forms to complete. This was no 1040EZ! (Do they still exist? This was a while ago!!) I would spend all night calculating and confusing myself. Additional problems would turn up and I would deal with them. By the morning I was totally ready to get on the tube and stand for a hot sweaty hour to get into London and start the day with a pile of US returns! Or maybe not!!
The stupid thing about all this is that I had a wonderful weekend. We helped to load a lorry destined for Chernobyl on Saturday morning which we all enjoyed. We managed to get some jobs done in the afternoon. The sun has been shining and Stuart's parents treated us to a delicious lunch on Sunday for Mother's Day. I suppose the beginning of another week without work is stressful. I can't do anything. Not to say that I haven't tried. The house is a clean as it's going to get and I have been running about like a mad thing! However, the sun is shining again this morning and life is good. We are happy and healthy and have so much to be grateful for! It's in the Lord's hands!! Have a blessed week!!
It is the first day of spring tomorrow and it has been a long time coming! The sun is streaming through the windows and even though it is cold, it feels like spring. The trees are coming into bud and the evenings are getting lighter. No matter how miserable things might be with the economy and the job situation, life just feels good when the sun is shining!
I have been pottering about doing various little jobs that need doing, at the same time avoiding the feeling that we really could do with a big spring clean. There are walls to be painted and rooms that need a proper clean out but right now I am concentrating on the little things that make a difference. I hoovered out the cars yesterday with help from Ewan. Stuart's car is his office and it can get a bit, er, untidy! Now he has a lovely tidy car to travel in! I am getting to the bottom of the washing mountain and dusting and polishing and generally getting a bit cleaned up. The kids are planning a sleepover so they are out of my hair for a bit. There is chocolate whip and ice cream sundae in production and the general chatter of excitement that precedes a sleepover is in the air
On the downside, we had to have the hot water tank replaced this week. We really could have done without that happening, but it is just one of those things. It turns out that the heating system needs a really good clean, but that is not going to happen for a while. After a couple of weeks of having to drain the tank to stop it leaking and then filling it up for showers etc I am really grateful for hot water. I ran the washing machine today without having to fill the tank first!! How would I manage if I didn't have my washing machine?? It doesn't bear thinking about!
As promised, some pictures from the British Museum. We couldn't take pictures in the Babylon Exhibition so here are some from the Egypt rooms:
The minute the sun comes out, spring has arrived for me. We still have the fire on because it is really cold, but it is sunny and that is all I care about. I must admit that I am ignoring the fact that the windows need cleaning as the light streams through!! The sun has prompted me to get up in the loft and turf out all the clothes I need for this season.
My loft is a treasure trove! The kids think it is a secret and exciting place; mostly because they are not allowed to go up there. There is too much stuff up there that I don't want them to know about. That is where old toys go for a brief period before they go to the charity. Do you do that? Hide them and see if they ask! I really don't want them to ask and they would get really excited about some of the stuff I have stored!
People give me clothes and I am always grateful for them. I store them away, sometimes for years, and then I get them out as and when I think they will fit. The kids have a trying on session and then the old clothes head out the door to friends and the new stuff is packed away in drawers. This bi-annual loft visit is always more exciting for Evie. Being the youngest and a girl, there are more clothes for her. The boy's stuff never seems to last through more than one child. I do have a friend with a child bigger than Ewan who is very careful with his clothes. I am always grateful for them!!
This year they all seem to have new clothes to wear. Not much for Callum but then maybe he might get some NEW things!! The best bit is, though, remembering the old clothes and the child that used to wear them! Here is Issy in that same pink fleece........
Well we are working through our cupboards and freezer. More out of necessity than a general desire to get cleared out, but every cloud has a silver lining!! In the last two weeks I have spent about £30 in the supermarket and that has been mostly milk and butter. I have been a bit surprised how much food we have in the cupboards.
We have recently joined a Co-op and so I have huge sacks of bread flour and oats and smaller sacks of lentils, sugar, cous-cous and other such necessities. The meals haven't been that exciting but the kids have enjoyed them!! For instance with a couple of tins of tomato puree, bread flour and some cheese we have pizza! I have some frozen vegetables in the freezer and they have accompanied meals and I have made various soups out of them. Most of them have been green but with a bit of creative naming, we have a whole week's worth of exciting soups. What? The kids fell for that? Well they didn't, but I can dream eh!! One mealtime Callum approached the soup pot, looked in and commented "Oh, we have CURRIED lentils today!". Actually this turned out to be a favourite so there is one I can add to my list! I replaced the milk with some powdered coconut milk I had in the cupboard and it worked really well.
Today we will be having an onion quiche. The chickens are laying and I have some cheese and milk. I will make a spelt pastry to give it flavour and off we go! If I make it big enough we can have cold quiche for lunch tomorrow and for the price of a bag of onions and some cheese I have 2 meals. Adding in the frozen vegetables again!! I am also planning a Root Vegetable Curry which we all love. That, doubled up, does a meal with rice and a meal on jacket potatoes. Add in some coriander and it becomes quite delicious!
I also have loads of oats for breakfasts and a baking cupboard full of odds and ends that can go into cakes and tray bakes. I think I could also make oatcakes to go with our HUGE tub of peanut butter.
The odds and ends that we have left in the freezer will be more of a challenge. One pork chop, 2 burgers, 3 fishfingers, and a partridge in a pear tree!! I feel a very strange mixed grill coming on! I still don't know what to do with the offal that came with the whole lamb we bought some months ago. I think I might have to be pretty hungry to eat that!!
The most exciting thing that has happened this week is that the sun has come out. It brings joy to my heart and means that the kids can run about in the garden much more than before. They have built a den and are spending quite a lot of the day out there. Oh the summer is coming!!
We are deep into Ancient History at the moment. We started with Sumer and the beginnings of civilisation as we know it, have moved into looking at the Assyrians and are about to start on the Babylonians. We have already studied Iraq in Geography so it all ties up together rather nicely!
There has been a lot of discussion about what we would consider to be "civilisation" and then some scrapbooking around the subject. We have drawn and coloured maps and created timelines. We have been reading through the Old Testament; this week Jonah and 2 Kings and looking at the Assyrians and what happened to Jerusalem. Also you can't study Babylon without looking at Daniel.
We had the most wonderful trip to the British Museum. We had an hour in the train and then transferred by Tube train. I think the kids would have considered it a great day, just having done that! Then we spent 6 hours in the Museum, stopping every couple of hours for drinks and snacks. The Babylon Exhibition was great. We also walked round most of the museum (which is HUGE!) and looked at the Bablylonian and Sumerian exhibits and later the Egyptian and Greek exhibits. My legs ached and ached when we got home but it was so marvelous that we didn't want to miss a single exhibit! They also have a great website on Mesopotamia which has been very useful.
Now that we are back home, we are trying to consolidate what we learnt. I am struggling to get the books we need though. Our local library seems to only have the history books that relate directly to the National Curriculum. I am assuming here that the Assyrians are not on the National Curriculum! I know for sure that the Egyptians are!! There are hundreds of books on the Egyptians and very little on any of the other civilisations around at the same time. I am just so thankful for the internet! I am also thankful for the Book Depository who seem to have a lot of out of print books and unusual books that are either not on Amazon or hugely expensive.
This week we are expanding on the theme of writing. We have been learning to write like a Babylonian, studying cuneiform, parchment, printing presses and modern technlogies. Callum is researching and writing a paper on the Assyrian Army.
I suppose I had better get on! Pictures of our trip to follow!!!
Now not everyone is happy with the treatment they receive from the NHS, but our family has had wonderful treatment ever since Ewan was diagnosed with a hearing loss. We have had free (at the point of use) appointments, free hearing aids, free moulds, free batteries and free access to the Teachers of the Deaf (even now that Ewan is home educated).
Stuart had a day off today because of car trouble and so he took Ewan to his yearly check up with the audiology department. He hasn't managed to take Ewan to many appointments because he is always working so it was lovely for Ewan to show Daddy how it all works. The Teacher of the Deaf (TOD) was there for him to meet and we always have a Paediatric Audiologist. They performed the usual hearing test and everything was the same. I am now long past the days when I went into the appointment hoping that it was all a big mistake and his hearing would be perfect! Then they take moulds and give us batteries and the tubing so that we can replace them as needed.
There is always time to discuss our concerns and to ask questions. This time, Stuart asked them about the problems we have been having with headphones and the telephone. The telephone doesn't go loud enough for him to hear it so he has to put the speaker on and hold the phone to his hearing aid. It makes it difficult for him to use the phone and he has no privacy which will become more and more of an issue. They gave us a magnet that we put on the phone so that it will transmit through his hearing aid - genius!
The headphones issue is a difficult one too. He has to take his hearing aids off to use headphones and then he has them so loud that everyone around him can hear everything he is listening to. No kidding, we can hear the story from his story tapes outside his headphones!! They have given us little shoes that sit on the bottom of his hearing aids and then the leads plug into his MP3. That way it plays right into his hearing aids. This is the most exciting development for us. It may not seem like much but he will be able to plug headphones into the computer and hear what is being said without us having to hear it in the next room! He will have better access to MP3 downloads like podcasts and story cds which is really exciting. The possibilities are endless!
I know it is not really free; we pay high taxes. However, if we were in an insurance based system, our insurance would not be paying for all this. We are incredibly grateful for all the help and assistance we have had over the last 8 years.
The Genius Academy is well and truely off track! Goodness me it has been a strange couple of months. The LEA visit went well, but the two weeks of questionning myself and doubting and navel examining that preceeded it made life pretty difficult. I put myself under way too much pressure. Actually the visit is always a pleasure. Our Welfare Officer is lovely and she seems to feel that the education we provide is excellent. What else can she say? At the moment her remit is to check that we are educating and it is very clear that we are. It is not the visit that I worry about, but the fact that someone comes into my home to check what I am doing. I am not sure enough in myself to take that kind of interference. I already re-examine my motives and what we are doing constantly. Complete strangers question me and well meaning friends ask me if I am really doing the right thing. The thing is that deep down, I know I am doing the right thing. Otherwise the kids would have been heading down to school a long time ago. This is not the easy option!
This week has been fairly typical of the last couple of months. Too much to do, too little time. The washing is knee high and I don't have any washing powder. The kitchen is deep in washing up. I forgot to put the dishwasher on last night so I am faced with either washing up by hand (heaven forbid :-)) or waiting for the dishwasher to finish. The kids bedrooms are a mess and everyone has got so deep in clutter that just the thought of tidying is too much. We pretty much ran out of food yesterday, but I still haven't been to the supermarket! As a consequence, we had pease pudding for tea last night. A family favourite, but even the children were commenting that we must be out of food!!
Now this all should be the consequence of me sitting on my butt eating bon-bons! I am afraid not!! I have been running about like a headless chicken. We had a wonderful but tiring half-term week. We saw loads of friends and had a lot of fun. However, we are now tired and crabby and off track.
I don't think the kids have noticed though! I managed to sit in the middle of the clutter yesterday to read stories. We are heading on with our Mesopotamia studies and have a visit to the British Museum to look forward to. Evie continues to amaze me. My first child to be school-free and wow is she clever!! I am also really enjoying the way the oldest two are reading for pleasure - proper "nose in a book and the end of the world wouldn't pull them out of it" kind of reading. It is all good really. We just need to get back on track. Actually I need to get back on track!!
Does anyone else love timelines like I do? I just love being able to see events and characters in context. It just makes it so much easier to learn when I have a picture in my mind. I am sure it is the same for the children. It also helps to check what the children have learnt. If they can create a timeline then they certainly have the facts certain in their minds.
This is how we started out yesterday:
