Malbridge House

Today we had a day of, we’ve done no work at all, aren’t we awful?

We had a lovely time out with some of our friends, we met at a local park ( not yesterdays, another one)  It was extremely muddy in places, but hey, that’s what wellies are for!

We walked for about an hour, unfortunately it started to rain, so as I have good knowledge of this park I though we could go and sit under a covered pagoda, getting there only to find it was already occupied. We did think of loitering around menacingly, hopefully they’d get the message and move on.

But we were brought up correctly so we moved on and decided to come back to our house, put a blanket on the floor and the children could have their picnic there instead. There’s nothing like a proper cup of tea either, as opposed to one out of a flask!

Our friends stayed until the middle of the afternoon, which was longer than we expected (pleasantly so.) Hopefully we can do it again, we get so bogged down with things, we’re always on the go, sometimes it’s nice to make the effort to meet with people and relax. (I just have to book it about two weeks in advance!)

Callum didn’t feel to good this morning when he woke and has slept most of the afternoon on the sofa, so I’ve dosed him with Calpol and hopefully things should run their course and he’ll feel better soon. I was only thinking a couple of days ago, apart from the sickness we had at the caravan, we’ve not been ill for months, I obviously spoke too soon!

Well, we don’t get the best nights sleep in this house on any night, so losing an hour doesn’t help. I forgot the clocks went forward until 11-15pm, which then made it 12-15am, so I got upstairs pretty quickly.

Took the dogs for a walk to our local park, as the weather was nice it was quite busy, we’re very lucky here, there are lots of beaches and parks and woods.

Our local park has an enclosed swing park, lots of grassy area and also a sandy beach, with beach-huts, so the dogs love nothing more than to swim out, usually to join another dog that’s already out there. They all run back in to us, covered in rather smelly water, seaweed and sand. You have to try and avoid being shaken all over. There’s nothing quite like the smell of damp, seaweedy dog is there?

We got home and I decided to tackle the seeds, I repotted the runner beans and dwarf beans, nasturtiums, but I can’t find the lettuce seeds anywhere, they are rather small and black which doesn’t help. So I’m going to have lettuces growing up within all the other veg! I potted up some more lettuces and some carrots, Eden took some pictures for me.

Mum came to tea, I’ve got a fruit loaf in my breadmaker and I’ve made some choc chip muffins, we’re hoping to go on a picnic tomorrow if the weather’s ok.

I’m not sure what’s happened to Eden’s blog, this morning the playlist was there and working, but this afternoon it appears to have disappeared behind her Header, that’s tonights job then!

Callum read one of his new books, he’s really enjoying reading them to us and he’s very enthusiastic, which is great.

Malc has bathed the three youngest so I’m off to wash all the sand out of the bottom of it!!

 One of Edens new friends made her up a playlist and last night we tried to fit it into her sidebar, unfortunately everything else in it disappeared, including the playlist, we tried making it smaller, but it was still too big, at the moment it’s in her Header and although it doesn’t look too bad, she would still prefer to put it in her sidebar, we’ve suggested getting another header, but she likes the one she’s got. That’s my girl! No compromise in her at all!

Has anybody got any suggestions?

See you later

Are you doing it? I’m sitting at the computer with a lamp on, the children are in their rooms with just lamps on, Eden’s on her computer, I’ve got our radio on and that’s about it, the heating’s on, but I’ve put it down by three degrees.

Malc did offer to share a bath with me a while ago to save water! I declined, I shared it with two men instead, Ian Rankin and Inspector Rebus!

We’ve had some good discussions today about saving energy and harvesting energy from the Earths natural resources, wind turbines etc.. I wanted to make sure the children knew why we were turning everything off tonight.

Eden did some work she’s been given from Bookclub, she’s keeping it all in a folder, funny how Bookclub work isn’t the same as the work I set her!!

Callum read the two books that he read yesterday, I like him to read them twice to make sure he’s got all the words, so we’ve got the next two out, which are actually in the next stage, so he’s chuffed!

They’ve all played games on the computer this afternoon, well it is Saturday!

Callum and Clark helped me to peel the veg for tea, Mum came up to eat with us.

My seeds are in a pot on my kitchen windowsill, the soil is in a pot outside getting very waterlogged, because to coin a really lovely phrase from Ruth, it’s hoying down, I love that expression, much nicer than any of the ones I would normally say!!

We did manage to pick out a lot of the seeds, hopefully to repot when it’s drier, my greenhouse in now anchored with about 8 housebricks on the bottom shelf!

A gust of wind has made my greenhouse topple over, all the seeds and soil were on the floor, honestly I could have cried. Eden very patiently picked up all the seeds and put them on a bowl and swept up the soil and put that in a pot, when the rain stops and it has all dried out a bit we’ll see what we can salvage.Some are still OK, I’m going to have to repot the others.

A lot of craft was done again this morning, even Cody sat at the table with a piece of paper and a crayon. Unfortunately I didn’t think to take a photo of him.

A vase of flowers by Clark.

Callum has read two Oxford Reading Tree books to me, we’ve been neglectling reading aloud, because he can read I sort of leave them to it, but after reading what a lot of other people do, I thought we would go back to it, I think he really enjoyed it, if only because it gave him amd me time together without the others. So, I think we’ll try and do this a bit more.

Eden’s reading is well above her age, so I tend to let her get on with it, I do look at what she’s reading sometimes and sigh, I would like her to read something with a bit more substance to it.

Talking of reading, apparently this year, is The Year of Reading, and there’s even a website to prove it, www.yearofreading.org.uk  They are going to do different themes each month and they’ve got competitions and things, I’ve not been through the whole website but there’s difinitely some things we could do there.

Another website to check out is this one, www.earthour.org  We signed up to this today, as we are a large family we are very aware of the carbon footprint that we would be leaving behind, we recycle, rubbish, clothes get passed down, especially the boys, I’m not too proud to accept clothes from friends who pass their childrens onto me.

We also compost all our veg peelings, tea-bags and the like. We turn off lights and try to save water, so I feel we try to  do our bit, and the children are aware of pollution and saving energy.

So tomorrow evening we’re going to make an extra effort to turn off everything we’re not using ( computer will still be on then!!) appliances and lights and we will look up the results of how much energy this has saved, we’re being asked to do it at 8pm. If you remember, give it a go.

This evening Eden went to the library for Bookclub, I took Callum with me and we sat and did some Maths from a workbook, for just over an hour, again I think he enjoyed the one-to-one, so I’m going to try and do it again with either him or Clark, the beauty of it is that we don’t get interrupted by, people, phones, emergencies, fighting and the like.

I’m even thinking of sitting in the mini-bus outside to avoid being interrupted, but I suspect somebody would knock on the window!

Every time we go to Beavers or bookclub, Eden and Callum sit in the front of the mini-bus waving to people, it’s so funny to see the look on peoples faces, you can see them thinking, you know me, you’re waving, so I’ll wave back even though the look on my face says I can’t remember who you are.

The children think this is brilliant and cheer every time somebody waves back to them, we sat at the traffic lights and got about four waves!

I am obviously cracking up laughing asking them to stop.

So if you see a big , white, mini-bus coming towards you, and the children in it are waving at you, please wave back, it’s such a little thing, but it absolutely makes their day!

One of my friends fifteen year old son will breathe on the car window and write "Help" in the condensation if they are in a queue anywhere, don’t you just love them? 

Today would have been my Mum and Dads 43rd Wedding Anniversary, I say would have because my Dad died 7 years ago at the age of 56 years old, but to me today is still their anniversary. So” Happy Anniversary” to my Mum and to my Dad whereever you are!

This morning we had our trip to Asdas, which was put off yesterday due to my headache.

This afternoon the children drew some pictures for the Sketch Tuesday site which we found on this blog.  http://educated-by-life.blogspot.com/

They have to sketch Something Alive.

Edens picture

Callums picture, a very tall man, a tree and some flowers.

Eden loves Art anyway, but hopefully it should spark some interest in the next two children.

 

I’ve also been out in the garden taking photos of one or two of the flowers that are out, there’s not many at the moment.

I don’t know the “posh” name for this flower but I know it as a “Bleeding Heart”

I’ve got a fuzzy close-up, the flower is a heart shape which splits in the middle and you have a white bit hanging down like a tear-drop, it’s incredibly beautiful and this picture doesn’t do it justice, in the end three of us were trying to get a decent picture, this was the best one taken by Eden.

I’ve had this flower about 7 years and brought it with us when we moved, I’ve now separated it into three flowers, two of which are doing really well, not sure if the third one’s going to make it.

Eden, Callum and Clark have all done about an hours Maths tonight from worksheets and then Malc read “The Magicians Nephew”  by C. S. Lewis, we try and read a chapter a day, but that doesn’t always work out and we seem to have been reading this one for ages, only about 4 more chapters to go, so it shouldn’t be long now. I borrowed a simplified version of ” Oliver Twist” from the library to read next. Hopefully we’ll get through that one a bit quicker!

I forgot to say, thankyou to all of you who looked at Edens blog, she had 9 referers and she was over the moon,

I’ve had a stinking headache all day, it just won’t go. Eden did some of her lapbook this morning and Clark did his birthday thankyous, they all did thankyou letters for their Easter eggs.

That’s about all that got done, the children decided they wanted to tidy their schoolwork corner and files and very helpfully found a load of work for me to mark.

I’ve spent a lot of time today on the computer reading other peoples blogs for inspiration, so if you find that somebody’s been foraging through your archives, that’s me!

I’ve found a few things we could do.

We follow National Cirriculum, and we’re very happy with it, it works for us, but sometimes I look at others peoples blogs and I see all this wonderful work that they’re producing, I think, I would like to do that.

So we will stick with what I know works for us, but I think we could incorporate a few new things in there as well.

Edens at Grandmas tonight, she’s getting a bit despondant because she’s getting no referers to her blog. So, if you’ve got a minute, take a look, you don’t have to comment, at least she’ll know somebody’s looking at it, it might give her a bit of motivation! There’s a link in my sidebar.

I’ve spent some time here today. http://structuredhomeeducation.freeforums.org/index.php

I’ve put a lot of the sites that I use for the childrens work on it. It’s always useful to share information.

I get friends whose children go to school ask me how to find extra work for them to do, some of the games are actually online, so be prepared to give up your computer!!

Over Easter I wanted to put up my mini greenhouse and get some seedlings underway, but because of the low temperatures and high winds, we didn’t do them.

I got up today and the sun was shining and my back garden beckoned, well OK, I thought if I don’t plant them soon it’s not going to be worth doing!

So I sent Malc out into the garden, shovel in hand, to dig a patch for my runner beans. I’ve already got a veg patch dug, but runner beans take a lot of room so we’ve put them in a seperate site.

Probably not the best photo of Malc I’ve ever taken!

We moved into this house 2 years ago, We didn’t realise we had a patio until we started cutting down the rain forest, and we discovered paths! Then I had Cody and life got busier and busier and although we’ve always had a veg patch, last year it was very basic. Loads of beetroot and not a lot else!

So this year I’m determined to have something decent.

This morning I set Clark up with loo rolls , cut in half ,

Callum put the soil in,

 

Clark put in the runner beans, lettuces and nasturtium seeds. I was going to make pots out of newspaper that I saw here, but try as I might I couldn’t do them. So I found out about loo rolls, and as we go through quite a few in this house, and we save them for the gerbils to chew, we had some laying about stored tidily above the washing machine.

Cody, the Foreman, surveying us all from his trampoline!

So we were an industrious lot, I’ve now run out of loo rolls, so I’ll have to wait a couple of days a week or so to collect some more.

Eden and I went over out local field with the dogs, only the youngest three go as Rimini and Gypsy are finding it hard doing anything energetic ( I know how they feel!)

Eden has been practising Fetch, Bring it Back and Drop, with Burley, and indoors it’s been working really well, so Over we went with the chukka in hand, well Edens hand, I had enough to do holding the dogs as they  pulled walked alongside me down the road.

The first few time Burley ran after the ball, sniffed it and ran back without it, Eden got a lot of exercise! Then after a couple of times, he picked it up, brought it back and dropped it at her feet. When I picked myself up off the grass we gave him lots of praise, so here’s the evidence as promised.

This afternoon the children have been doing some craft, Eden made this chick,

and dafodil,

Not sure what the boys made, I have been told one of the items is a snow storm!! Callum’s got imagination, I’ll give him that!

This is a picture of my youngest brother,Craig, drawing with his foot.

It’s quite a long story, but Craig has always been "into" Art. He went to Uni and whilst he was there he sustained a neck injury. Click on the pictures of Craigs artwork and it will show you more. I prefer his drawings, if you click on them it will bring up the individual picture for you. He has got a couple of drawings in there of himself drawing. He stands in front of a mirror.

You know what I find amazing, not just the fact that he draws with his foot but the fact that he can stand and maintain his balance for so long!

Here’s a shortcut to his site going straight to his pictures.

Click on these to view a couple of my favourites. These are his drawings.

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/worksinprogress//cs-drawings.html

These are his portraits, he’s even got my other brother, Brent in there and Cody at 1 hour old.

http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/worksinprogress//cs-portraits.html

My favourite in the drawings are "Vision Angel" and "Elements -Water" Although all of his "elements" series are brilliant.

If you bring them up individually you can see the fine detail on them.

Anyway, take a look when you’ve got a few moments, because I’m so proud of him, this post will go on forever!

Here’s his website address to look at the other artists. www.artworksinprogress.co.uk.  

Didn’t I say nothing ever goes smoothly in this house.

Saturday morning Hubby went to a place ( rhymes with t d curled!!) Got a hard drive, got home, compared it with the one in there, it was much smaller, but as I said that’s progress for you everything gets smaller. Now, bearing in mind the bloke in the shop had looked in the tower, looked at all the leads and said everything was in there for hubby to transfer from the old hard drive, we couldn’t work out why we couldn’t connect it. So hubby went to a friend of ours who imformed us that we had the hard drive for a laptop!!

We also found out that hard drives only usually last about 2 to 3 years so we can’t complain, this one is 7 years old!

Went back to said shop, only to find they didn’t have the one we wanted in stock, they had some at 9am because we rang to check, but they’d sold them by midday. So hubby mumbled his way out of the shop, and we went to another place much further away, which just goes to show going closer was a false economy!

Picked up the right one, took it back to our friend who said he would sort it all out for us, and put some games on for the children, pick it up Sunday about 11am.

Malc went there this morning, not all done yet, problems with the motherboard, by this time this mother was bored!!

It turned out to be a pile of dust above the processor, Dust! In my house, I think not!!

Anyway, he went back at 5pm and Voila! Here I am, fours hours later.

As we’ve not had the computer around we’ve had time to make all these.

 

One of my lounge walls is completely covered in these!

This morning the children subjected me to treated me to an all singing, all dancing show.Here are some pictures from it.

We even had a visit from the Easter Bunny!

 

I’ve just caught up with all my blogs and found that we’ve got a new picture for the structured forum, which I hope to put in my sidebar this evening.

I’ve also just had a hissy fit because somebody has put the lead for the digital camera "up" somewhere safe and nobody can remember where it is. Hubby to the rescue, he found it in with the charger, what an incredibly stupid place to put it!!

My hard drive has nearly died on my computer, last night I couldn’t get anything, this morning I can get the internet but it’s soooo slow, so I thought I would let everyone know that I might not be around for a couple of days.

So we’ve got to go out today and get a new tower and transfer everything across, hubby assures me it’s easy!!

I hope to be back online this evening, but that’s not how things usually work in this house, there’s usually an extra problem somewhere.!!

So I’ll see you when I see you.

When we left the caravan on Tuesday morning, I’d washed everything down and sprayed an anti-bacterial spray everywhere, to get rid of the sickness germs that I’m sure must have been left there, so today we went down to our caravan, me armed with a big bottle of bleach and Malc with our carpet cleaner and we set to work.

I have washed every wall, surface and orifice with bleach, the carpet smells of oranges and lemons instead of damp dogs! Always a better option.

We usually clean it at the end of a season and again at the beginning.

We bought this caravan at the end of last season and we’ve actually only been away in it once, although we’ve stayed in my Mums back garden about six times.

Our last caravan was about ten years old and was getting a bit worn, so whilst we were away , we went to a camping place to buy some of that blue loo cleaner stuff, asked the man about 6 berth caravans and lo and behold they’d just had one in.

So we bought it, we measured it and then had to go to my Mums to measure the gate opening to make sure we could get it through. I’m not sure if they would have given us our money back because we couldn’t get it through the gate, but luckily that never arose because it does with not much room to spare!

We’ve had some fabulous times in our caravan, from really, really, bad rain to high winds, but we’ve always had fun. I hope the children will look back on our camping days with fond memories.

We tend to go to little campsite, big ones with loads of entertainment are not really our thing, I would worry about children getting lost and dogs barking all the time.

We go to a little field with a waste  and a tap, usually no more than 5 caravans, the children can play all over the field and you can see them.

We have had people ask if our caravan is like a tardis inside, to fit us all in.

I like nothing more to see peoples faces when we turn up on site, a mini-bus, me, Malc, five children, five dogs all getting out of the bus. Their faces are priceless! 

Anyway, I thought I’d better do the next dog before he’s rehomed !!

Burley

Burley is a Bedlington X Whipet, although I don’t think he looks like either.

A Bedlington looks rather like a sheep and a Whippet looks like a small Greyhound.

He was born on the 7th September, that makes him nearly 7 months old.

I’ve looked in my dog book for the history of  both dogs and very weirdly the Bedlington says it was known as a Rothbury Terrier until it was crossed with several dogs, one of them being a Whippet, and the Whippet says that the breed was crossed with terrier blood, one of then being the Bedlington.

How funny is that?

Temperament

The Bedlington says it makes a charming and loyal pet. The Whippet says that it’s one of the nicest dogs you could hope to meet.

Now I would agree with that, both Burleys parents were Bedlington X Whippets themselves, we didn’t see the Dad, but Mum was absolutley lovely, you can imagine, Me, Malc and the five children, all excited, all her puppies climbing over us and Mum was so friendly, not bothered by us at all. She really had a fantastic temperament, and I can say Burley has too, he’s full of mischief, affectionate, very laid back, very quick to learn commands.

I’ve had my dog book for about 15 years and in that time I’ve read it from cover to cover many times ( I know, complete anorak!!) and no where in this book does it say that Whippets or Bedlingtons will chew you out of house or home!!

We’ve gone from wax jackets , to bags of peat, to shoes and now we’re onto pants!! We’re not fussy anyone’s will do!

We’ve bought this "chucka" thing now, you put the ball in it and throw it and you can pick the ball up with the implement as well, we haven’t used it yet, Eden’s been training him to fetch and ball and bring it back before I go over the field and look a complete dipstick, with the ball going one way and the dog going the other!

Dogs usually chew because they’re bored (wish I had time!) So I’m hoping to try and tire him out a bit with this "chucka" . If it works ok and I can throw the thing I might even take some photos for you all to look at, if it doesn’t you’ll never hear mention of the "chucka" again!

Lord, what a mad couple of days, Sunday, still cooking,

sausages and sausage rolls, decorating cakes.

Got to the hall and put the tables out, the guests arrived, we played a few games, ate some food, played a couple more games, tidied and packed up.

Put like that it sounds so easy but I was shattered.

We stayed for a couple of days in our caravan in my Mums back garden where we store it. Clark loves the caravan and wanted to stay in it for his birthday. I didn’t feel I could arrange a party whilst we were staying in it on a site somewhere. 

The good thing about staying at my Mums is that she has a TV licence so we can take our portable TV and watch it, so we watched the final of the celebrity skating and then I watched "Lewis" which I’ve not seen before, I use to love "Morse" though.

Monday morning we got up had a lovely breakfast at Mums and Clark opened his presents, it took longer than we thought and as we were meant to be meeting some other home-edders I had to phone and say we were running late, only to load everyone in the mini-bus to find it wouldn’t start. Luckily one of my Mums neighbours had a battery and some jump leads.

Got there, it was a bit cold, the children played in the outdoor park area, we went inside and looked around their visitors centre, I love this place, Avon Heath, we go there a lot with the dogs, they do nature trails and there’s always a lot on in the school holidays, den building, pond dipping to name a couple.

Our friends had to go after about an hour but we stayed, the children did some drawing, Eden wrote a poem for one of the competitions that they’re running. 

 

The squirrel collecting his peanuts,

The fox stealing them too,

If we want to encourage wildlife,

What should we do ?

 

We talked to the ranger about home made treats for the birds, we have a tree and a feeding station in out back garden, the lovely lady then came out with some monkey nuts saying that they didn’t have any bird food making workshops on for a while so would we like the bag of nuts that they’d got left over.

They have got an indoor bird hide that you can look out over an enclose area with binoculars, sounds wierd but it’s great, we saw rabbits, a pheasant, loads of birds, squirrels and we even saw a woodpecker, I don’t think I’ve ever seen one before.

We went outside and ate our picnic, ( we’re very hardy in our house!!) Then the children played in the park area again.

Went back to Mums, got a chinese take away for tea as a birthday treat.

We all went to bed quite early as we were shattered still, I was woken by Soloman being sick, sorted that out only to then have Callum being sick and then very closely followed by Malc being sick.  Not a lot of fun in a caravan!

Got up this morning after not a lot of sleep, packed up the caravan, got home unpacked, did some housework, tried to catch up on emails, read my favourite blogs.

Clark stayed at Mums for the day, she brought him back at teatime. He sent me an e-card saying thanks for his party and his presents complete with music, I will admit I cried, he’s such a lovely little boy with a lovely nature, he’ll bend over backwards to help you. He’s just learnt how to make a cup of tea and if it were up to him I’d have about 15 cups a day!!

Eden had her last night at Brownies this evening, she’s going to miss them, I will admit Brown Owl is absolutely lovely, as are the other leaders there, but we’ve met her new leaders and they seem to be lovely too, everytime I go to pick her up the Guides seem to have made something edible and they’re there tasting their wares, I think I could be helping out on Guide nights !!

All the children that weren’t well seemed to have recovered, Malc still feels a bit worse for wear. I don’t think starving himself for 24 hours agrees with him!

I hope they’re all ok tomorrow, shopping day, I can’t wait !

Eden had to go to the libraby this morning, she’s been going for over a year to an Art class there ran by a lady called Barbara. At the beginning of the year she recieved a certificate to say that she’d done a years course. She adores Art, some of my brothers genes in her I think.

So I lost my assistant baker, Callum, Clark and I have made more fairy cakes, fruit loaf, cheese scones, friut buns, I’m going to take some photos tomorrow before we pack it all up to take to the hall with us. Hopefully they will get you salivating.

I’ll be glad when this party’s over, mind you then it’s on to baking for Easter!

We went to our local church this evening, Eden goes there for church parade with the Brownies, and this evening they were putting on a production of " Joseph" So as I had a bath before we went, I had the top three children(privacy,what’s privacy?) in the room with me, and we were rehearsing the songs for tonight, it made me think, I learnt these words over 25 years ago, and I can still remember them, I even sang a song from " Samson amd Delilah" and " Jonah"  So, I do remember something from school!

The show was lovely, our local school choir was there , so Eden met up with three of her old friends, although she sees them at bookclub and Brownies.

Our church usually puts on a show a couple of times a year. Although we’re not overly religious, it’s nice to go to them, you know you’re going to have a good time, people aren’t going to get drunk, no fighting or swearing, good family fun.

We had an interesting conversation on the way home, because it was dark, the children were talking about foxes and wolves, Malc and I said we don’t really get wolves in this area, I explained that the domestic dog descended from wolves, so in fact our dogs are descended from them.

So the conversation then went to, could a wolf eat a hedgehog? Yes. What about a cat? Yes. What about a deer? Possibly if they were in a pack. What about a human? No not really, unless there were a lot of them in a pack. Luckily we arrived home so we were spared what about an elephant or even a dinosaur?

Kids, don’t you just love ‘em?

I can’t believe it’s so late, I’ve got to blog, it’s in my blood now!

This morning we did some cooking, Dorset Apple cake,

,

 and cheese scones

 

We were just about to start when we recieved a phone call from the company that’s putting cavity wall insulation in our walls, they’d had a cancellation, they could be here in under an hour.

So I had children everywhere, doing various jobs, including making cups of tea for workmen!

The dogs would bark madly everytime they saw one of them, the children kept wanting to go out and watch! Bearing in mind they were using a huge drill and there was cavity wall insulation stuff, for want of a better word, flying everywhere.    

Anyway, it’s done now.

Had a quick lunch, picked up my Mum and went to Asdas, got the last of the party food, sweets for prizes, things like that. Then I went back to "The Works" to get some more stickers. The manager in there told me that they’ve been taken over and they won’t know until the end of the month if they will still be trading, the new owners might keep them going or keep trading under a different name or shut them altogether. Some of their shops had already been closed.  I was devastated, no "works" Where am I going to get all my home-ed stuff from?  There’s nothing else like them in our High Street, they’ve got to stay open.

Funnily enough when I was talking in there yesterday, home-ed reared it’s ugly head and the man that served me said he was taught at home, I’ve never met an adult that was home-educated so it was nice to hear how he feels looking back. He said TV got in the way, which is OK because we haven’t got one.

He had a lovely personality and sense of humour, so it doesn’t look as if it did him any harm anyway!

Had tea and then the taxi services begun, Beavers and Book Club, in between pick-ups I managed to do about 45 minutes of ironing, which hasn’t even made a dent in the pile.

Sorted out party bags and made chocolate Rce Krispie cakes, hence the late hour.  Tomorrow is going to be even busier, with loads of baking to be done, I wish I could just buy it all, but I look at the prices and think I could make this for so much less!

We got up this morning to Rimini barking, when I got downstairs she was not moving with her back legs splayed out in the sitting position, I really thought her back end had paralysed, Malc lifted her up and put her in the dog cage out of harms way while we discussed vets and "The Big Decision" We heard her paws clicking on the wooden floor and off she trotted out into the garden, so thankfully that "decision" can wait for another day. She’s nearly 14, and she’s doing really well, she walks a bit stiffly at times. We got a magazine from the vets and it had a chart in it  explaining how old your dog would be in our years, she came out at 90 yrs, so she’s not doing bad.

I walk stiffly like that after a hike with the dogs and I’m only 40!! (ish!!)

The children made Easter cards today, just for a few friends and family.

I discovered this a couple of days ago.

My lovely little puppy has chewed my new wax jacket,   luckily I discovered it whilst I was out, so I couldn’t shout too loudly. I don’t think I was even angry, I think I could have just cried. I’ve been to Oswald Baileys where I bought it to find out if they did tent patches that I could sew over it, but the lovely man in there suggested using material from the hat. It’s detachable and I wouldn’t use it because I’ve got a magnificent "conquering Everest in a blizzard"  hat, complete with ear flaps, because I get pain in my ears from the wind. I think they’re called "deerstalker hats" That horse racing betting bloke wears one a lot, can’t remember his name, I think he was on Big Brother or something similar, anyway I digress!

In town there’s a place where they do repairs so I thought I would pop along and see if they can repair it and get a quote.

This afternoon we had a trip to the vets, our vet is situated in the back of a big pet shop, so we’ve got five dogs , at the other ends of the leads are five children, all winding our way along the aisles, with a Boxer and a German Sheperd barking at us. I had to weigh each dog individually to work out how many worming tablets each one would need, I know not a nice topic, but it’s got to be done!

Honestly, if it was happening to someone else I would have been on the floor laughing, the dogs wouldn’t stand on the scales, the Yorkie weighed 20kg, until we realised that Soloman was kneeling on the edge of the scales!   Then we had to wait for the tablets and wind our way back out of the shop.  Luckily we don’t have to do this every time, it’s just that the puppy has grown and so has Tula and we weren’t too sure of their weights.

Then Malc dropped me off and waited in the mini-bus for me while I quickly ran to "The Works" my favourite shop. I needed some more plain cards to make Clarks birthday cards with, they had some stickers on sale 10p a packet, so I bought about 14 packets and I’m hoping to go back tomorrow to get some more, I didn’t have a lot of cash on me today. Absolute bargain!

As I’m typing Eden has brushed the dogs and she’s trying to teach Burley to "Fetch" " bring it back" and "Drop" She’s got some hope!!  

We were up until 1 am, this computer’s so addictive. I managed to put my profile in my sidebar and link Edens blog in, it was all trial and error, trying to think logically with what I’ve learnt over the past couple of weeks.

Shopping day today, with even more to plan for because Clarks birthday party is on Sunday, his actual birthday’s on Monday, so I had to sort out all the party food, extra flour and stuff for the cakes.

Then into town to get serviettes, balloons and party bags. I HATE party bags, I think they’re a right con. I have had children coming up to me at the end of a party asking me for their party bag because they’re going now.

Anyway, got some pencils, little pads, streamers and stuff to put in them, we’ve got nineteen to do. We’ve got nineteen children and twelve adults coming. I’ve hired all hall, I’m not having that lot round my house!! Besides, if I leave food anywhere a certain dog is bound to get it!

 We were in the queue buying these things, Eden was with me and she always makes a point of working out the change before the till can do it, which she did today, and it was right when I looked up and saw her new Guide Leader who I met for the first time last night, she’d heard Eden working out the change and made a positive comment on it. I was so chuffed.

I have to fill in her form for joining Guides and the form asks which school they attend, I just love writing in that space that they’re home-educated.  When I write it I feel like I’m just daring them to say something, too many years of negative comments and my self doubt I think.

Edens staying at Grandmas tonight, I do miss her when she’s gone, but they get to do things and she gets time away from the house which is chaotic and can be quite stressful at times. I think I might have to stay at Grandmas one night !

Right I’m off to write a list of party games, I’ll have a cuppa first and see if I can dig some inspiration up from somewhere.

I didn’t get to sleep until 2 am, last night I managed to upload a new photo into my sidebar and one into Edens blog and I was on a high, so I had all sorts of ideas going through my head of what I could now do with my newfound skills.

We were also going to be meeting some home-edders that we’d not met before, so I was a bit apprehensive. Would they like us? Would the children behave?

We met and the time went very fast, we all got on well, the children behaved, we talked about a number of things not all home-ed stuff. Lovely "normal" people, if I can use that word without appearing to be offensive. 

My Mum called us whilst we were on the way home, her hammock in the front garden had blown over and she was afraid it was going to hit her car, so we went round to put it back up for her, she came home with us and stayed for tea.

Eden went to Brownies and recieved her badge, she finishes next week and then we’re off to Guides.

In the Evening Echo this evening, there’s a story of a house being hit by lightning, about 1 1/2 miles from us, right outside the school that the children use to go to, luckily the Infant school was shut due to damage the night before due to the bad weather, but the Junior School was open, all their phones went.

I know exactly when this happened because we had an enormous clap of thunder when I was on the phone talking to my Mum, I saw the lightning and before I had time to say anything the clap came. I’m ashamed to say I deafened my Mum by girlie screaming . I hate thunder storms.

I didn’t put this in my blog yesterday because I was quite ashamed at my reaction, I didn’t want you all to think I was a wus! 

LOOKING down through the destroyed roof of a home in Upton which was blown apart by lightning on Monday.

The whole of the top floor of the house was gone, apparently two of the children were playing in a upstairs bedroom. Everybody was OK, a bit shocked, but unfortunately the hamster and cat didn’t make it.

There are also some fantastic pictures of a surfer being towed by a car as the road was so waterlogged!!

We’ve got heavy rain again now,I’m not sure what the forecast is, but I’d better batten down the rabbit hutch!

Got up this morning to find everything intact, house and garden wise, we had to do a little running repair to our back fence, otherwise the litle dogs would get through and then we’d have to speak to our neighbours which is to be avoided at all cost! Believe me that’s a post for a rainy day.

Eden made some cheese scones and a big sponge that was going to be Clarks birthday cake but she only put five eggs in it instead of the six that she was meant to, then I went and overcooked it slightly. So I stuck some jam and buttercream in it and put it in the cake tin,. It’ll get eaten, my boys aren’t fussy.

I was, at the time that it was in the oven, doing five things at the same time, watching Eden (obviously not close enough!) Flitting in and out of schoolwork, putting the ingredients of a fruit loaf into my breadmaker, washing up and cutting out the cheese scones.

We had some of the fruit loaf and scones for lunch, homecooked food doesn’t last long in this house, actually thinking about it, no type of food lasts long in this house.

Wasted some time Spent valuable time on the structured forum brushing up on my computer skills.

The children answered some of their emails, Clark at nearly five is amazing, I have to type for him, otherwise we would be here all day! But he knows what to click on to retrieve them and how to reply to them. More computers needed I think.

The children wrote letters to the two ladies that ran the library event, they may be brats but they’re polite ones!

I even found time to do some knitting this evening, even though my wool is still tangled, I managed to unravel a little bit to knit a few rows with.

Eden has been drawing a road safety poster so she should get her Road Safety Badge at Brownies this week.

I’m off for an early night (code for I’m going to lurk around structured forum for a while!)

Probably see most of you there!

I was woken up this morning by my lovely children holding onto a tray with a cup of tea on it, two slices of burnt well done toast and a jar of jam. Bless them, what have I done to deserve this? and moreso, what did they want?

Apparently nothing, they were bored! It was only 9am, I wasn’t in bed all morning!

The little darlings had cleared out last nights coal fire and swept through downstairs as well.

So seeing as there wasn’t a lot to do downstairs I took the hoover upstairs!

Wasted a lot of time on the new structured home ed forum, I thought blogging was addictive!

Then my genius daughter showed me how to download my pictures onto Adobe, then she uploaded them to Flickr so that I could put some of them back into my blog.  It took me about 1 1/2 hours but I think they’re all back up, let me know if you scroll through and some are missing.

Made Crofters Pie for tea, mince, onions, mushrooms and carrots with scones on top. Delicious.

Eden has started a blog herself, so now I’m going to have to fight for use of the computer, mind you hopefully she’s going to do lots of work so she can take pictures to put them on her blog.

I’m off to waste more time on the forum. The housework can wait, if I wait long enough, the children might do it!!

I have deleted some of my photos off Flickr, not realising that they need to stay on there for people to see them in my blog. Does anybody know how I get them back?

Here are the two photos from the last post.

I’m going to have to upload my photos from my camera and put them back in, bear with me it’s going to take a little while!

Hubby is still ill, I feel a bit bad about my post the other day because I think his illness could be genuine!!

We don’t usually do school work on Saturdays but the children were so bored this morning that they sat and did some.

"Tula" for short, born December 28th, just over one year old. She’s a Bichon Frise X Jack Russell, but as she favours the Jack Russell that’s the details I’ll give you. Called "Toulouse" because Bichons originated in France.

The Reverend Jack Russell of Devon was a keen foxhunter and established this breed and he also gave it his name. He wanted a nippy dog that could keep up with the hounds and be brave enough to face its quarry underground. The Jack Russell is bred more for it’s character than looks which is why their physical appearance varies so much.

Temperament

They are excitable, cheerful and loyal, they make excellent guard dogs. ( Meaning they bark at anything)

Tula is very tolerant of the children, excellent to train and has the prettiest face. She does bark at everything and anything, she’s very affectionate and very bouncy!

Today we went to our local library as they had a workshop for home-edders, it was connected to a world record attempt to have the most (aiming for 200,000) children reading aloud at the same time.

In 2004, to mark Great Ormands Street centenary they launched the search for a sequal to JM Barrie’s Peter Pan .( Apparently this week is Peter Pan week, www.peterpanweek.co.uk ) Barrie had made a gift of the copyright to the hospital. Publishers and literary agents worldwide were asked to put forward authors to compete. Out of nearly 200 authors Geraldine Mc Caughrean was chosen. Her finished sequel was published last year.  It’s called "Peter Pan in Scarlet"

We read a 2 minute extract from this book at 9-15 this morning, hopefully when all the adjudicators results are in we would have accomplished the world record.

The children will receive a certificate to say that they took part.

This workshop was run by two ladies at our towns main library and they have been really helpful to me in the past, one of them dressed the part.

They also provided some worksheets for the children to do.

We also met a man and his two children, a boy and a girl, ( 5 and 7 ) who we chatted to for quite a while, only to find out that he lives about 3 roads away from us. Small world isn’t it?

At the library Eden found a DVD about a dog called Mist. It was only linked to my sheepdog DVD that I had for my birthday, it was about the next generation of puppies and featured all the older ones, so we sat down this afternoon and watched it. It updated us on the dogs progress and we were sad to find out that during the filming, Dave’s oldest dog , Greg, died, poor Eden was in floods of tears.

Callum is a Beaver and this week I went along to help, Good Lord, it’s not like Brownies is it?  There were 20 boys running around, skidding, shouting, rough and tumble stuff, don’t get me wrong, Brownies play games, but they’re so much more sedate about it!! I’m only helping out every other week, I think I need a week off to recover!! They were lovely though and it was lovely to watch Callum playing with his friends.

The children have got the craft stuff out again, let’s hope we don’t have any artistic disagreements this evening!

Good news, nothing has been chewed today!!

Callum, Clark and Soloman did some cooking this morning, we made fruit bread, Dorset Apple Cake, cold tea  cake, cheese scones and a Victoria Sandwich.

I was hoping to take pictures but it was stressful enough supervising the three of them making their own cakes, let alone take pictures too! Eden’s the budding photographer and she was still at Grandmas.

The three boys all peeled and chopped a vegetable each to put into a stew, which we had for tea with dumplings.

I think they would work less if they were in a workhouse!! They ask to do it though, I think the secret of our success with home-edding is that the children are included in everything we do. Cooking, gardening, decorating, the lot, it’s easier than trying to keep them out of the way.

We went to Grandmas to pick Eden up and broke up some wood that she had in her garden to put on our open fire. There is a log burning merrily as I type. We do have central heating but the children seem to be fascinated by an open fire. I think it’s better to have it and teach them to respect fire, than to ignore it and have them start one later because their curiosity hasn’t been satisfied.

The children are round the table now with crepe paper, scissors and glue making chickens  and rabbits which I’m apparently going to put on an Easter cake! Didn’t know we were having one, but there you are.

Eden enjoyed her Art Exhibition last night, she took lots of photos, so I’m going to sort through them and do a blog about my brother in the future.

I’m going to leave you there, we have an arguement artistic differences of opinion that I need to go and sort out. 

Do you want to know what he’s done today, eaten Solomans shoes, now I know it’s Solomans fault for not putting them up properly( I tell them every night to do this) and it’s also my fault because I didn’t double-check, but they were from Clarkes and cost a fortune.

Luckily Malc and I were discussing shoes the other day and the need for feet to be measured and new ones bought, but we were going to check our bank account first, now Soloman has got to have a pair. I found his Doodles from last summer( in the loft) so he’s wearing them for a couple of days until I can get into town to get some more.

I’m severely tempted to take him over the field and hide behind a tree until he wanders off! Knowing him though he’ll just walk back home, honestly I’ve never had a dog like it.

We have a dog crate that the two youngest go in when we go out so that they don’t party whilst I’m gone, but I don’t like to put them in it at night. They actually come upstairs with us, now he doesn’t chew anything overnight, it’s always first thing in the morning whilst we’re all getting dressed. You can imagine, it’s quite busy here so we’re not watching him.

Usually on Wednesdays we don’t get a lot of school work done, it’s shopping day. By the time we’ve got there , shopped, gone through the till, got home and unpacked, we’re usually into the afternoon and there’s no hope of settling down to work.

But this morning the children did a good hour of workbooks, so that was a bonus.

Malc has gone to bed early, he doesn’t feel well, he thinks he’s coming down with a cold, I know he’s ill if he’s gone to bed. So I suppose I’ll have to put my wifey head on and try and find an old Lemsip and dish out lots of sympathetic noises!! A nurse I’m not, I’m quite compassionate with the children, but a 50 year old man with a cold, I’ve had five babies, for goodness sake, how much sympathy did I get? A cup of tea and a biscuit, that’s what I got, and he didn’t even make it, the midwife did!!

Eden’s gone out with Grandma this evening, she’s staying there for the night, but they’ve gone to my brothers Art Exhibition this evening, my brother’s a very talented artist, but there’s something extra-special about his work, I’m hoping that Eden will take some pictures of his work that I can post tomorrow and I’ll tell you all about it.

But for now, I’m off to find that Lemsip…..

Right onto next dog.

Medina is a cross breed, Saluki X Jack Russell, Jack Russell was the Mum and she had 6 puppies, clever girl.! Medina looks more like the Saluki so that’s the details I’ll include. Because they come from Saudi Arabia, again we looked at the map and decided we liked the name Medina.

Medina is six on 24th May ( easy to remember as it’s my sisters birthday too)

Salukis are named after the Arabian city of Saluk, now vanished beneath the sands. The pharaohs were said to have hunted with hawks on their wrists and Salukis on leads. Mummified remains of Salukis have been found in Egyptian tombs.

Temperament

The Saluki is even tempered. It might require obedience training to keep it’s deep rooted hunting instincts under control.

I can vouch for that, a bit of woodland and she’s off. Not the easiest dog to train, very stubborn. At the end of a walk I call "leads on " and all the dogs apart from Medina will come back, she wanders back and stands about 15 feet away and you have to walk that extra bit, she will not come to you. She’s very graceful and has a wonderful temperment, the children lay all over her and she’s very tolerant.

Todays News

The puppy’s been at it again, I came into the lounge this morning and the rotter had got my knitting bag, thankfully he hadn’t pulled any stitches off the needles, but he had got two balls of wool and completely tangled them up.

Both Eden and Malc have had a go at it, I think it could take a while.

The top four children did workbooks again this morning, Eden did division and a Suduko, Callum did hand writing and a wordsearch, Clark did addition up to ten, then some beginning sounds, "ch" "th" "sh" He had to match them up to the pictures. Soloman did some colouring.

Callum and Clark went shopping with Grandma, the rest of us walked to another library, that we sometimes go to, about 1 1/2 miles in the other direction of the other one. My wax jacket had an outing with the dogs, it’s a lot of road walking, so good lead practice for the younger two dogs.

Eden went to Brownies this evening, she’s only got another two weeks and she goes up to Guides, Lord , I can remember when she started Rainbows, where does the time go?

Anyway, I’m  hoping to get to bed before midnight tonight, somebody said on my first post that blogging’s addictive, they’re damn right! I dream about what I can put on my posts!! 

Last night I wrapped a Smartie birthday cake in wrapping paper, then brown paper ready to take to the post office to send this morning. My lovely little six month old puppy, had torn a corner, gone through both sets of paper, the box and eaten the whole bottom layer of the cake!  I sincerely hope he enjoyed it!

The children did work books this morning, and just to prove that they do actually receive an education, I took a picture of them.

The others usually work for about 2 hours,  usually maths/english although they do workbooks on other subjects. They usually do these in the morning so I can leave them and get on with other things, pegging washing out, hoovering etc.

They call me if they need me, but usually the older ones will help the younger one. Cody,the baby was playing with plastic food whilst they were doing this until Soloman joined him and it all goes pear shaped, fighting over a plastic sausage!!

Then we all did some ironing, I say all, Eden, Callum and I , they love ironing and I often have to fight to get possession of my iron! .

This afternoon we went to the library, I love our library, the staff are really helpful and friendly. They help us enormously when we need special books or imformation.

We were there for an hour, we usually book in and out at least 70 books, order a few more, the children play in the "kids Corner"

Today the staff had the children doing "jobs". Callum had to stamp some videos that they were putting out for sale, then he had to arrange them on a table. Clark helped him.

Eden was putting away the "returned" books.

Got home and had tea. The bottom two boys are asleep and the top three children are in Edens room, huddled round her computer, designing party invites for Clarks birthday party in a couple of weeks.

Well, I hope you’ve enjoyed your light relief, tomorrow we’re onto the next dog!!

I was thoroughly spoilt, lots of hand made cards, a lovely one that Callum made at Beavers with a photo of himself in uniform , where did my little boy go?

I was given White Musk smellies from Body Shop, flowers in a vase that Eden made at Brownies, and a greenhouse, one of those 4 tier ones that have a zip-up plastic cover. So in a couple of weeks time you’re all going to be bored with my pictures of seedlings!!

The children and I went to see an old neighbour of ours who was so lovely and I hated leaving, but we needed a bigger house, she’s not to far away though, we always get her a Special Friend Mothers Day card and a bunch of flowers.

She loves seeing the children and how they’ve grown.

Got home and the house looked lovely and smelt of roast pork which my hubby had cooked . I suppose I’d better name him, amongst others, affectionate and not so, he’s called, Malcolm, Malc for short. He cooked us a lovely dinner, which my Mum, my sister, partner and son all devoured, the two men then washed up.

All in all, a smashing day,shame it only happens once a year, I think Mothers Day should be monthly.

The DVD was lovely, lots of action, with the dogs running around, love, Greg and Swift had six georgous puppies, beautiful background scenery and even educational, we know how to shear and worm sheep now!

Off to have an early night, all this excitment doesn’t agree with me.

Rimini is our Rough Collie. a "Lassie" dog, she’s the tri-colour version, she is 14 yrs old this August.

Called Rimini because the breed were used in Italy as sheepdogs, so we got a map of Italy and studied all the names of the towns to find one we like.

Rimini is the only K.C. Registered dog we have( pedigree with papers) > she has a very posh full name.

 Arimini ( Rimini) Augusta( born in August) Amberglen( name of breeder)

We’ve had her since she was 7 weeks old.

Rimini made us front page news in our Evening Echo about 7 years ago, when she jumped over our back fence after being frightened by a firework that went off on Jan. 1st  about 10pm.  She made it to a train track near us and was missing for 3 days, we saw her but couldn’t get to her as she’d gone over the water.

Railtrack were useless and wouldn’t turn off the tracks so we could go and get her, they would if she electrocuted herself and died, apparently corpses block up the line !!

The R.S.P.C.A. were useless, (don’t even go there) unless your a celebrity or you’ve got someone with a video camera with you, forget it.

In the end my husband and Dad went to get her, they couldn’t find her, but a couple of hours later , we were at my parents house and their Golden Retriever wouldn’t stop barking, so Dad went to investigate, only to find Rimini standing at their front gate.

Goodness only knows why she went to their house and not home to ours, (we only lived about a mile apart.)

What makes this funnier looking back is that Hubby had broken his ankle and we were running everywhere trying to find her!!

Rough Collies

Originated in the Lowlands of Scotland.

Queen Victoria became enchanted with the breed when she visited Balmoral and took some back with her to Windsor Castle. The breed then became highly sought after, and even more so in the 1940’s when the breed was chosen to star as "Lassie" in the much loved films.

Temperament

A good-natured friendly dog, wary of strangers and very affectionate to it’s owner and family.

What the books don’t tell you is that they round up children like a sheepdog(especially crawling ones!) and their coat is a nightmare, I can get a carrier bag of hair out of her every night. Saying that, their coat is absolutely glorious when taken care of. ( There I go on about coats again!!)

Onto todays news.

This morning a lovely bouquet of flowers arrived for me, went to town to get Mums pressies, I think the children got me a couple more.  Lots of pictures to take tomorrow.

This evening we’re going to sit and watch a DVD that I was meant to recieve for my birthday, but it didn’t arrive in time, we picked it up today.

It’s a big blockbuster, lots of stars, A Year in the Life of a Working Sheepdog.

Have you stopped laughing yet? I’m hoping it will help me train my dogs! ( some hope!) It stars .. well.. dogs.. and a shepherd , hopefully in a wax jacket!

I read a book called "A Shepherds Watch" by a man called David Kennard, who farms in Devon, it told about sheep farming and the dying breed of shepherds, mainly because of the lack of money in sheep farming, I got it out of the library mainly because it was about dogs! But I couldn’t put it down.

This man has branched out into other fields to make ends meet, writing, making videos, breeding his dogs and he also holds sheepdog demonstrations on his farm during the summer months for tourists. ( Guess where our caravan going to be parked this summer?)

He has joined up with another man and they now do the sheepdog and a Bird of Prey demonstration together.

So, my evening is complete, sitting in front of a coal fire, with my hubby, my children, a DVD, dogs, more dogs, a shepherd and hopefully a wonderful array of wet weather outfits!!

Night!