Tuesday 1 May 2007

Catch up

I don't know what has happened to this last week. It has disappeared in the flurry of activity around workmen and appointments. It has all been happening - our kitchen units have been fitted, the back garden has been turfed, the man from Story Carpets has been back again to look at the problems, we've been to the dentist and optician...and so it goes on...it's been a busy one.

I thought I had best try to catch up here but don't really feel I've the energy right now after a lovely long day in the sunshine so it's more just the bits I remember.

Rainbows is still going well. Hermione appeared slightly reluctant to go along the other day but came back in very high spirits and looking forward to next week. Badgers is also a big hit. The girls received some forms to complete this week to get their first badge. It's a basic welcome badge, they just have to write out the set rules and say their Badger Promise. Starting from next week the whole set will be working towards their entertainment badge for sixteen weeks. All sounds like good fun.


Today we have spent most of the day in the garden. The weather has been fabulous. We did come in for a short while this morning while Miles was napping to enjoy a story from Circle Round about the origins of the maypole. Hermione would like to go maypole dancing. We usually do at Cherryburn but that is a bit of a hike this year. Will have to ask around and see if anything is happening locally on bank holiday. If not we may have to make one.
We made a start on our garden diaries which I printed off as a free ebook from here http://www.homeschoolestore.com/catalog/index.php . We filled in the part about the seeds we have planted so far and wrote a little about the wildlife in our garden. We then went out into the garden to look at what was happening with the veg in particular and took some photographs of them. We will take more pictures as things grow and possibly make a bit of a scrap book come autumn.
I decided to point out the wild garlic in our garden to the girls. They hadn't realised it was a form of garlic, they just thought it was a flower which smells really bad. After the standard chat about safety and when to eat wild and not to eat wild, we picked some and added it to our salad for lunch. We all enjoyed it. The girls enjoyed it so much so that they decided to pick more for with dinner tonight. Unfortunately that was a bit of an overload and I fear they won't want it again for a long while. Never mind, I think we will try the hawthorn leaves next. Where does foraging come up on the National Curriculum? Is there a box we can tick for this?


There is quite a lot going on in the garden right now. The beans are bursting into life, the potato leaves are showing, the onions are coming on nicely and the couple of herbs we do have are filling out. We have magpies, doves, wood pidgeons and a wren nesting in the garden - those are the ones I know of. All in all a hive of activity!
Today felt like a good day to watch a programme I had taped from BBC Schools TV ages ago about growing rice and tea in Bangladesh. It was just a short programme of about fifteen minutes. We watched it together and all enjoyed it. It showed how in some places the rice grain is still separated from the stalk by the pounding of buffalo hooves. It was very interesting.
I've prepared some bits and pieces for tomorrow. We really do need to get back into the FIAR routine. The girls both asked for a new learning book today. I have decided we are going to start A Pair of Red Clogs by Masako Matsuno next week.
One of these days I am going to figure out how to do links properly on this thing.






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