Actually, looking at the calendar, it’s not been as long since my last post as I had feared. This is almost regular blogging 😉 Nonetheless this will be a quick catch-up, not least because I have a borderline migraine…
The main focus last week was getting the first three activities for the Shakespeare laptops completed: a timeline, a biography and the outline of a vocabulary section. All five children now have that done ready for next WedEd when we’ll move on to looking at the context of Shakespeare’s plays and then to looking at some of the plays themselves. H, J, K and L have also all been working through an HTML 101 course online, with a view to moving on to doing more programming if they wish to, once they’ve finished that course. Music practices are getting back on track too, after a bit of a hiatus over the summer, and H is getting good value from his monthly pass by fitting in as many swims as he can.
Monday was the first HE gym session this academic year. H, K, L and A all took part, while J opted for IGCSE English work(if he’s to take it this year then he needs to cover pretty much all the work before he goes to Germany, which is quite a tall order) and I had a lovely chat with Merry 🙂 The coaches said that next time they’ll know to expect older boys and will have some equipment and ideas ready for them, rather than having to make it up on the spot. That won’t be for a couple of weeks (gym is on but we’ll be elsewhere) but should make the sessions well worthwhile 🙂
On Tuesday A had an appointment for a filling 🙁 The dentist again told me off and said it must be diet and I again pointed out that A’s diet is the same as the boys’ (who have no fillings), that we very rarely have fizzy drinks, fruit juice or sweets, that she cleans her teeth well (he has even commented on how clean her teeth are) and doesn’t eat between meals any more (since that was the only area we could see which could be improved). In the end he conceded that it probably wasn’t a problem with diet after all and has prescribed her a mouthwash to try, in hopes that it might help to protect her teeth a little more.
In the evening L had her first fencing session, having been talent-scouted from the beginner sessions we did over the summer 😉 This meant that I had to get J and H to take A to Brownies, since the timings exactly clashed. L loved it and is keen to go back, so I fear we may have found yet another way to use up time and money! We’ll give it a term, and then maybe a year, and then see where we’re at.
Wednesday started early for me, driving over to my mentor’s house to get a lift to Usborne Head Office for training. We had a fabulous day, including meeting various HO staff, getting our hands on some as-yet-unavailable books (there are some corkers coming up!) and gaining lots of motivation. I now have a 90 day plan and I’m not afraid to use it 😉
Meanwhile Bob worked from home while the children educated themselves (I think most of what they did was educational…)
We had planned to get to the HE multisport we don’t usually go to, to see if it was something we wanted to do this term, but although everybody else was up and working at a reasonable time H remained sound asleep until noon and none of us had the heart to wake him, so we missed it! Instead we did lots of concentrated work to make up for lost time 😉 Then in the evening A had gym, I cooked a quick tea, we scooped her up and headed off to band. K is starting on euphonium, as a stepping stone to tuba, so he joined H in his lesson while the others were in junior band. there was no senior band, as they had a gig, so J didn’t need to stay.
Cello first thing on Friday for A and K – Gill started them both on pieces for their next grades (7 for K, 2 for A) so they’ve plenty to get on with in practices 😉 We delivered an Usborne book on the way back, fortunately as it happens, since the detour that involved took us away from our usual route which was at a standstill due to an accident. Bob came home at lunchtime and worked from home for the afternoon so as to be ready to take the boys to London for an evening of science-based stand-up. A last minute change of plan on discovering that a) my sister was in London for the evening and b) K would still be needed in Fri choir and Thurs choir discontinued meant that his ticket went to her and K came with us to choir, via L’s violin lesson.
No chance to sleep in on Saturday! The girls had music school, H and J their first day of volunteering at the cafe, Bob and K were covering an Usborne event for me and I was sorting out and adapting Tudor clothes for the girls and me to be visitors at a heritage event featuring a visit from the Lord Protector himself, Oliver Cromwell! That’s how we spent the afternoon, giving out biscott and little cups of that new-fangled spiced drink chocolate, collecting in donations and playing with little R, who was finding his feet but not always reliably, so clung to fingers in a very endearing way, then had to be rescued from unexpected bicycles!
