Making friends and influencing people

Sunday brought us a church sandwich, with preaching in the morning and singing in the evening. Between the two Bob and H went off to a WWII event while J, L and I did some delivering and K and A stayed at home and did ‘cello, amongst other things. Hopefully Bob will put pictures up on flickr so we can find out what the event was like 😉

On Monday we missed gym in order to get to the (nominally monthly) HE rollerskating meet up. This was preceded by a talk about engineering, at which we had arranged to meet up with another German lad who is staying with a family from our old church and was hoping to spend some time with other teens. The talk was good, but the audience rather younger than expected, on the whole (a surprise to the speaker as much as to us, but he did well to hold everything together) so J was very happy to be told he can contact them whenever he likes for more ideas and help with projects he has planned 🙂 We spent some time admiring and handling an array of mobile phones through the ages, seeing how their size has reduced and reduced and is now increasing again.
Our plan to picnic in the park between talk and skate was scuppered by a sudden shower just as we pulled up at the park. We abandoned the idea and instead drove to our destination and ate in the car – not nearly as exciting even if the girls and I did discover some nice hidden paths between the buildings to explore. The skating was good though, and A enjoyed soft play with Jax’s littler ones while Jax and I did some Usborne planning 🙂

Tuesday was a quiet recovery kind of day, with lots of pottering and catching up, Brownies for A and L’s second session of fencing, which went well enough that they’ve asked her to continue and she’s agreed.

Wednesday was WedEd, where we designed and then played a board game based on a TEFL activity to get the Beans’ Spanish daughter and H to talk lots of good English. We also did some more on the Shakespeare lapbook (starting with a reminder of what we know about Shakespeare’s life, writing epitaphs using his as an example, then looking at what life was like for an Elizabethan actor and comparing that to actors nowadays) and those who wanted to do Maths with theBabs had the chance to do that too (J and K did and I had hoped that H would in the time he had left after I’d taken the K, L and A to choir, but I think he opted out). SB led a rather lovely art activity, drawing and colouring owls, and HH worked through experiments and conclusions with two different groups of chemists. It felt like a very useful and productive session, even though I had to drag three of my children away early!
K is now spending Weds library time (while the girls have choir) teaching his friend A music theory, with the incentive of an offer of payment by results when A passes his grade 5. This seems to be working well and he’s setting goals and targets like a pro 😉

Multisport started again on Thursday, which made a second day of extra time with other teens this week 🙂 The coaches were late getting there, thanks to bad traffic, so the session ran late – fortunately no trombone lesson to rush to afterwards meant this wasn’t a problem. The church have started laying on a coffee morning type thing for parents, which is lovely; we all sit and chat while the children do their sport and it’s been great to get to know a few people better, as well as to have some interesting chats with the church ladies too 🙂 Plus there are usually good biscuits 😉 This week I spent a fair bit of time chatting about Usborne, so it’s been feeling like an Usborne-chat kind of week – you never know, perhaps I’ll end up with the HE team I’ve been daydreaming about!
We got back in good time for A to get to gym while the others rushed around getting ready for band. It’s always a bit stressful trying to fit everything in with the added factor of traffic, but we’ve warned people at band that we’ll usually be late and it’s still worth going, if only because there’s nowhere else they’d get the same experience. H’s teacher is happy with his progress; K has now joined him for lessons and both boys should be able to move into band in a few weeks 🙂 J had a bit of a headache on the way over and took painkillers but unfortunately by the end of junior band he was a very odd colour and having visual disturbances as well, with what was clearly a migraine developing. Senior band didn’t seem a good plan, all in all, so he went home with the others to get an early night in a nice quiet, dark room.

Fridays start just a little too early most weeks, given the late-ish finish on Thursdays, with ‘cello lessons for A and K. The others usually get to take their time more though, as there’s not really time for me to crack the whip before we go 😉 L has violin in the afternoon, then L and A have choir, with K’s choir after that. This means H and J have the choice of coming in with us and working in the library or staying at home to do their own thing. So far they’ve always opted for the latter. I hope this means they’re working… I left a to do list on the board, because there was packing and sorting to be done as well as the usual work. I think I need a board which shouts reminders at people as they walk past!

This week has mostly been about getting an HTML 101 course done, which H, J, K and L have all been working through online. Once it’s completed they can sign up for the next one, which moves on to rather more advanced programming, apparently.

One of the reasons packing needed to be done early was that on Saturday Bob headed over to Kentwell with tents and his Tudor stuff while I took the children to a Have Your Say day at Addenbrooke’s. They were invited because of the research stuff we did there some months ago, and H was welcome too. While they discussed, debated and learned I rushed back home and loaded the car up with everything Bob hadn’t taken. If I’d known T41 would be there I’d have done that the night before so I could have spent a day with her 🙁 We did manage a nice chat over a cuppa though. The day ended at 3:30 with presentations and goody bags (rather impressive ones really – they were all pleased 🙂 ) and then we drove to Kentwell, aiming to get there at flagdown ready for unpacking, tea and then Scare Academy. Mission accomplished, with success 🙂

1 thought on “Making friends and influencing people”

  1. I’m glad we managed that chat at the beginning of the day. I forgot to tell you that my phone had no service in the waitrose (I’m wondering if they have a block there as the road outside was fine) so I didn’t get your text until walking back to the centre. I wouldn’t have been so slow had I realised you’d managed to pack the car quickly enough to give a bit of spare time at the end. X

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