March just after the Spring Equinox

Beautiful day spent in the garden, digging out weeds (one particular weed that is unidentifiable and is killing my lawn - everything else like nettles, dandelions and so on are not "weeds" in my book), withSpringy and her friend doing Easter egg colouring in pictures, making a den and with the hens wandering about, Lily watching the hens (and occasionally having to be stopped from being overzealous with squashing Violet) and the 2 guineapigs grazing away again. Next door came over for a bit and we had even more children doing colouring and following round the animals. C went rowing around the harbour earlier in his little rowboat and then later he and I did some salsa dancing (well I tried - I usually step on him and then nearly fall over) to some music he'd found on the net. I watered the borders this evening (from the water butt which is starting to look low again) to aid the rose bushes and then listened to the song thrush singing his magnificent repertoire in the top of the big tree in the garden. There's now a mist over the fields and a pink haze in the sky.

Ronia

Today we started to read Ronia the Robber's Daughter by Astrid Lindgren.  I can't remember it although I'm about 80% certain that I read it as a child.  We love Pippi Longstocking here so I am hoping that Springy will enjoy reading about another character by the same author.

Springy also had an Irish dancing class today as next Saturday is St Patrick's Day.

Springy's latest hobby is...

A light thump, a whoosh and ...8, 9, 10, 11...

Yes, that's right it's skipping with a skipping rope.  She loves skipping in the house (although I'm trying to have some rules on that) and outside in the garden, especially on the trampoline.  I think it's great exercise for her and she really enjoys it.

 

Skylarks of Spring

Spring is here - just heard the skylarks in the field for the first time this year. I managed to get a quick glimpse of one and then my eyes failed tracking it. We also saw a buzzard chasing off another buzzard and the kestrel flew by a few times. I can feel the sap rising in the trees as the wind blew through the empty branches.

February 2011

The history of weights and measures is complicated but really fascinating. We've not done much on measures other than walking around the house seeing how many thumbs etc it would take to measure the table and so on. Then we demonstrated h...ow having different people's fingers, thumbs, elbows and so on would be not much use in terms of consistency so we got out rules and tape measures to work with inches and centimetres. We've weighed each other and covered it in baking. However, I'm reading up on the history of weights pounds, ounces and so on and trying to decide whether to try and approach this again later on in the year (after I've understood it myself but I now know where the d came from in old money, at least I think I do).

The crowsfoot is starting to appear and there are some wild primroses. There were 2 skylarks singing away over their territories. I'm soaked because i had to wash Lily (and remind me never to feed her sweetcorn again!) and Violet the Pekin bantam (very froo froo feathers so she gets really dirty - like a feather duster).

22nd February - Springy and I had a great time at the Willow workshop. The morning was spent harvesting willow withies (well I mainly watched whilst Springy had a go). We then helped the group to plant some willow withies in the ground. Then it was lunch. We then helped build a willow dome and she had a great time doing some gardening (mainly digging soil) in the greenhouse (an industrial one).

 18th February - we had a lovely ML this morning. We sang our morning verse and then did a poem on Spring and a movement verse on horses. Springy then worked on nouns. After that I went to my yoga class and that wiped me out so I had an afternoon nap.

Lambing

This morning we went to see the newborn lambs at a local organic farm.  They had several hundred sheep in the flock.  The ewes had loads of lambs and all were adorable.  We saw some that were 5 minutes old with the umbilical and placenta still on show.  Fresh hay was being given to the ewes and there were lots of lambs skipping about with their dangly tales.  I got several large bags of lambs' wool to use for needlefelting and dyeing.  It's of no use for spinning because it's a second shearing (too short).  However, I was so happy because I got it for free.

Spring has sprung

We've had a lovely day. I did a blackboard drawing yesterday (I'm not very good at drawing but always have a go) in anticipation of the Spring Equinox and drew a daffodil and a primrose and also a night sky with moon and stars and a sun in a paler blue sky.

I wrote down:
SPRING EQUINOX
NIGHT = DAY

and we talked about spring. Springy came up with the following words that remind her of spring:

birds, flower, warm, sun, daffodil, hyacinth, primrose, tulip, lamb

Then I asked her to use her magic book (main lesson book) to do a picture in. She got frustrated by it so we used some ordinary sheets of paper for her to practice on first. She still hasn't put a picture (apart from a partially drawn robin) in the magic book but it may take a few days. Then I asked her to go out in the garden and count how many daffodils there are. She found 5 patches of them and then I asked her to count them because the fairies need to know how many there are in each patch. We did a bit of mental arithmetic adding up how many altogether. Lily-pup was out there with her, charging about and stopping to listen to birds, trying to get the chickens (who are in the run) to play with her and then Springy made a mud pie. Yum to mud pies - every child should make mud pies. I asked Springy to wear a hat because the sun is strong enough to be a summer's day today.

An Egg...and Hares...nearly Easter

Our little frizzle feathered pullet became a hen today as she laid her first egg (technically she has to be a year old to be a hen but I feel that the act of laying an egg is a rite of passage from being a girl to a woman!).

Springy knew Frazzle had gone broody and ensured she was sat in the nest box undisturbed. An hour later Springy went back out and found the little pale brown egg (pale brown is the colour of her ears).

Springy ate the egg with a potato cake for her lunch - yummy!

On our puppy walk this morning we saw some March hares in the field. It seemed to be a female and three males (the females are the ones that box and I told Springy it's because the boy hares all want to marry her but she has to be very tough with them).

Puppies and poopies

We're having a backwards step with the puppy at the moment, although she has managed to get her poopies in the right place...mostly. However, wees are going all over the kitchen floor! We've had some lovely walks so far and puppy is responding to "Sit", "Down", "Come" and today we managed a first "Roll over" in terms of doing the first stage of the move. She's a bright little puppy but Springy is a little jealous of her at times (which has been interesting).

Springy has had a nice weekend and we went to visit some friends we haven't seen in ages for a playdate and they came around today too. It was really nice and they were very interested in the puppy.

Today I wanted to do some gardening but instead the weather stopped it as we had galeforce winds (after a lovely morning start). I really want to clear up the front because I left all the Michaelmas daisies in place for all the insects etc but now the front needs a good tidy up. I'd also like to have a few more primroses in place and cut back things that are stopping the light from reaching the rose bushes and so on. Instead, I had a nap...just fell asleep on the sofa with sheer exhaustion.

Springy needs to do a little bit more knitting than she has been. She's reading My Secret Unicorn: The Magic Spell. Apparently, it's good and I've been reading the Rainbow Magic books.

We watched Prince Caspian - talk about inappropriate for under 12s! It was incredibly violent (I did read these books as an under 10 year old but don't remember them being graphically violent but...it just irritates me that the film classification was so wrong). Anyway, I've said no to any more viewings of it (we borrowed it from the library and C chose it). I want to read The Hobbit to Springy but there is no way I will allow a viewing of The Lord of the Rings. I'd ideally like her to be able to read the books first. I've told her if she wants to see Harry Potter films she has to read the books first (which should take long enough in years).

She's also reading Animal Ark: Hamster in a Hamper by Lucy Daniels (actually by a book company who have utilised the name for a whole series). Because I work part-time as an editor it makes it really difficult for me to read books these days because if I'm working on one I have to focus myself entirely on that otherwise I get the plots muddled up between books. It's a bit annoying having to wait until the next book is finished and I got a book from the library called The Various which looks quite good.

Brownies was really good again - the theme was St David's Day and Springy dressed in red for the Welsh dragon. We had Welsh cakes too.

Drawing and Form Drawing

This is a very useful article on drawing at the Waldorf Library:

http://www.waldorflibrary.org/Journal_Articles/drawing.pdf

Today we got up, had porridge for breakfast and Springy went outside straight afterwards and found a pill millipede which she put on her hand, with the hope that it would uncurl and move. It didn't so she went a bit later to watch her wren's nest. She noticed that all the moss in the wren's nest had been pulled out but didn't tell me until this afternoon and it looks like the stoat has been there, taken all the babies and destroyed the nest. There is a stoat poo underneath the nest and we'd seen the stoat yesterday evening going through the flower bed. Springy was upset but we said that that is nature because the stoat has babies to feed too.

We went to the duck pond later and Springy saw some beautiful little ducklings. She was feeding them and they came very close and she was able to reach out and touch them several times which made her really pleased (she got very grubby knees from leaning over). It turns out that our own Mrs Duck is nesting next door to us now - hooray! We hope that she is well hidden and that her babies will hatch soon.

Re: Looking for lost things

Springy has been hilarious this weekend. She's really into telling jokes at the moment - at first they were not funny e.g. Why did the rabbit cross the road? Because it left it's car there! but she's slowly adding in more funny ones, the traditional jokes of childhood that I remember. For instance, she has been telling her Grandpa "Will you remember me in a day? ...a week? ...a month? ...a year?" to which Grandpa responds Yes and then Springy does the "Knock, knock" and Grandpa responds with "Who's there?" ...see you forgot me already... I also taught her a new one today which was to do a gulping noise with your throat and ask what bird is it. It's a swallow!

As I'm typing this Springy is playing before bedtime and the sky is a beautiful lilac, pink and orange colour. I'm hoping that means "Red sky at night, shepherd's delight" and that tomorrow will be a glorious day.

C lost his voice to laryngitis this weekend and Springy wondered whether he had lost his voice under his side of the bed. It was so sweet to hear her say this.

In our garden we have a wren's nest in the ivy. Springy has been watching the parent birds go in and out, bringing food to their chicks. The chicks seem to consist of large beaks, either in closed or open mode. The goldfinches have been fabulous this year - they are like clockwork birds at times with their funny little dances. We also have a baby wood pigeon who is now a fledgling but is still being cared for by her parents. Many of the birds seem to have no fear of Springy.

Springy has been watching the bees on the comfrey and in the foxgloves too. I told her to listen to the bees when they go in the foxglove because the buzzing noise makes more of a ringing sound. It is no wonder that foxgloves are considered fairy flowers in folklore.

This morning's maths lesson was about division. We had iced gem biscuits (a rare event) on a plate and I asked Springy to divide them between her, me and 2 toy dogs.

A glorious spring day for Springy

Today was about 18 deg C and although there were some slight westerly winds it was warm. We now have Mrs Duck nesting outside our front door. She is hidden in the herb patch there and is very well camoflauged - just not quite enough for humans going past with shopping. Springy thinks it is very exciting to have Mrs Duck nest there.

We went for a 2-hour walk yesterday and spotted cherry blossoms, a few butterflies, bees and so on. Springy wanted to do it again but instead we went to see N and went on a little walk with her instead. The dandelion flowers are bursting out, in time for Beltaine. I love seeing them and Springy found a piece of petal from one, asked what it was and I told her to look closer at the dandelions; she realised it was part of the flower.

We practised our piano earlier - Springy can manage Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star fairly well but she is struggling with Frere Jacques. I noticed that I have started to remember the note positions and am naming them as I play. I hope to get to a level whereby I can play simple nursery rhyme piano from books like Sing Through the Day.

Beaver Scouts has started again this week which is great for Springy. She was talking about having a dog today because then she would "have someone to play with all the time". It's not easy being an only one, if you want to have a brother and sister, and I guess a dog is a good substitute. I'd rather have another baby than a dog though, but the latter may be easier to attain!

Swallows and Bunny rabbits

This morning, whilst I was washing up, I spotted a tiny bunny rabbit on our patio area. I called for Springy but I think the sound must have carried down the sink, down the pipes and out of the outside drain because Baby Bunny ran away.

Springy participated in a St George's Day parade today. It was a scouting and guides thing - lots of flags and lots of tiny Beavers/Rainbows, larger Cubs/Brownies and even taller Scouts/Guides joined in. Springy enjoyed it. We participated in a Church of England thing which was a bit weird - I wish the religious stuff didn't have to come into it. They sang the Lord of the Dance which I always feel is neutral and uplifting in its stance. However, some of the other hymns just were full of "sin" and "smiting" which I cannot stand - Victorian killjoy/superstitous desert deity nonsense. Anyway, I don't think the lady next to me in the pew was happy - I noticed her giving me looks because I didn't sing with the hymns (actually I did - one of them I changed to Sing Susanna, Sing Susanna...to the Lord of the Rings) and wouldn't do the prayers either. The Scout/Guide movement in this country seems to be chockablock full of religious zealots and bigots (not all, thank goodness but there are many) - it's Christianity or you're a godless heathen and therefore evil. If I had been Jewish, Hindu, Buddhist, Moslem and so on, the whole thing was exclusive rather than inclusive and...well they just don't get how out-of-date they are when they don't need to be. Morals and kindness are not part of a religion - they are a natural part of human nature and you don't need superstition or supernatural deities to threaten people with in order to be kind and pleasant.

Anyway, little rant over. I was looking outside this evening and up in the sky there was the first swallow of the season. I yelled for C and Springy to have a look too.

Spring is here

Today has been a beautiful day in terms of what happened and the weather. I'm writing this with a big, fat wood pigeon looking in at me through the window (and who also nibbles the shoots on the blossom tree). It's 7pm and the sun is still shining and hasn't started to set yet.

Springy and I ate doughnuts today - a special treat. We also went grocery shopping - butchers and to the greengrocers and also took N to her favourite food place for her shopping.

Springy had a lovely walk with our neighbour. They were looking for a missing dog that had run off and had taken a scarf ready to tie him up with (not likely since it was a missing setter, who are very slippery at being caught!).

We have a hedgehog living in our garden. He or she has a little nest near the fence and is on occasion popping out. I'm not sure whether or not they are really meant to about during the day but she (Springy has named her Sarah the Hedgehog) seems to only stay out for a short burst of time. I'm keeping an eye on her to see if there are any health issues, like a runny nose. ~We may get some meat and cut up a small portion and place it in a bowl near the nest. Home education is ideal for nature watching.

April Snow Showers

Today it snowed. Springy woke us up with "Mummy, Daddy, look outside, it snowed" and was ever so excited. She's never seen so much snow before. I got her dressed as quick as possible so she could go outside. She stood in the garden and was in that childhood place of wonder and awe. The snow was flurrying down on her and she did the picking up snow, looking at the bird tracks on the lawn, catching the snow in her mouth and all that. Then she went nextdoor and had a snowball fight. She got hit in the face at one point and although a little tearful, as it had hit her eye, she pulled through.

The only problem was when we got back inside. She'd been out a little too long and her gloves were wet and her hands had gone icy cold. Anyway, we wrapped her in blankets, gave her hugs and I made a lukewarm Ovaltine to help her energy levels.

The snow didn't last for long and by the afternoon, although it was still cold, the sky was blue and the sun was out with the only signs of snow along the north facing fence and hedges.

I'm so glad she saw the snow.

Re: Spring walks

We have had a lovely day today so far. Last night we had a gorgeous beef and vegetable stew, all homemade, with pot barley too. Today we had a lazy morning as the clocks have sprung forward. Springy and I had our breakfast whilst watching Nigel Marven's Polar Bear Adventures and after seeing this we reckon that polar bears look very cuddly.

Our first main task was to go and look after our neighbour's guineapigs which was great fun. Springy was so happy because they have some baby guineapigs and she was able to hold and cuddle them. We watched them for quite a while - they are such fascinating little creatures. Then we came back to our house and let our guineapigs out in their run and gave them some cuddles too. After this (and having had lunch) we went to the big water and fed the ducks and swans. The dominant cob there came out and we handfed him. He had his fill of brown wholemeal and some wheat grain too and then set out to preen himself. He was using his oil gland on his rump to coat and clean his feathers and he looked so fluffy and babylike (very large baby!). It's lovely to see him because we've known him since he was a cygnet, although one is very aware that he requires a lot of respect.

After that we went for a walk in the woods. We visited the pond and found some frogspawn, although we saw a newt in amongst it so perhaps it is newtspawn. We saw lots and lots of pondsnails as well, which kept Springy fascinated. The bird song there was glorious and we also saw a goldcrest (tinier than a wren) - fairy birds:

http://www.garden-birds.co.uk/birds/goldcrest.htm

In my opinion, it is so important for children and adults to go out into nature on a regular basis and find out about their local environment. Even in a city there are parks but we're lucky in that we live in a fairly rural area so we have a lot of choice as to where to go. We also have a garden which, although unpleasant in the winter (like a wind tunnel), is a delight in the spring, summer and autumn.

Chocolate and play

I'm hoping to visit this place soon: it's called Demel in Vienna and it is a delicious cafe haus.
http://www.demel.at/en/frames/index_demel.htm


I love sachertorte.

This is an interesting article on play:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=19212514

Re: Spring has arrived... for now

We have had lovely weather so far. Our daffodils are already out and the crocuses are peaking like baby birds, with their yellow beaks wide open.

Springy was invested in the Beavers this week. She said her promise:

I promise to do my best
To be kind and helpful
and to do my duty to good.

Today (Wednesday, 6th) Springy and I did quite a few beanbag games, performed a puppet play together (using the sea puppets from Ikea) and then went out into the garden. We put the guineapigs in their run and whilst I cleaned out their home, Springy played with them. Then I mowed some of the dry parts of the lawn so it looks a lot neater. Springy watched as I gathered nettles and took them inside to make a nettle vinegar - we also got stung. Later on in the afternoon I waited here for the courier to arrive so Daddy took Springy out to the harbour to feed the ducks, then to get some shopping.

The last few days have been fabulous in terms of the weather. It's been so sunny and the guineapigs have been out again. Springy and I put down some turf today (recycled from where it has grown over flagstones - she watered it and I hope it will patch up some of the bare patches in the garden. We've been planting some more bulbs (gladioli) and have sorted some of the pots out ready for planting later in the season. We have a new lavender and I got some thyme too (it's a very handy medicinal and culinary herb). We made nettle vinegar (gather spring nettle tops, place in jar as full as you can and then add apple cider vinegar - seal for a month or two before using as a salad dressing).

I've been reading through issue 2 of the Living Crafts magazine (http://www.livingcrafts.com/). It's such a lovely read and also many of the crafts in it are simple enough to say "Yes, I'm going to have a go" to (and we have been). I've lost issue 1 and I can't find the Story of the Root Children either (which is not good because it is a perfect seasonal story).

I've been telling Springy the poem Princess Spring from the Enki kindergarten curriculum as well.

Easter and Spring crafts

Craft things to make:

felt a bar of soap (spring cleaning)
take bar of glycerine based soap and felt around with wool

make a fairy garden
take a plant pot drainage tray, add soil, use wheat grains to grow some grass with and decorate (with Springy) with shells, stones etc
or (which we've already done) take a bowl, fill with fine playsand, add some glitter, wool, stones and so on - for winter we made a snow scene with some white modelling clay (snowman), white wool, a pipe cleaner sheep and some brown and red for a robin (use cut down cocktail sticks to prop up figures if necessary) . For Spring you could fill with the sand, use some green wool and a yellow pompom or yellow clay to make a little chick or some flowers.

Felt egg (and add little chick from yellow wool or pompom for Easter Sunday)
i)Tightly wind wool around a small rock (for the egg shape), wind layers thinly and have lots.
ii) when it is thick enough (about 1/2") put the 'egg' into hot soapy water. Keep it in your hand and squeeze the water in and out from it.
iii) After a few minutes place it into a cold water bath squeeze - do the hot and cold several times more.
iv) Squeeze the water out
v) Leave to dry (I put my wet felting things on a flannel in the airing cupboard)

Spring 2007

Spring has arrived and although we are away from home on a holiday to grandparents at the moment, here is what our Spring looks like.

First off, we are growing a bean (planted on a waxing moon) plant. Daughter has been very interested in watching it from the first shoots to when we left it the other day with about 6 leaves.

We have also grown a Triops, called Candle, from an egg. He (or she) was the only one to hatch and daughter has been enjoying feeding Candle every day. She has learned about cleaning it out (I do it but she helps by ensuring I don't catch it in the cleaning pot) and had to patiently wait before it hatched. It's a fascinating little creature (it's a type of crustacean) and it zooms about its little tank and when it finds food it gets very excited, homes in on it, grabs the food and swims on its back (a bit like a sea otter). They are a lot of responsibility so not recommended for families who won't look after them properly!

We also are using some stories and songs as a regular part of our rhythm:

Princess Spring - Enki Education
The Story of the Root Children - Sybylle Van Olfers
Pelle's New Suit - Elsa Beskow

I also ordered a bag of fleece and some mini carders. We washed the fleece by soaking in warm water and washing up liquid (Ecover) - soak and don't rub unless you want felt. We dried it and then carded it. I've tried to spin it on a drop spindle but that isn't working (well it works but I don't know how to do it right, despite some good instructions).

Daughter has also seen some spring lambs who were just a day old.

Easter is only a few days away and gifts this year are toothpaste (Weleda calendula and Green People Orange), a little knitted rabbit (homemade), a wooden orange, and some felt egg cosies (which we need to make).