Roman Palace

Today we went to the Fishbourne Roman Palace and Springy joined the Roman Army. She had to learn archery, slingshot, sword, spear and took part in a drill. She also ate Roman style food and made a poultice in her brief Roman medicine lesson. She rode a Roman horse (wooden but with a Roman soldier hat) and we played 9-...Man Morris. She even got paid her day's coinage and became a Roman citizen!

Walks in the Mist

Today we went on 2 walks down the farm path (including one this evening with the torch - we even had "pirate" mist). We also made purple almondoil/lavender essential oil soap, discussed hibernation, did some sorting out and played with the Sylvanian families amongst other things.

RIP Frazzle

Our beloved Frizzle-feathered Pekin Bantam - Frazzle - died. We're really going to miss her. She would follow us around, come up to the back door and would sometimes wander into the kitchen on her quest for maize. When we first got her she would follow Springy all over the garden...

Today our beautiful Sarah guineapig passed away. Springy and I both keeping crying because we will miss her very much. I knew last night that today would be her last and she went this morning. We've buried her in the front garden under the comfrey and by the roses. Our other guineapig Rose is going to need a lot more cuddles now that she on her own without her sister.

Lovely blog with bee feature

http://naturenest.wordpress.com/category/animals/bees/

and this:

http://web.me.com/meaningfulmathbooks1/Site/Lower_School_Math.html

and this article:
http://opencreativity.open.ac.uk/assets/pdf/strathclyde/Learning%20to%20think%20in%20Steiner.pdf

And this on rainbow writing:

http://faeriedust2001.blogspot.com/2005/11/rainbow-sentences.html

Writing workshop

Springy had a writing workshop at the library today. It was quite funny to see her roll her eyes at the boys who were not listening. She was the only girl there so I wasn't sure if she wanted to stay or whether the subject (a book she hadn't read called beast Quest) was of interest. However, she enjoyed it all and wrote a great amount of detail.

We had a bedtime story last night about a boy and his mud horse. It was from the Enki Education curriculum but I'm certain I've seen the story elsewhere too.

I'm reading a Robert Holdstock book at the moment and want to make another foray into Middle Earth to read The Hobbit. I want some sunshine days to happen next week. I'd like to hire a Rug Doctor to clean our carpets and for that I need good weather. I also want to wash all the bedding and towels again at a 60 deg C wash.

I want to tidy up the garden, mow the lawn and tidy up our lounge so that we can access the blackboard again. I wish I could work out how to re-arrange our home to make it easier to organise everything.

Springy painted a shoebox tonight and decorated it. I think it's meant to be a new room for her Sylvanians or her dollshouse folk.

The Cat Who Decided

We still have our gorgeous dog. She's such an adorable dog, with spaniel-like ears and looks nothing like a Shih Tzu and more like a Tibetan Spaniel. She's out for a walk now with C and Springy. She can do high fives, sit, down, jump, woof and so on.

Our last read aloud was The Cat Who Decided by Margaret Forrester and at the end I cried. It was a wonderful story about a cat who does indeed get to decide on who his family is.

We just got Miquon Maths - the red and the blue book which I hope is the level where Springy is at and a little bit extra. We also have the Sonlight Science kit and Instructors Guides. I'm managing quite well with removing the Creationism stuff and don't feel at all offended by its inclusion (each to their own is something I've learnt a lot of with home education).

I just found these mandalas for Springy:
http://www.kidsweb.de/basteln/mandala/tier_mandala.htm

Springy's two wonderful Beaver leaders left this term and she made a knitting fork belt for each of them as a gift. She's really good at doing that now. I just need to get my confidence up with regular knitting so that she feels more confident about it (she can do it). I'm using feather yarn to make a scarf at the moment. It's really difficult to use as it's difficult to see and feel the stitches. However, I hope that when it is ready then Springy can use it as a dressing up item and pretend to be a bird with wings etc.

We have some new books for Springy - Magic Hoofbeats, The Year of Miss Agnes and some kind of unicorn book (from a series) called The Magic Bracelet. I need to get her book 1 of the latter though as I didn't realise they were a series. I've been using the Sonlight reading list ideas along with Chinaberry. It's a shame neither have a UK branch but it would be too costly to buy from them direct and then have them shipped over.