christmas

Photography conditions are never great in our house even on the brightest of days but we love this scrappy garland so much that I had to show it

old decorations have come out

for some reason we do have a pink giraffe on top of our tree rather than the more traditional angel or star, blame it on father and daughter doing the tree decorating!

 a feathery home made angel

still writing christmas cards, crocheting snowflakes and a little bit of amigurumi which will hopefully become a snowman

We're going back past the wicker man for christmas so my blog space will be quiet for a week or so. 

I hope you have a wonderful christmas, (I'm hoping for a white one but I understand that not everyone feels the same way!!) See you in the New Year

Kate x

Stuff we're enjoying right now

Every year around this time we seem to get a lot more reading and bookish learning done.  Today in particular it has turned colder so we don't mind staying in and cosying up with a good cd

and this is a great one, it's entertaining and informative enough to make us want to find out more.  Today we listened to the piece about Galileo and it has inspired us to look for a galileo telescope kit so if anyone knows of a good one please let me know

I have begun my Open University course and am back to reading and then reading again, oh and then reading in a bit more detail!  But I'm enjoying Chekhov ( I can't say I have ever read or seen his plays before).

and Annis has bought a fabulous Julie West embroidery pattern from Sublime Stitching that is so cool and funky, that coupled with gold thread... who could resist.

oh and there's nothing I like to see more than a teenage reader.  The oldest (now at college) enjoyed reading but it's been a bit more of a struggle with this one.  Percy Jackson and the lightening thief seems to be doing the trick though.

and Annis has been crafting all by herself (poor thing) with her autumn finds from a lovely walk this morning in Morrab Gardens.

What are you finding to do now it's getting colder?

that autumn crafting feeling

Annis has got the knitting bug, she has three of these dolls but apparently that's just not enough!  The difference is that this time she wants to knit it herself from one of these lovely books

Then we remembered this sad half finished monkey that she got for christmas and began two years ago.  As far as I know grandma asks her if she's finished it yet every time we visit.  So, I put my foot down and said the monkey has to be finished before we move onto purl stitch.

See the speed she's knitting that monkey in her cheery mish mash home ed tshirt which she adores!

and in the dining room (I thought it was quiet) whole armies are being created

painting warhammer (another gift from two years ago that has just sat around half finished!).  All this leaves me a little time for blogging and...

a little time for embroidery.  I love autumn!

celebrating the diversity of home education

This morning I saw a link on our local home ed list to this article all about the proud  success of a fourteen year old home educated boy having been accepted at Cambridge.  After reading about this great acheivement I went through to see what my thirteen and ten year olds were doing

this is what I found

and no the banger is not in his mouth

I tried to upload the video but it just wouldn't work so I'm afraid you will have to imagine the end result

now, I and most other home educators know that we can pass this off as science, explosions, experimentation, animation, modelling, sculpting, art...  But I don't expect a letter from Cambridge in the next year or so!

rainy days and djeco

this blurry picture is showing the most gorgeous craft sets that Annis received for her birthday from this shop.  There is a stamping set, a stencilling set and a paint by numbers set. 

the stencilling set comes with a book of suggestions

and cards showing how to make patterns starting with a single motif

or you can totally do your own thing

it feels like a lesson in textile designing.  And there are plenty of the images to work on.  In fact, I think once you finish the images you would be ready to make your own.  The set comes with the most high quality double ended felt pens with a brush pen at the other end.  I can't recommend it enough!

The second set is a stamping set.  Again the images are beautiful (my favourite is the tightrope walker above) gorgeous stamps and red, gold and purple stamp pads. 

This also comes with a book of suggestions, but you don't have to follow it.  I was worried that this wouldn't entertain us (how could I resist trying it!) but it did, it's just as delightful as the first set and we took an hour to complete one picture each.  Annis also got a paint by numbers set from the same company and again the images are beautiful and the paints good quality but she hasn't tried it yet so I will blog about it when she has.