An afternoon of culture

Undeterred by the hat fiasco, I have been knitting, but I haven't yet taken a photo of the progress. I designed a vest (waistcoat) pattern in garter stitch, using the James C Brett Marble yarn. I swatched with #7 and #8 US needles and preferred the #8. I have started work on the back and I promise to get a photo tomorrow during the hours of daylight to show you.

I am having to be careful when moving my stitches up as the aluminum needles are a little sharp and have once again punctured my right index finger. It is sore but I can knit as long as I remember NOT to press down on the tip of the needle with the same fingertip.

It's been ages since we went out anywhere for a "field trip" so this afternoon I took the boys around the "cultural" part of downtown. It was a mild sunny day and therefore perfect for walking around town. We started at the museum, where a friend and her son met us. Part of the exhibition was about the local hospital and we were fascinated by this ...
an iron lung. This one was actually used by a local man who contracted polio back in the fifties and he spent 20 years in it!!!

There was a reconstruction of an old-time doctor's surgery ...

Ninja Boy was most interested in the guns (he took these photos) ...

The weapon at the top of the above photo had a barrel about six feet long! I can't imagine how one would manage to support that and fire it at the same time.
This machine (below) is called a fluoroscope. It is an X ray machine that was once used as a shoe-selling gimmick. Shoe stores had them, presumably so people could try shoes on and X ray their feet to make sure they fit well. This was before they realised the dangers of radiation. Apparently the machines were not regulated and gave out varying degrees of radiation and the salespeople in the store were the most at risk, being exposed regularly. They were quietly phased out eventually.After this museum, we walked to the Orchard museum, which includes an extensive model railway. After the boys had made the train go round the tracks a few times, we moved on to the art gallery. (above...part of the model railway)

The art gallery had a members' exhibition and another by a local artist. There was also a giant chair, taller than the building itself, in a courtyard outside. It was made from wood held together with the metal panels that are used to join roof supports. I'm sure if the kids had been able to get out there, they would have enjoyed climbing up it!

They goofed around a bit in the art gallery but I was able to get them to focus on some of the art for long enough to get them interested. They were impressed with a soapstone sculpture of a pair of hands and a painting of a fantasy landscape with dragons.

The plan was originally to go to the library, but we bypassed that and went for a drink at a coffee shop instead. We do that rarely enough that it's quite a treat!

Je vais mourir de honte!

I love that phrase! It means "I'm going to die of shame" in French. For a bit of fun, the boys and I have been reading Robert Munsch books from the library. We have been getting them as book/CD kits, so we listen to a page then I do a rough translation (my French is a little rusty), pointing out particular French words to them. In the book "Ma Mere Exagere" the boy is dying of shame on almost every page, thanks to his mother's behaviour at the mall.

Anyway, tonight I noticed that I, the queen of criticism when it comes to spelling mistakes, typos, grammatical errors, et al, made a mistake in one of the sidebar page elements. Oops! I have corrected it, and while I was at it I updated middle son's age, as he recently had a birthday.

For those who wish to email me rather than leave a comment on the blog, I have added a clickable link below my profile on the left which will automatically take you into your email program and insert my email address (a new gmail account that I have set up especially for the purpose). I hope this won't increase my spam! Kudos to my Computer Geek son for knowing the html code to type in to get this set up :-)

A little designing

I'm grabbing the opportunity for a mid-afternoon post while the two younger boys procrastinate instead of finishing their math. Today they're learning how to multiply and divide decimals - not too hard once you know where to put the decimal point in the answer. However they are busy goofing around with my exercise ball instead.

Yesterday afternoon I knitted up a gauge swatch with some Sirdar Just Bamboo which I've had for months. I only have four 50gram balls so can't make anything particularly big, but after seeing a cute little garter stitch baby sweater in Weekend Knitting I thought I'd have enough for something similar. Borrowing the measurements from the schematic, I sketched out a design for a sleeveless baby top with a hood.

The back and front are very simple, both the same shape, with a slit opening at the front to allow extra room for the baby's head to go through. When I've knitted them and joined them together, I'll pick up stitches around the neck and knit a hood. Not sure exactly how yet, but I'll figure it out as I go.

I'm knitting it in garter stitch from side to side - that'll make the stitch-picking-up part easy. One stitch for each ridge around the neckline.

I've made good progress on the back since I photographed this yesterday, but I'm very close to the end of the first ball and I'm hoping I'll have enough yarn.

Arty morning

We have settled into a bit of a routine around here in the mornings. The two younger boys are getting into the habit of expecting some "schooly" stuff, and we're splitting our time between Math, French, English and History, with some handwriting practice mixed in.

They are making slower progress on the Grade 5 math workbook than the previous two. There's been some new stuff to learn with long names, like "prime factorization"! For French, we're using one of our Usborne books and they are writing out all the new words in their notebooks. For English, we have another Usborne book (when I was an Usborne consultant, I decided you could build a whole curriculum around their books) called Better English. And for History, we're reading Story of the World. Now we're on Volume Two, the Middle Ages. We're not doing a lot of supplementary reading, but we have googled a few things, for example photos of the temple called Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, which we had read about. The Story of the World is also sparking some interesting conversations.

This morning, Lego Nut asked for the beading supplies. (I know he's been up to something because he banned me from his bedroom....something to do with my birthday coming up in a couple of weeks.) Once the beads were out, Ninja Boy wanted to play too, and so did I!

I decided that it was therefore going to be an Art morning - forget the academics for one day. Out came the tubes of acrylic paint that Computer Geek had recently cleared out of his room and we enjoyed creating some artwork for the kitchen.

While the kids work, I often knit. I had one skein of Ty-Dy cotton (which in a previous incarnation was my moebius scarf, which I unravelled, and returned the extra unused balls to the store) and I squeezed four dishcloths out of it. I know there are only three in the photo, but the first one was already being used.

Storm

We had a huge storm come through the valley today. The boys and I were at the dining room table this morning doing "schooly" stuff when we noticed the trees getting blown about, then the rain came. (That link will take you to the local news website.)

We had to rescue a few things off the deck so they didn't blow away. My laundry was out, carefully pegged to ensure it didn't blow away, but of course it's now wetter than it was before!

We have heard sirens on a regular basis - the emergency services going out for fallen trees, car accidents, grass fires.

I walked up to the bakery in the rain to find the shops at the plaza closed or closing as they had no power. I just made it in time to pick up my sub buns for dinner - luckily I had cash as they had no way of accepting plastic.

I just checked the forecast for tomorrow, as I have arranged to meet a friend at the beach, and it's supposed to be sunny and 30 degrees Celsius, so that's good.

Ninja Boy, Lego Nut and I had a productive morning, once Lego Nut got over his resistance to doing his math. I wouldn't back down, he had to do the pages I gave him, and it eventually was finished. We finished reading about Rome and the Romans in our Usborne Time Travellers book, and I gave them a spelling test of 15 words each - aimed to challenge them a little. They then went next door to watch movies with the neighbour's boy, taking some popcorn with them.

The weather seems to have settled down now. Time for me to have a little game of Bookworm...

Whoosh!

Isn't homeschooling great? Ninja Boy and Lego Nut whizzed through Grade 3 in three weeks. Two or three pages a day and they're done. We're starting Grade 4 tomorrow!

Canada Day

Canada Day was a quiet one for us, mostly hanging around the house, getting some cleaning done (I'm ahead of schedule for my "spring cleaning" and all my mason jars are sorted and tidy) and the boys did some writing, math and listening to more Story of the World. This evening, after a walk around the neighbourhood, we read from an excellent library book, The Illustrated Book of Myths, retold by Neil Philip.


This is a beautifully illustrated book and I counted 68 myths in the contents at the front of the book. They are drawn from many old cultures, from Sumerian to Greek to Celtic to Australian Aboriginal. Today we read a few of the Sumerian and Greek myths, as they fitted in with our reading from Story of the World. I don't often say this, but I think this would be a great book to own.

Nilesh Mistry's fantastic illustrations make it visually appealing to me and to the children.

Tonight we plan to go and see the fireworks display for Canada Day which will be happening over Okanagan Lake. We haven't bothered for a few years, but this one is apparently going to be twice as good as they are making up for cancelling it last year. I think it was too hot and dry last year to risk sparks setting off forest fires.

We've had very hot weather the last few days, plus thunderstorms and raindrops the size of golfballs, and lightning did start a small forest fire which I believe is under control. I'll be glad when the temperature dips back into the 20s again - it'll seem cool after this!

Sumerian clay tablets

I mentioned yesterday that we were planning to make some clay tablets following our reading of Story of the World.

I pulled out the Sculpey - it's actually white, though these photos don't give you an accurate idea of that.

We bought a huge "teacher's pack" of the stuff ages ago and there's still more left in the box.


We had so much fun that we were wondering why we didn't get the clay out more often.


The top picture shows a story by Lego Nut of someone spoiling Christmas (never mind the fact that they didn't have Christmas in 3000 BCE!). The second one is my version of a Sumerian shopping list. The third one is Ninja Boy's story of how early man found out how to put out fire.

The fourth is Lego Nut's racetrack (again rather modern subject matter). The fifth picture shows miscellaneous miniatures, and the last is my disc showing the phases of the sun and moon (don't know whether I had the moon pointing the right way). I also made a little coiled pot, just for fun.

The benefits of homeschooling

I love the way homeschooled kids get to mix with people of all ages and be comfortable around them.

Yesterday, my friend's older son celebrated his 17th birthday. He invited a few friends over for pizza followed by a couple of games at Planet Lazer (this is a place where the kids run around in a darkened room with loud music, blasting away at each other with laser gun-type things). Sort of like indoor paintball!

There were a couple of 17 year olds, a couple of 13 year olds, and my three, who are 16, 12 and 9. The birthday boy couldn't imagine inviting just one of my boys, so he invited them all. Where else would you find a 9 year old at a 17 year old's birthday party, if not within a group of homeschoolers?

Many parents who send their kids to school seem to think that spending most of their day with a large crowd of their peers is getting them "socialized". I prefer our way - my boys have friends aged 6 to 80, and that results in a rich social life and an ease around adults that is good to see.

Murder in the living room

When my kids get a new Lego set, they don't necessarily play with it in a predictable way! Here's their photo story....

Death of a traveller

Scene 1: Here he comes.


Scene 2: Oh no!


Scene 3: Aaaaaargh!


Scene 4: Digesting...


Scene 5: Aaaah, that's better!


Scene 6: Not again!


(Just in case Scene 5 needs explaining, the dinosaur has pooped out brown Lego and a Lego skeleton. Typical boys, being amused by bodily functions :o)

This is where we were today

Our homeschool support group met at the BMX track today. It was a good turnout. Lots of kids whizzing over the bumps, and lots of mums to yak to.


When I got out of bed this morning, the sun was shining, but when we were nearly ready to go out we had a shower - a white shower - sort of soft hail. I wondered whether we'd be cold at the track, but thankfully it stayed dry and when the sun came out it felt warm.

We met a couple of new families, one from a nearby town and another from Calgary who are moving here for the husband's work. Even though they didn't have bikes with them, their kids still had fun. I noticed two of the older girls playing cards, and some of the boys abandoned their bikes and started up a game of baseball.


It was good to see my boys getting some fresh air and exercise, and I got some much-needed decompression time with my friends (after the stresses and strains of getting the teen - who had only had three hours sleep - out of bed, out of the house and into the van)!