It's cold outside

A Christmas review full of Christmassy things like presents, time spent with family and friends, food and celebrations. Not a lot else to report as we have become incredibly seasonal in our home ed journey and have spent multiple days snuggled up on the sofa(s) watching endless tv and cuddling in the warm. The combination of dark days, school holidays, cold and wet, windy weather have encouraged us to spend more time as a family enjoying all things at home together.

I have got into house planning, how can we make our indoor environment work better for us as a family...and daddy has been obliging and listened to my grand plans. Mostly lego storage. Bean was inspired by his friends lego arrangements and i am secretly glad as i have it in me to organise such things well i have just been itching to organise the lego but holding off until the smalls show an interest otherwise it would be me getting frustrated that no-one was using the system correctly! Bean has mostly been immersed in minecraft (books,gaming and youtube videos) with Pumpkin looking on and joining in. Bean and I have played all his new board games together, several times over. The Star Wars Lego game is a big hit. We're enjoying Flat Stanley books and have more Paddington bear lined up on the book shelf.

Pumpkin has also been enjoying his joke kit and watching Mr. Bean and Dennis the Menace as he relaxes in his new Spiderman suit (which he has owned for 48 hours and hasn't taken it off yet) I finally feel like we might have found something that makes him tick after several viewings of Mr.Bean and the whoopee cushion having endless uses. Pumpkin is really testing out the 'how much control do i have in my life?' scenario atm especially with the endless supply of chocolates and sweets around, coupled with the refusal to wash or brush his hair, and his need to constantly wear the same outfit, ironically though he is fastidious about brushing his teeth.

Plum has been learning new words at a rate of knots and in the two weeks that it's been since we wrote a family newsletter and wrote down about 25 words that she could say, i reckon that she's doubled that easily. The very best being that she now says 'mummy' without prompting, hurray! We have read every board book in the house and have spent hours rolling marbles down the marble run together.

The lull between Christmas and New Year has allowed a little thought to be put into January's birthday fest (Plum 2nd, Pumpkin 20th, Cousin J 18th, FA#3 20th) Plum and Pumpkin's will be small affaris this year, by choice. Pumpkin has requested a family day where he and Bean wear their spiderman outfits and we will be venturing out as a family for Plum's birthday too.