Summer Days

I have't posted for a week! Life has been busy. The day light hours are getting longer. Today is the summer solstice. The weather forecast is set at 34° today. Our home ed aim for today will be to stay cool.

Bean, 10, has spent the last week mostly involved in oreparing and displaying his Bakugan project. After weeks of trawling ebay, Saturday we found an auction listing in nearby Shoreham and they accepted our buy it now offer. Daddy took Bean down to collect a new case and 18 bakugan. Monday he displayed his project.
He has also been watching a lot of extreme sport tricks and world record holding stunts on youtube. Tight rope walking over niagra falls and the grand canyon, rock climbing without equipment up sheer rock faces, jumping without parachutes, skateboarding into the grand canyon, extreme mountain biking etc. He says he wants to overcome his fear of heights so that he can climb higher.

Pumpkin, 8, has helped taste test cakes for me for daddy's birthday party and we have been trying to faciliatate as much time as possible at home for him in between a very busy schedule. Friday we stayed home all day and made cakes and wrapped daddy's presents, Saturday morning i stayed at gome with him whilst the others went out and he and i stayed at home sunday morning whilst the others went to church. Then we drove FA#3 and family to the airport and had a beautiful drive home, just the two of us.
Monday, Pumpkin and Bean played with a HE friend that we have known for years but for the first time really connected and they have plans to go and play at his house.

Plum, 5, busy busy busy as always. Plum helped make and ice all four cakes that we made for daddy's birthday. She played relentlessly with her cousins C and H and enjoyed having them for a sleep over at the weekend, she made a new friend at the project showcase who shared their hoola hoop with her. She also took her my little ponies to display and another HE teen helped her to mix slime. She has met a friend at fisher's farm and played in the new indoor area together. And when she needs a rest she takes her tablet up to her room and watches youtube.

Pumpkin, 2, is a delight. She's there mixing cakes with us and hanging the laundry, she hides every nappy change under the duvets and sheets and then i have to hide from her too, she chops vegetables for dinner and feeds the rabbits with me, she colours and loads her own films to watch. She has begun to copy the dancing in films, her best being madagascar' "move it, move it," nut job's "gangnam style," and frozen "do you wanna build a snowman?" Her sleeping patterns are unpredictable as she transitions from regular afternoon nap to no nap through late afternoon nap which the heat is contributing to.

We have also managed to complete our lego card collection, pending promised cards, watched lego batman together, played at Fisher's Farm Splash Attack and go karts, where bean gave plum and pippin rides around the track, and went to the animal handling, held daddy's birthday party and played with lots of friends.

Today we will stay at home and rest, with no specific plans, except to stay cool in the heat.

Rainy days

Plum, 5, and Pippin, 2, spent over an hour role playing together. Today's theme was schools. They reasranged the letters and words on the fridge and had 'lessons' and then took their babies and fed them and put them to bed. They then repeated this over and over again.

Pippin and mummy made a marble cake together that Bean, 10, declared to be his new favourite cake.

We buried Charlie the guinea pig. Pippin played guitar and sang a 'goodbye charlie' song and bean got his prayer book and we said the 'thank you for our dead pet' prayer.

In the afternoon we went to Fisher's Farm. We played in the new indoor area and then all the smalls went for a pony ride. It was pippin's first time on a pony ride. We then played on the go karts for half an hour before heading home.

Back home bean and pumpkin, 8, played terreria together. Plum and pippin played together before she went and lay in her bed and watched on her tablet. Pippin fell asleep on the sofa and the boys watched more Simpsons.

It's Oh so quiet

At Home Day #3 Pumpkin, 7, was positively bouncing with excitement when i said we had no plans today. Bean, 9, discovered that he can watch dvds on their computer so he and Pumpkin chose two that Plum doesn't enjoy and they watched those, star wars and harry potter. They also play the espcapists and watch dantdm and stampy. I set up skype for Bean on his tablet and we play a skateboarding game together. Bean also has a bath today. And him, pumpkin and plum, 5, watch Kermit Swamp Adventures together in the evening.

Pumpkin is in his happiest when we stay at home. After watching films and youtube he plays a capture in the dark game that he has made up with Bean and Plum. This then turned into wrestling. Followed by general climbing, running, chasing, fighting, energetic games.

Plum mostly watched on her tablet today. She has been very restful. She has been watching Steve and Maggie. She helped me make cupcakes in the evening ready for her party tomorrow. We read stories before bed and she read Ketchup on your Cornflakes to me.

Pippin, 2, has been colouring and playing Bing. She has watched Bing and Topsy and Tim today and also found the Peppa Pig dvd on the shelf so we watched that together.

Ginger Cat Cake

Another At home Day. This time planned. Bean, 9, had a wedding cake to make in the style of a stripy ginger cat.

Pumpkin, 7, enjoyed not having to share the computer and watched all day. He watched Skylander walkthroughs and Skylander cartoons, he watched DanTDM and Stampy, he watched The Simpsons and probablt other things that I missed.

Plum, 4, also spent most of the day watching on her tablet. After Pippin had a very long afternoon nap, they played together. They each had a dolly and a buggy and they kept putting on coats and shoes so that they could 'go out.'

Bean spent 9 1/2 hours baking and decorating cakes, with food and drink breaks included. It took 2 hours purely to mix and bake the bottom cake. This one on the top was a chocolate cake recipe that grandma gave us. We covered it with a thin layer of marzipan and then had to leave it until last before we covered it with foundant icing and put strips on it. For the following layer we made a Victoria Sponge. We mixed and cooked two layers but he decided only to use one. This was covered with butter icing and orange foundant and then cut out pieces to create the facial features. Next we made a batch of vanilla cupcakes. We used four of these for paws and covered them with orange foundant and decorated them with claws. Bean used a fifth one to make a mouse. The tail is a long roll of orange foundant.

We have used Pinterest to get design ideas for the face and recipe books and people knowledge to get different recipes to try. I have been baking a cake a day this week to try different flavours and sizes and strength and successfulness. Today Bean used YouTube to watch tutorials on how to shape and ice cakes. Daddy went out shopping to find a board to place it on. He couldn't find a cake board big enough so bought a large pizza board instead.

We will all be eating the left over cupcakes and one layer of Victoria Sponge.